Gracelynn Paige is an 18 -year- girl who just moved from her small hometown of Charleston to the mysterious town of Shadow Creek, Vermont. As a life-long orphan her only wish is to find somewhere where she felt as if she belonged, to no longer feel...
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***Gracelynn Paige***
All of my life I've been nobody. Nobody's daughter, sister, cousin, friend... Never have I meant anything to anyone in this cruel and lonely world. For as long as I can remember I've been alone, almost in complete isolation.
My parents, whoever they were died soon after I was born, where I was then sent to go live in foster care, bouncing from one unloving home to another. Since then, my life has been in shambles. Never have I felt real compassion or experienced true human care, the most I had received dwindled down to the look of pity across the faces of those that hear about my background. I hated that stare. God, I hated it more than the invisible cape that seemed to drape over my head the moment that I walked into a crowded room. Shame creeped its way into the pit of my stomach anytime that I recognized the all too familiar sense of pity. It made me feel less then. Though thinking about it I guess that's exactly what I was. I would always be a nobody.
Graded school, Junior High, High School, it was all the same. I would bounce from one school to another every time I was deemed unwanted by my temporary family. I never had the chance to make any friends, and to be honest I'm not sure I would have even if I stayed. I never knew what to say, how to approach people, or even how to communicate without feeling my heart feeling as if it would burst out of my chest.
For years I dwelled on why I was never invited to stay with any of my temporary homes. Sure, not all of them were the greatest, some were even downright scary, but there had been a select few that weren't all that bad. One family that took me in when I was about ten had me for the longest. I was with them for a year before they decided that they couldn't handle me being around anymore. I remember that day all too clearly.
I had come home from school, ecstatic after I had gotten a call that my foster parents; the Johnsons, who had said that they had an announcement that they needed to make. I had convinced myself that they were going to be the ones to finally adopt me. Out of everyone I had stayed with they were by far the best, they were nice, I thought they had been caring, they had even gifted me a time or two. How stupid I felt when my smiling ten-year-old self came smiling, basically skipping into the kitchen where two grim-faced adults stared back at me, my possessions neatly packed away in the bags in front of them.
They were silent as I was walked out of the house with my caseworker, to a car that I hoped I would never see again. I begged for an answer as to why. What had I done wrong? But even to this day I am left without an answer. A long while after that I pondered over all of the possibilies, but still was left confused. I had been polite, made sure to say thank you when they had presented gifts, I had done everything I could to not cause them any trouble. After being rehomed numerous times after that I realized that the problem was just me. I was unlikeable, unwanted. It was like a curse that lingered above my head. No matter what I did or didn't do I would always be a burden.
