The Troubled Life of Peter Flynn

Entry One 24.3.94

I really don’t know why life becomes so rough for some people. Why some people have great successes in life and become super rich and win the hot chick that works in strip clubs, whist others sit alone and cry at 3:06am because they got picked on at school today; for ridiculous reasons like being overweight or because they got good marks on a test. I am not the person who gets all the girls and wins at everything, in fact, I’m quite the opposite. I’m the teenager that sits alone at the table in the far corner of the cafeteria every day, eats his lunch while reading Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens, then has the school bully approach him and make fun of him; then hears the ooohs and the cheers and the laughter of everyone around him. My solution is running to the toilets and crying until the bell goes for class, because I’m a pussy and can’t stand up for myself. I am okay at school, my grades aren’t bad, but they aren’t great either. My favourite subject is math. I’m good at math. It sounds stupid because math seems to be every teenagers’ worst nightmare. My math teacher in grade 8 told me that she believed I will go far in life and I will be successful in whatever career path I chose. That was the first ever compliment I’ve received from someone other then my mum. 

My mother died 5 years ago, when I was 10, and ever since then my life has been a total bust. Every time I think about it I start to cry and I can’t stop, and I don’t like talking about it either. After her death, we (dad and my 17 year old sister, Chloe and I) moved away. Ever since then we’ve been traveling from place to place, never staying anywhere for more then a year. Making friends is difficult for me. The only friend I’ve ever had was when I was 9. His name was Aiden, but he moved away to Michigan, 5 months before mum was killed. We wrote to each other for a year, and then we became distant to the point where we stopped talking.

I haven’t quite introduced myself yet. I’ve been so caught up in everything that I’ve been writing about to even notice that I haven’t even written my name yet. I am Peter Lucas Flynn, but I prefer Pete. I have decided I’m going to keep a diary to let out all my feelings and experiences because I have no one to share my problems and issues with outside my family. I keep secrets from my family, things I don’t want them to know because I think they’ve been through enough already. I don’t want to tell them I get bullied at school, that at one point I lied to them about joining the football team to cover up my detentions for not doing assignments and being rude to teachers. One time I broke into a house and stole some money to pay for the fines of shoplifting. I am a troubled teenager. I want to protect the only two people in the world that matter to me from getting hurt again, and sharing my problems with them would do the opposite.  

My dad, Rodger Flynn, has decided that the three of us are relocating from our current location (Appleton, Minnasota) to some place I don’t know how to spell, Pennsylvania I think it is. He didn’t tell Chloe and I where though, he said he wanted to keep it a surprise. We fly out there tomorrow and I start school the next day. 

Dad use to tell us stories of his relationship with mum, how in love with her he was, how she was his dream come true. He had so many tales and memories, all of them sound like a fantasy. He would break down crying close to the end of his story, and Chloe would put her arm around him with tears in her eyes and say “we miss her too, dad. It is going to be alright”’  then dad would say “‘I love you kids so much”’ and pull me close to him, and we all sit there, all embraced with each others’ warmth, all shed a few tears then eventually fall asleep. We would wake up in the morning tangled up with each other. The last time dad told us a story was two years ago. He never speaks much of mum anymore. He is always out when I come home from school and he doesn’t walk through the front door until 2am the next morning. I have thought about following him, seeing where he goes everyday, but I’m worried he’ll catch me. Maybe he’s got a new girlfriend and is seeing her in secret because he doesn’t know what Chloe and I would think of her. We just have to wait until he’s ready to tell us, that would be the right thing to do. 

We leave for our new mystery home early tomorrow morning, so I better get going and get some rest. I’m not really excited about starting school there. It’s always a scary thing to do, the same cliche people: the bullies, the nerds, the sport enthusiasts, the 3 popular girls with the biggest bitch in the middle, the one that is mean to every single soul in the building, and her two followers on either side of her. There is a chance this school will be different, and I hope it is. There is this feeling in my gut that I’m in for a shot at having a friend. How good would it be, being able to call someone my friend. Friend. The thought is giving me shivers.

Peter