Born to be a Leader

Part 1; Change

Chapter 1

The woman next door

Why does this always have to happen to me? I ask myself as I start brushing the food off of my old blue jeans. I look around at all of the familiar faces laughing at me. Middle school was not a nice place. I only tripped up and fell, it wasn't really that funny, was it?

"Jessica, just get up. Ignore them." My best friend, Lauren said, holding her hand out to help me.

I couldn't ignore them. This was my life, I couldn't escape it. I felt a sob crawling up my throat. A tear rolled down my cheek. "I can't do this anymore!" I screamed as I ran out of the cafeteria. I look down all if the long hallways and realize that I don't belong in middle school. I don't belong here on this planet. I don't belong here... Or there... I don't belong anywhere.

I found an empty janitors closet and locked myself inside. I could finally start crying. Every single day something bad happened. Every single day I was laughed at.

"Jessica! Jessica!" I heard Lauren walking down the hallway looking for me. I opened the door to let her in.

Lauren was my only friend. She was my best friend. And I was hers.

She entered the closet and closed the door behind her, making it once again very dark.

"I asked Mr. Smith to call your uncle. He's on his way." She said quietly.

"Thank you." I muttered. Every few weeks, my uncle, Danny, had to come and pick me up because the teasing was so bad. My uncle Danny was a nice man, but I didn't really like living with him. I wanted a normal family. I wanted to know my parents. It was too late now. They ran away as soon as I was born and left me with uncle Danny.

Lauren opened the janitor closet door and let me out first. We walked together to the principals office and sat down in the two chairs in front of the desk. Lauren stayed with me until the bell rang, then she had to go to class. My uncle came about ten minutes later. He has short gray hair and stubble and always wears jeans with a different orange shirt every day. He was a tall man, about six foot.

"Are you ready?" He asked. It was so ritual that he came to get me that he didn't even ask what was wrong. He didn't even really care anymore. It was just another day.

I nodded.

We walked to the car in silence. The ride wasn't any different. Finally, we pulled up to our little house. It was a one story house with a door right in the middle. On either side there were two windows. Inside, there was a small kitchen a dining area with a small sitting area right next to it. Past the sitting room there was a hallway with one bathroom and two bedrooms. But today I didn't feel like going inside to my stuffy house.

Instead, I walked over to our next-door neighbors house, Sally. Her house was big and neat, very different from ours. Plus, Sally was like a mother to me, nice and caring. I knocked three times on her blue door. Her kind face greeted me as it opened. It was petite with defined features, topped off by her brown hair.

"Happy Birthday Jessica!" She exclaimed.

I almost forgot. Today was my 13th birthday. We didn't celebrate birthdays in our household.

"Thanks Sally."

"No need to thank me. Today is a very special day. A day like today needs to be special. Come here... Follow me..."

She said quickly as she weaves through her maze of a house. She stops in front of a door that was always locked, and that I had never seen open.

"Are you ready?" She asked excitedly.