Begin Again

The Moment I Knew

June 18th, 2023
Veronica's POV:

At 8 am I double check that I have everything I need for today before leaving my house to go out in town. My father is allegedly still asleep on the couch downstairs. He'll be there for a while or at least until 11ish when he'll leave the house to go drinking with some of his friends. I never expect him to be back before nightfall if he even returns within the same day that is. The nights where my father doesn't come home are the best. I don't have to worry about when I go to bed or that I'll wake up because I'm being hit or something at an odd hour and I can be in control of my own life and not have to be scared of everything little noise I make or the house automatically makes.

The post I made yesterday has officially gone viral. I'm in shock. I didn't think that I would even get one like or a view but I've gotten thousands! The comment section is overflowing with people saying that they resonate with my caption, that they're sorry that I have to go through that, that Taylor has got to see my post and meet me, that I'm beautiful, that I just gotta keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep going, and a lot more positivity. Of course I received a lot of negative responses as well. "What's the big deal? Lots of people have bad home lives. You're not that special." "You're ugly." "Look at the bruises under her makeup. She probably does that to herself for clout." "If that's true then you wouldn't be able to even go to the concert and have such good seats at that." And more.

Turning off my phone and stuffing it into the side pocket of my leggings, I climb out my window, down the tree, and leave the house, walking toward town. I connect my AirPods and press play on my Taylor Swift playlist. I like having it on shuffle a lot of the time since sometimes it gets boring when I know which song comes next. My good friend I Did Something Bad kicks off my adventure for the day and I tap my hand to the beat as I walk. The routine I have on my father-free days out in town is always the same. Get up, get out of the house by 8:00, walk to town, get to the bookstore by 8:30, help sort books for two hours to make a few bucks, then read until noon, get lunch, and go from there.

When I arrive, I take one of my AirPods out, automatically pausing Tell Me Why as the manager greets me and points in the direction of the stacks of books for me to shelve. I smile and walk to my job and put the AirPod I removed away and unpause my music. I learned that it's best to only have one AirPod in if any at all in case someone needs me for something. Sorting books is actually kinda fun for me. I've always liked organizing things and besides, reading is my favorite hobby right up there with listening to music and dancing when no one is watching and of course drawing. I've never been able to do a sport so I've just taken up more creative things instead.

Time flies and before I know it, I've finished putting away all of the books. I alert the manager and he hands me my payment for my work. I smile and thank him before I walk off to grab a book out of the young adult section called The Problem With Forever. I've already read it but I like to read certain books again. Leaning against the sidewall of a shelf I open up the book and start on page one. The book is 444 pages. That's not that bad for me. See, I'm a super fast reader. For example, I read all 390 pages of The Hunger Games Mockingjay from start to finish for the first time in 1 hour and 41 minutes. That's my all-time record for timing myself while reading a long chapter book by the way.

Anyway... In between pages of this book, I pause to fix my bracelets I got last night since the words got all turned around when I was working earlier and I haven't fixed them yet. Eventually my left hand drifts up to my silver zodiac sign necklace that my mom gave me when I was born. Of course the length is adjustable but I never really take it off. The five stars that make up my Cancer zodiac sign are made out of moonstone on the pendant. Noon rolls around and I put the book away before leaving to get lunch or something.