Everything And Nonsense

Marin, Beck

The next few weeks was a blur.

I was in Marin House for a while. They had us share rooms with these bunk beds. Mine was the right door visible before the hallway starts. I say "mine" because again, I was the only female child in this house, so I didn't have to share because "Oh, boys can't share with girls!", even though we were all like 8. Whatever. I was usually sent to my room a lot, and I think that's when I fully realized that I preferred my own company to other kids' my age. I pretty much raised myself from 5-8 years old, so I was usually alone anyways, but being sent to my room for the smallest things was actually beginning to sound better than talking to those annoying ass kids. Another thing: You couldn't touch anyone. Yeah, you obviously couldn't punch another kid or, I dunno, kick the president. But we literally could not hug each other. We couldn't high five. Y'know, stuff kids do. I understand having to ask for hugs though, that's a decent rule. But you had to ask the fucking STAFF to hug your FRIENDS, which by the way, did you know we weren't allowed to have friends? We had to be "acquaintances" because friends would "distract the healing process" or whatever shit they meant. So anyways, me being the only girl was pretty fine, didn't have to share a room, loved being alone. They crushed that. Had to pack my suitcase one more time, and I was absolutely stoked because I thought I was going home early. Of course, as usual, I made a severe lapse in judgement. Mr. Andrew probably considered dropping me and my suitcase off at the door, but maybe he thought I'd escape or something stupid. Kidding, nobody was at the house at the time so he wanted to make sure I was okay. He was a very nice guy after all. One of the only nice ones. When we got into the house, I looked around and he called to ask someone where they were. Then we heard a van pull up, and he immediately left. 4 other girls, along with 2 staff members, walked into the house. The staff members' names were Ms. Maxine and Mr. Louie. Or atleast, that's who I met that day. They definitely worked there, but I'm having a hard time remembering who was on what shift. The girls' were Ariel, Aliyah, Alexis, and some other girl who's name likely started with an A, probably Aircraft 329. I dreaded being around other kids, especially girls. I always got along with boys better. Oddly enough, despite hardly ever having friends, the ones I did have were mainly boys. Whatever. Aliyah was probably the only memorable kid there. She was a horse girl. Like, harcore horse girl. I didn't like horses but I liked her personality and confidence to just be herself. It was nice. We ended up friends. We shared a bedroom, which was actually nice because we didn't have problems between us. Oh, you know about imaginary friends? Obviously. But I literally had like 3 friends in my life back then, so I was pretty fucking lonely, y'know? I was so different and weird that nobody wanted to be my friend. So I made my own when I was like 6. His name's Nathan, and is the sole reason I talk to myself even as a teenager. Black hair, hazel eyes, freckles. He was a guy I could tell my problems to and he'd listen, someone who never judged me, someone who understood. He's real important later on. Imaginary friends were what got me through this situation. I watched a decent amount of TV as a kid, so 2 of my imaginary friends were show characters, like "Plex" (Yellow robot dude) and I think "Lucky" (Oh wait, that's a cereal mascot). "Click" was this little mouse from a magazine I constantly read over there. Yeah.