Make it Right

Chapter 1

You and JK grew up together in the same town and have been friends since you were three years old. You two lived three doors down from each other and would play together from morning until dinner time. You called each other best friends and often went on make-believe adventures together. By the shore, in the forest, and in the playground, when you two were together, there was never a boring day.

Even when you started school, you two were inseparable. Like two goofy peas in the world's silliest pod. You shared laughs, fought from time to time and loved each other without ever having to say so out loud. Both of you had loving families with supportive parents. Both of you were only children and you two kept each other company. He was your person and you, his. You could say that your lives were almost perfect. That was until your tell twelfth birthday.

On the way to celebrate your birthday at your favorite restaurant, a drunk driver on the road fell asleep behind the wheel and crashed headfirst into your father's car. It was just the three of you in the car and you were the sole survivor of the accident. After your parents' death, you stay with JK's family, but that didn't last long. You had an aunt that lived several states away and she would take you in, and of course, the life insurance money from your parents' policy that you'd bring with you. So, after the funeral was over, you were sent immediately to live with your father's sister.

Saying goodbye to each other was incredibly difficult for the both of you. You and JK promised each other that you guys would talk to each other every day and visit each other as often as possible. The day you left town to move in with your aunt, both of you sobbed in each other's arms, and when you left, JK was inconsolable. It broke your heart to see him so upset and you looked out the back window of your aunt's car until you couldn't see him anymore. You lost your parents and your best friend in the entire world, all within one week span and you were not sure if you would be okay or not.  

You do keep in touch with JK as often as possible in the first couple of months. However, soon after getting to your aunt's home, your aunt and her family become verbally, emotionally, and financially abusive towards you and on those rare occasions, physically abusive as well. She would constantly berate you and tell you discouraging things to break your spirit.

Your aunt starts to take away your freedom to do ordinary kid things like going out after school, playing sports and having friends. About three months in, she takes away your cell phone and laptop saying that they are too much of a distraction, effectively leaving you completely isolated from the only support you have, JK. 

For all intents and purposes, you become the maid and the cook in their home. Without any way of communicating with JK, you lose touch with him within the first year of living with your aunt and her family. You think about writing him a paper and pencil letters but don't because you are afraid that your aunt will get a hold of them somehow and use them against you. So, you resign yourself to keeping him in your memory and in your heart.

You feel truly alone, like you have no one that knows who you genuinely are. Sure, you make some friends at school, and they are great, but you never let your guard down long enough for people to get close to you. You are afraid that the minute you let them in, they too, will be taken away from you, leaving you to cope with more loses.

So, you think of JK as your first and last true friend and mourn the loss of him from your life. But you continue to cultivate a persona of him in your mind, so that you can have a little piece of him growing older with you.

As you grew up and enter into dating age, you make it a point to keep things as casual as possible. For reasons that are not quite clear to you, men tend to gravitate towards you. They find you attractive, and you are approached often for dates and sometimes, just straight up sex. As they would have said in the olden days, you have plenty of suitors, but you frequently decline. After a while, the boys around you just quit asking.

The next six years of your life are very unkind to you. Looking back, to describe it simply as "unkind" is an understatement. You work 2-part time jobs and go to school. However, you still graduation from high school in the top 1% of your class. Your guidance counselor strongly urges you to go to college, but the only objective you have in mind at that time is to finish high school, to get a full-time job that will pay enough money for you to move out of your aunt's home and out from under her abusive thumb. But you have to admit that not being able to go to college after high school is a bitter pill for you to swallow.

To make yourself and your circumstances feel better, you promise that you'll return to school as soon as possible and then tell yourself, "Better late than never." That would help ease the pain and disappointment somewhat. But you spend more than one night crying yourself to sleep over having to give up going to college.

You do end up getting an entry level job with a company, GAC, that is out of state. This job would pay enough for you to live on your own and provide you with benefits to boot. So, soon after you accept that job, you take all of the money you had saved from working your two part time jobs and move out of your aunt's home without ever telling anyone.

Luckily, you don't have much to your name so packing and moving is easy. You put the most valuable things in your possession into a single book bag and one carry-on suitcase and leave while your aunt and her family are away one weekend. You leave no note and no forwarding address. You do not want her or anyone that she knows to ever find you. You used to have nightmares about your aunt finding you at your job and making a scene so that you would agree to come back and live with them; to continue to work as their unofficial slave.

So, at eighteen years of age, you essentially run away from home. You find a studio apartment that is well within your budget in a neighborhood that is safe. In the first 6 months of being in your new place, you sleep on a mattress on the floor and live out of laundry baskets. You don't care though. For you, it is the perfect home. You get to come and go as you please and don't have to do anything you don't want to do. There is no one around to tell you how much of a burden you've been to their lives and no one to tell you how worthless your existence is day in and day out.

As you work, you save as much money as possible and live very frugally. You buy second hand furniture that are in good shape. You clean and restore them for your own use. Except for the mattress that you've been sleeping on, everything you own had a history of their own and now, they are a part of your history. You thank whoever is watching over you every day and live a quiet and content life.