At the age of 14, Cooper had two choices.
1) Try to withstand the hell hole of an orphanage for the next four years of his life until he was finally released and find out what he wanted then.
or
2) Escape immediately and explore for himself - while in hiding.
He had already made up his mind. At any opportunity Cooper would be ready to run like his life depended it out of the ancient front door and into the real world that he'd dreamed of. His bag was already packed, the one, holey blanket he owned was folded up on his bed and he always wore his newest, springiest trainers to be entirely sure he got the quickest getaway.
No one was aware of his plans, not even his only friend in the house. They weren't exactly close, Cooper and Sierra were complete opposites in fact. Sierra was a quiet, shy 14 year old girl with glasses the size of apples and her blonde hair in permanent pigtails who knew everything about everything - especially Blue whales. Her skin was so pale it looked ghostly but her eyes were a sharp blue. Cooper was a rebelling, boisterous young man who had hardly read a book all the way through and was always covered from head to toe in bruises and grazes from his skateboarding stunts. His hair was shaggy, a few centimeters short of his shoulders, he had brown eyes that could melt any girl's heart and his chocolate skin made him stand out from the rest of the children.
Cooper was the only one with foreign roots. He roughly knew that his relatives originated from Jamaica but that was all. He'd never been singled out from the others, but he'd always had a feeling he was different, separate. The only other person in that he knew of with the same skin as him was the kitchen assistant who kept herself to herself and never left the kitchen before the inhabitants of the house were fast asleep.
Cooper was bursting to tell Sierra what he was going to do, and at the lunch table on the following Monday afternoon, he slipped up. In the end she knew everything - and insisted coming along.
YOU ARE READING
The Boy without a Birthday
Mistério / SuspenseCooper is an orphan abandoned by his mother when she fled Jamaica to save her and her son from her abusive husband. All he has left of his past is half of a letter, but he wants to know more. Cooper struggles to find out about himself and discovers...
