Learning to Trust (A Leo Valdez Love Story)

Prologue

**EDITED**

Since Kyra was born, and left on the doorstep of an orphanage, she had been in and out of countless foster homes. She was constantly being moved around because even at 5 years old, no one wanted to adopt her. Maybe it was because of her bright silver eyes, or her extremely pale, light skin. She had no idea, she never had a chance in life.

  In all the different foster home she went to, Kyra seemed to be a magnet for trouble. The other kids would always bully her in ways children should not know how to behave. Even the adults treated her poorly.    

One day when Kyra was only 7 the bullying hit an extreme.

Kyra took  a deep breath, glad to finally be away from her screaming foster parents even if she was sitting all alone in a tree. Suddenly her short moment of peace was disturbed.

  Hey FREAK!"  yelled Tyrone, one of the foster home's many bullies.

Tyrone walked up to Kyra smirking with his wannabe gang following close behind. Kyra tried to ignore them but that somehow just made it worse.

 "Hey, can't you hear us? We're talking to you!" Matt yelled, he was part of Tyrone's little posse that liked to make Kyra's life a living hell.

As Kyra scurried out of the tree she was residing in and tried to get away Tyrone ran up to her, grabbed her by her hair, and whispered in her ear, "Going somewhere?"

 He then pushed Kyra to the ground. Kyra was used to being abused, she was abused no matter where she went. But Kyra had never felt this terrified before.

 "When we call your name you listen and do as we say, got it FREAK!" Kyra flinched, she hated being called that. She knew she wasn't a freak, just a little... different.

Here we go again. Kyra thought. Why does this always happen to me? I have done nothing to deserve this. Right now Kyra felt like screaming to the universe. But instead, she tried to focus on her happy place while she got kicked and punched around. She would imagine a place where she was accepted and treated as a person. A place where at least someone would love her for who she was.

Tyrone, Matt, and the rest of the group then proceed to kick and punch Kyra over and over again. Kyra noticed that one boy wasn't hurting her and looked at her in pity. Who cares! She thought, if he really felt bad for me then he wouldn't let them do this to me.

 Kyra then felt herself being lifted off the ground by Tyrone. He pulled her up by her hair and said to her, "You are just a freak and that is all you'll ever be, and you know it too!"

As he threw her to the ground, he  took out an extremely sharp knife. Kyra's eyes widened in fear and so did everyone else's. Tyrone bent down to her and brought the knife close to her face.

"Tyrone! That's enough! You have to stop, you're going too far!" It was the boy from earlier who didn't hurt her.

 "Shut it Luka or she won't be the only one bleeding!" Tyrone said whilst standing up.

 All of the boys fled in shock, except for Luka who gave Kyra one last conflicted glance before walking off with tears in his eyes. He knew better than to mess with The Fates' plan.

 "Now then, let's get back to it!" Tyrone said with a crazed look in his eyes. As he cut into her cheek, Kyra shrieked out in pain.

Now, Kyra was back in her small closet-like room at the foster home examining her wounds from Tyrone.

 She had 2 nasty cuts on the top of her arms from the knife, but she was thankful they weren't as deep as they could have been. There was also a wide assortment of bruises donning her body. And her head hurt terribly. What was really bad was her face.

As she looked into her tiny, cracked mirror she could see the word "FREAK" carved into her cheek almost deep enough to see the bone. She had a black eye and cuts all across her forehead.

 Tears came into her eyes as she started to believe that she really was a freak.

She heard a faint knocking on her door as she struggled to wipe the tears off her face. The door then slowly opened.

 "Kyra" came a soft voice.

She opened the door wider to reveal Luka with a tearstained face. She backed up, afraid of what he was going to do to her.

 "I'm not going to hurt you Kyra." Luka said slowly walking up to Kyra.

"A-and how do I know that!" Kyra stuttered trying to act brave.

"Because I said so!" He screamed. Luka had never been the best at dealing with his emotions. Kyra flinched.

 "Sorry! I'm sorry! I just came to check on you." Kyra had been hiding her face up until now as she slowly turned to look at him. He rushed over and tried to bring Kyra into a hug.

"I'm so sorry!" he said.

"Don't touch me!" she screamed. She was so used to being hurt that she won't let anyone touch her, especially boys, for reasons she wouldn't like to explain. He slowly backed off with more tears in his eyes.

 "Okay, Kyra listen you are losing a lot of blood right now so I'm going to help you." He barely finished his sentence before she blacked out. 

***

When she woke up she was in a white hospital room with a nurse fixing her IV.

 "Hi there sweetie, I'm your nurse Amelia and your alright now. You took quite a beating there.  You made the news as the little orphan girl who survived a kidnapping,"

Figures. Of course Kyra's foster parents would protect Tyrone like that.

"And good news! Because of that someone has requested to adopt you!" the nurse said. She was way to cheery for Kyra's liking.

Kyra then turned her head into a mirror and saw a girl she didn't recognize, she had long light brown hair, scared bright silver eyes, cuts running across her face, and the scar of "FREAK" on her cheek. Then, with a jolt she realized that this petite young girl staring back at her was her.