It was Saturday around noon, we were driving down the road. Mum was humming off tune and I was watching the view of trees like the replay of a boring sitcom. I soon got tired and tried to get some shut-eye but for some reason mum said, "This is fun, isn't it. Driving down the road together, we can finally have that mother-daughter bonding like in those classic movies." Of all the things to say. I wanted to say something sarcastic like, "Yeah mum, it is so fun I just want to jump up and down like a 6 year old that got a new bike." But instead said, "Huh? Oh, yeah... Fun." I knew she was trying her best to perk up the dull mood, but moving to Illinois was just going to be hard to adapt to. Making new friends, new school, new house, new neighbours, it just seems to difficult for me, after all, how much can you put on a 14 year olds shoulders?

"Are you okay, honey?"
"Doctor, is she okay?"
"Please, honey, listen to me;
don't leave me, here the sound of my voice."

Shoutings and cries that sounded like soft gentle murmurs to me. I was 14. An average teen that just loved to mingle by herself away from everyone else. Why? Well, lets just say I found it complicated on my behalf to "fit-in" with the crowd. As every school no matter where in the world, there will be the jocks, the popular aka wanna-be's, average kind of guy or girl like the girl-next-door type, and then there are the smart one's as I like to call them even though mostly people bully them and call them "nerds". But thats not what I want to tell here. Not exactly at least. I had just moved from Arkansas, my birth place, my home. Back home I had the best of friends I wouldn't want to trade for anything ever. Especially my best friend Jamie. Every time I think of home, I remember streams of salt water just flowing out of my eyes. All the things I would miss, the smell of the fresh pine growing at the backyard, and the sweet smell of pancakes every Saturday when Jamie would come over for a study group and school projects we used to love doing together. Remembering all that I knew later on I would have to stop glistening around the past and move on to a greater challenge; Reality.

My name is Kayla Janine and this is my tale of how I got through a year of neglectance. Well, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It wasn't brutal or fatal. It was more of emotional suffering rather than physical torture, and pain. It was the wounds and scars, the lies and stabs that just wouldn't heal. Then hate washed me, and I soon forget every ounce of happiness I had and swam in misery. That little light I was holding on to was mearly faint.