The Missing Piece [Discontinued]

Chapter Two

Skittles was tired, had bruises from gym, had a headache from math (who even cared if she could find the square root of a number?), and a sore throat from yelling at some brat at recess. In other words, she was not in the best of moods. She especially wasn’t happy when that stupid Joy ran straight into her when she was trying to get to her bus to finally  get home. What did Joy want and who did she think she was?

****

Joy was still confused over the note until she accidently ran into Skittles. That was when it hit her (quite literally): she just ran into a clue on how to solve the mystery of the note! She had a hunch, but she had to be sure of it.

            “Hey, Skittles!” she said, plucking up all her courage to talk to her (after accidently spilling milk on Skittles in third grade and getting a hard blow to the stomach in return, they weren’t exactly best friends.)

            “What do you want?” Skittles snapped.

            “Um, well… I was just wondering… uh… what’s your real name?” Joy spoke the last words so  quickly she wasn’t even sure if Skittles understood her.

            “Why do you want to know?” Skittles narrowed her eyes at Joy, suspicious of the question.

            “Jus cause. Please, what is it?” Joy begged.

            “My real name is…” Skittles hesitated “my name is Faye, okay? Now get out of my way!” Skittles shoved past Joy, sprinting to catch her bus. Joy frowned, disappointed. Skittles answer wasn’t what Joy expected. She had gotten nowhere on solving the mysterious note.

            For the second time that day, Skittles wondered who Joy thought she was,  asking about personal info! Still mad, Skittles sat down on the first empty seat she saw. It wasn’t until the bus lurched forward that she realized that her seat wasn’t empty. Bird. Of all people it had to be Bird!

            “Oh my gosh! You are seriously the last person I want to see right now!” Skittles exclaimed bluntly. Bird surprised Skittles by glaring at her and replying,

            “I’m not exactly thrilled to see you either!”

Angered, frustrated, and shocked by his reply, Skittles (literally) punched that smug expression right off of Bird’s scrawny face.

            Bird had been just as surprised as Skittles about how he talked back to the feared Skittles. But he did expect the punch. It was hard, and immediately brought shouts from the bus driver:

            “Hey! You! Back there! No fighting!” The bus driver directed his next words at Bird. “You ok, kid?” Bird nodded, plugging his bloody nose shut.

            “Faith! I’m gonna have to write you up you know! Third time this week!” the bus driver shouted again. No one answered back. No one knew who he was talking to. Well, almost no one.

            “My name is Skittles,” Skittles yelled after the pause. Skittles’ name is Faith? Bird thought to himself, I almost forgot that Skittles had a real name!

            “Faith! Skittles! Whatever! You are getting a bus report! And this sort of thing better not happen again!” Not that likely, Skittles thought, but she kept her mouth shut for once.

            Skittles hated her real name: Faith. When Joy had asked her about it, she chose a shorter version, “Faye.” Skittles didn’t like those weird names like “Hope”, “Faith”, “Joy,” or anything like that. Skittles made sure people only called her by her nickname. Only people who hear the teachers say her real name know it. And Skittles wanted it to stay that way.

Sitting at the end of the table, Joy poked at her spaghetti with her fork, not really eating. Instead she focused on her parent’s conversation.

            “I’m telling you, it’s a stupid myth!” Joy’s father, Marc, insisted.

            “People constantly leaving? You can’t say that’s a myth!” Kim, Joy’s mother, argued back.

            “No, I can’t. But you’re over-analyzing everything! Why can’t you just drop it?” Marc pounded the table, scaring Joy.

            “Dad, really. Please. Stop,” Joy whimpered. Marc stared at Joy, as if just realizing she was there.

            “I’m sorry honey. Your mother and I will choose another time to discuss this issue,” Marc responded, looking at Kim instead of Joy. Kim glared back.

            “There is nothing left to discuss,” she stated coldly, and left the table. Joy shuddered, missing the love usually shared when her family ate together.

*****

“Faith, I’m going out! Be back when I feel like it!” Skittles’ mom, Nina, shouted. Before Skittles could protest, and demand to know why she always had to be gone, Nina quickly left. Grumbling, Skittles dragged herself into the kitchen to see what she could eat for dinner. She opened the fridge, looking for something decent to eat. Swatting an unnaturally dark red curl out of her face, she sighed.

“My life sucks!” Skittles exclaimed to the always-empty kitchen, to the always-empty house. The silence that followed agreed with her. The silence angered her, enraged her. Her whole body shaking with rage, she stiffly dragged herself to the wall of the kitchen. Taking a deep breath, trying to calm herself, Skittles put her forehead to the cold white plaster wall. Breathing didn’t help. Nothing would help, Skittles realized.

            “Nothing!” she shouted as anger took over and she kicked her foot through the wall once, twice, three times. Sobs racked her body as Skittles slid to the floor, digging her head into her palms and wishing it was all over.

“Faith, I’m home!” Nina called into the quiet house, slamming the door behind her. “Faith?” she called again, when no one replied. Her perfectly-arched light eyebrows scrunched together in confusion—where was that child? Nina stopped short in front of the kitchen wall. Correction: in front of the hole in the kitchen wall.

“Faith! You brat! What did you do to the wall?” Skittles heard Nina roar. Skittles shuddered under the warmth of her covers. After smashing the wall in with her foot, she had considered running. Running away. But to where? Skittles knew she had to face Nina for what she had done, but she was scared.

If anyone at school heard that she was scared, they wouldn’t have believed that tough, dirty-mouthed Skittles would be hiding under her covers from her own mom. But she was. How would she explain this to Nina? Skittles almost laughed aloud at the thought. Nina wouldn’t give her time to explain. Nina would just be plain-out furious at her. The wall would cost a fortune to fix. A fortune they didn’t have.

“Faith! Answer me!” Nina stormed into Skittles’ room looking like she was out to kill. Her emerald eyes sharp and piercing, her dyed-blonde hair flaring out of her head, and her long fake fingernails digging into her palms.

 “Do you think that we live in this ‘classy’ apartment because we’re rich? Do you think I work double jobs because I feel like it? Do you think we can rip holes in the walls because, maybe, we’re having a slightly bad day, and assume we can fix it up right away, no problem? Is that what you think?” Skittles stayed quiet, and cowered behind her sheets. But inside of her, anger was growing.  Did Nina care that she just had a nervous breakdown? No. Nina insisted, instead, on chewing her out. “I should have run,” Skittles thought to herself, “I should have run away while I had the chance.”