The Ship

Prologue~Chapter 1: Page 1~~Her Past {E}

~Narrator's POV~

Ever since Luce was a young girl she was obsessed with couples. No one knew how this mysterious quirk started, not even Luce herself. All we know really is this love of couples was always there with her, even in preschool. And Obviously, none of the other preschoolers likes the idea of romance, hence liked each other. Because of this difference, Luce was treated very badly by her peers. She started getting bullied, the bullies beat her every day in the bathroom during free time, they teased her at every hour of every day about her addiction. They spread rumors about her so she lost a lot of her friends. People didn't want to even sit next to her in fear they might get bullied too. To make it even worse, she didn't tell anyone about it, she took the beatings day after day, believing that it will one day be better for her and the bullying will stop. 

One day, one of the bullies found out about Luce's crush, Maz. Maz was one of the only people who didn't bully her. He was also Luce's best friend since the first day of school. One of the bullies turned him against her, Maz was told that Luce was spreading rumors behind his back saying how bad he is. Enraged by this, he went up to Luce during playtime and slapped her. He started yelling at her, calling her the names her bullies called her, causing many toddlers to look up from their own play to see the commotion. Luce was shocked by the sudden outbursts and cried the whole time he was yelling at her, heartbroken and filled with anguish she ran away to the far side of the playground, waiting until recess was over. 

When her dad picked her up she told them everything, slowly tearing up at each description of the beatings and the new betrayal of her best friend. Her parents were enraged at this and the next day told the headmaster of the daycare. The headmaster quickly spun blame on Luce for her not being strong enough to face the abuse, telling her to grow up and a little teasing won't hurt her. Her dad fell silent at the headmaster's claims and nodded at every word and glared at his daughter. Promising to teach his daughter about the importance of the "effect of her actions". When he got out of the building he looked at his small Latino daughter and told her in a harsh tone they were moving from Canada to America.  When Luce's parent said they were moving to America, she was overjoyed. Not in the least bit sad about leaving her childhood neighborhood behind.

She went on to be homeschooled for two years as her father was still afraid of her getting bullied. After much pleading to the overprotective dad, she was finally sent to a public school to go to 2nd grade. She was careful to not remake her past mistakes, she never talked about her love of shipping afraid to weird out her classmates. Usually being shy in the past she decided to give herself a bubbly persona. She was very outgoing and had lots of friends. Even though she did this, she still got bullied for things other than this like her hair, or how she dressed, etc;. However, this didn't bother her one bit as she now had a close group of friends who would defend her when she couldn't herself. However, when her friends weren't with her she would get beat up badly and teased like she was in preschool. Being a bit the same as she was back then, she told none of her friends about it, and of course, her dad didn't know anything either as he would immediately make her be homeschooled again. This went on for years until one day in the 5th grade.

Luce was sitting by herself at free period one day just sketching quietly. It was June, she had the window seat so she had a perfect view of the outside world. She looked up from her window, It was beautiful the trees were coated with bright green leaves and the flowers blossomed vibrantly. Two birds were perched on a low hanging branch of a tree chirping, seemingly to be singing sweet songs of love to each other. A few more days or school and then she was free from this prison and she wouldn't be just looking at the beautifulness of the outside world. She would be there basking in the sun smelling the wonderful scents of the sweet flowers and hearing the hum of cicadas. She mused at the thought as a smile crept up on her face. Just then was a large bang on her desk, she turned around slowly to see her friend, Tiala. She was as into shipping as Luce was, but of course, she wouldn't tell her that. She looked quite ecstatic though her long raven black hair bouncing up and down from the impact of the desk banging a few second ago. The raven-haired girl was quite fashionable today too, going all out as it seemed. She was currently wearing a white shirt with countless small black strips accompanying it all completed by a set of trousers resting comfortably over the outfit. Luce smiles with glee as she looked at the girl's outfit "You finally took my advice, Mei! I knew those trousers would look good on you"

 The girl blushed a slight shade of pink and squirmed slightly "Shut up! I just didn't have anything else to wear today, so I-"

"Yeah, Yeah uh-huh" Luce rolled her eyes.

"Hey, that's not nice Lu-Lu! I was about to compliment you on your fashion sense!"

"Sorry" The chestnut haired girl lied, "I was just zoning out that's all"

The gorgeous raven-haired girl playfully gasped, "What couldn't be more important than talking to me! The great Mei-Mei!"

"Stop it you sound like Amelia, and god knows she'll tear you apart for saying that" Luce replied. Mei was about to sass her friend when she looked up and a shocked look spread across her face.

"Um, Lu-Lu?"

"Yes, Mei-Mei?"

"My ship has finally sailed". A smile was gleefully pasted on her dumbfounded face as she pointed to the location.

Luce raced to the back of the classroom where there was already a crowd circling around the scene. Lots were whispering about what was going on as she pushed, shoved and apologized tremendously as she slowly reached the center. She was shocked, A boy classmate and a girl classmate were holding hands! The boy was standing shyly holding their partner's hand scratching the back of their neck looking off to the side. The maroon-haired kid had adorable freckles now coated with a slight shade of pink, he was known for his kindness to everybody. He was wearing his usual outfit, round glasses with a black button-down shirt and grey khaki shorts. To his right holding his hand was a girl Luce was very familiar with by the 5th-grade gossip, Gracy Levilia. Gracy was currently wearing an oversized light blue sweater with black leggings and her blue converse shoes. Her long orange hair was tied back into a ponytail. She stood proudly holding her nervous partner's hand, showing everyone that this was no coincidence. At the time Luce was a huge shipper of the pairing and was freaking out internally at the latest development.

"This is my boyfriend,  Aden" Gracy said as she turned to everyone in the room, "He's mine so back off".

The crowd broke out into high pitched squeals and giggles, some were just staring at the official couple while breaking into tears and some, oddly, had notepads out seeming to write a ship name for the two and the others in the crowd were covering their ears trying not to go deaf at the age of ten.

"What's all the fuss?" one girl questioned from the outer ring of the crowd hushing down the excitement. Luce whipped around to see a tall blonde hair girl to her far left. The people of the crowd were now making a pathway for her to the center of the action."It's not that big of a deal their just holding hands" she huffed and crossed her arms. The girl was wearing a pink short sleeved top with a picture of a chocolate cupcake on it, she wore short jeans and a seemingly over-sized red sweater around her waist. She was also one of Luce's main bullies since 3rd grade.

"Maybe to you it is Amelia!" a girl quickly retorted, she had more trouble breaking into the crowd than Amelia. You could here countless excuse me's escaped her mouth as she was passing through. She pushed one last spectator before making it to the scene herself. "This is revolutionary! Do you know how long some of us have been waiting for them to get together?" she said as she walked over to the blonde haired girl. "They've been dating in secret for MONTHS this is great that they decided to come out!" The girl looked out at the crowd and saw a bunch of heads nodding, Including Luce's.

Amelia loathed at that fact she was so greatly outnumbered.  She loved making people feel on the wrong side of the conversation, just not herself. She wanted all the negative attention to direct back to someone, anyone, so she targeted one of her own bullying victims, Luce. She pulled by her brown short hair and said, "Your just a loser you have no say in this."  A select few were laughing as Luce looked down at the ground, tears watering in her eyes as the blonde bully shook her head violently while pulling her hair hard.  

"Hey let her go," a mysterious voice said, "She can do whatever she wants, why can't you accept that and not be such a diva".