BETTER APART. - 5.H

0.01

My name is Jules Diez.

I grew up with a semi-normal life. I went to a rowdy public school, filled with young alcoholics, and drug addicts. I never minded this, all I knew was that I should stay away and make my mother proud. 

I had a small group of friends; Shaya Woods, Samuel Ling and I. We were all unlocking our bikes from the fence out the back end of the school, nobody put their bikes there, well other than us three. One day we all got out there at the same time, I had always been curious to see who it actually was who parked their bikes back there. 

Shaya Woods. When I first saw her I thought she was about three to four years younger then I was, she was tiny in height. I was the average height for my age, but Shaya on the other hand had to be at least three inches shorter than me. But despite her height Shaya was very athletic and adored gym class, she did lots of sport clubs outside of school, that she would always encourage Sam and I to join, but we refused; accepting we would look embarrassing doing anything to do with sport next to her, she would never rub this in, the last thing she would ever want was to make Sam and I feel bad about ourselves. Other than her height that caught my eye the day I met her, her hair was beautiful, she had a short buzz cut that looked to be a few weeks grown out but I had never seen someone so cool in my life. She was mixed race; black and Asian. And she was the most beautiful girl I have ever seen walking around in the dump that we called a school. Shaya also found light and joy in every situation, and could make anyone's day better by just looking at them. Thats why I loved her so much.

Samuel Ling. Also known as 'Sam'. When I first saw Sam walk out to unlock his bike, I recognised him from in the halls, he wasn't a new face, but I had never spoke to him before. Sam was originally from south Asia, and had lived there until he was four. He was on the chubby side, and had scruffy hair. But Sam could dress. Well. Very, very well. He had a unique way of dressing, where he would use bright pops of colour in his outfit, that was one of the reasons I noticed him in the halls. Sam also gave the best gifts, not only could his parents make the best food on the planet, but he would always add in a piece of clothing into any gift he gave me, as he knew how much I admired the way he dressed, by the five trillion times I would tell him. Sam was very straight to the point, but well spoken. If Shay or myself did anything wrong he would tell us, if he didn't like something he would say something about it, not in a bitchy, stuck-up kind of way, but so that others could learn from their mistakes, he would do anything in his power to help and support the people he cared for.

And that was us, the trio. We had a normal life, we would all drool over our celebrity crushes. Have sleepovers and stay up all night watching movies. Danced to our favourite songs. And cry together. 

I was loving life.

But there was something I hid from my best friends. From everyone I knew. The only people who knew were my mother and I.

I was one of the many born on the 12th hour of the first day of October 1989, thats not the unusual part. My mother had no warning whats so ever about my birth. In fat she was almost 100% sure that she wouldn't be able to have children in her life time, she never minded as she never wanted children in the first place, she despised the thought of having to look after a human of her own, she might have thought this because she was only sixteen, but she was sure she couldn't have children, she was unsure how my birth was even possible. Whenever she would tell me the story, I would always feel terrible how I put her through so much pain. She lived alone in a small one-bedroom apartment. There was nobody that could look after her as both her parents passed away in a car crash while they were drunk while driving, and she didn't have any siblings or cousins, or aunts and uncles. So she delivered me on the carpet floor of her tiny apartment. I couldn't even imagine how traumatic that would be to a sixteen year old girl.

But being born without my mother actually being pregnant wasn't the most peculiar thing about me. I found out I could control the elements; water, fire, air and earth. As a kid I would always watch 'The Umbrella Academy' on TV, I had always dreamed of being like them; living with multiple people, using powers to fight crime and benefit the world, be famous. My mother told me that the man who was the owner and the adopted father of the umbrella academy offered her five and a half million dollars just for him to take me and raise me to fight crime. When she first told me about this event, I can't lie I was livid, being young I has so much envy for the kids in the academy, the news and TV made their lives seem perfect; not a single flaw, I couldn't help but be mad at her, I was also angry at the fact she could have bettered herself with that five and a half million dollars, she could have moved out of that shitty apartment. I mean she didn't even want a child, she was sixteen, she could have been free to have the best last few years of her teenage years she could have asked for but she declined his offer. When watching The Umbrella Academy kids on TV I would always study their emotions, I was and am brilliant at that, I would look at their body language, eye contact and communication with others. The two who really caught my eye when I would do this were, number two, and number five. Number two looked as if he was trying so hard to seem strong, make him seem the best, but there were signs that he was nervous someone else would take his place, this made me very interested in trying to find out what he was hiding and why, but I knew I would never get a chance to ask. And number five was interesting as he would never show a single emotion... ever. He would smile but had no emotion behind his eyes, his body was always tense and stern, his voice was monetone, and he would answer questions brutally honestly, I'm going to be honest and say I have the tiniest crush one number five, although there was nothing he showed that was normally likable, but he was inturiging, and not like anyone I had ever seen in my life time.