Chapter One
I feel like a hypocrite. I once said that I am only antisocial to shallow people. Only, now I have become one of them—or I am in other peoples eyes. Even though, I know I'm not shallow, is that enough? Or do I need other people to think it too?
Although, I can't say the people got this idea on their own. I did contribute and I knew what I was doing. I just couldn't stop. I think it's like an eating disorder. Where you know it's bad for you and you should stop before you seriously hurt yourself, only you're addicted to it, because it makes you feel good about yourself. Because you have this good self-image of you, other people are going to have too. What I didn't realize though, is that I was only seeing one angle. What I see can be completely different from what someone else sees.
What I saw, was a girl who had fun without hurting anybody. A girl who loved all things, but just had a shell cover. A girl who could be a bitch, but in the end always had a good heart. A girl who would give anything for her friends and be there when they needed her, and hoped they'd do the same.
Other people saw, a girl who was vicious and malicious to the people she loved. A girl who's attention was always focused on herself, and not observing her surroundings. A girl who, as long as she had daddy's money, would be content and self centered. Not my friends, though, strangers. My friends knew my situation.
How they got that conclusion, I do not know. Once or twice, I would pull out a mirror, like every other girl in my school, to check my reflection, but that's it. Only, unlike the other girls in my school, they weren't being watched constantly. It's a shame someone can be watched so closely, yet still remain a mystery. That's what I was—am to them. Just a simple girl turned into a mystery.
Someone could have guessed I paid attention to my surroundings, by my quiet nature most days, or by my quick arrival at a friends side when they needed help. Some people probably did, just afraid to say it out loud. Afraid to break the mystery of the girl they've watched carefully for the past four years.
I could have said something, but what was the point? I knew the truth, and that's all that should count, right? Of course, it sounds simple, but in real life its not. In real life, I yearn for someone to know the truth about me. You'd have thought that my friends would have defended me, as many times as I jumped to their side when they were in need, but they didn't. Instead, they created distance. A lot of distance.
Before, I often wondered why people were so curious about me. Why I was the center of their attention? Could it be because I had that certain aurora that leaders give off? Or was it because I had the looks, only not really? No, it wasn't those things. I had been naïve before, or just avoiding what I knew deep down it was, but now I know. It was because my skin color. I was always one to jump and defend against people being prejudice against people, until it happened to me.
At this point, I don't know whether to thank my mother, for trying never to let me experience such hate, or be mad at her, for trying never to let me experience such hate. Maybe she thought she was protecting me. In the long run, maybe, I'll feel different, but now I feel it was a mistake. A small piece of a bigger one, but still a mistake.
I was always in the best schools; minorities were scarce, so most of my friends were white. I never saw anything different between us, I always seemed to miss, the apprehensive glances their parents gave me when we played together. I was clueless, to the hesitation the waiters at expensive restaurants gave me, when I was about to order. I didn't think anything of it when people were always asking me how I got into this exclusive private school. All those little details somehow bypassed me, until now.
All it took was for me to become pregnant by the most popular boy at my school, who also happened to be my mothers' boss's son, for me to realize all these things.
