Dreams That Do Not Matter (gmw fanfiction)

Girl Meets Forgiveness Project

Verity's POV

"All through history, countries go to war. That's what we normally study in here," Mr. Matthews explains. "But today, we're going to talk about peace and forgiveness and how we get there. Every once in a while, I come up with a good idea." I can feel this is definitely not one of them. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, today we're going to begin the forgiveness project. Our history isn't just about what we've done. How we grow comes from the repair of what we've done and how we forgive what was done to us."

"Hmm, we're in," Riley agrees eagerly. "What do we do?"

"Everyone, take out a piece of paper. So, this isn't your laptop or your cell phone. You've got unlimited characters here. As many words as you want." Mr. Matthews starts handing out some envelopes for everyone to take. "The impact will last longer than six seconds. And I guarantee you, it's never going to disappear. So, pick up a pen. Express feelings. This is one of the most important things you're ever going to do. You're about to forgive someone."

"What's this got to do with history, Mr. Matthews?" Maya asks confused.

"It gives you a chance to change it," he answers with a smile.

I already hate the assignment and we haven't even started yet. I have always hated writing my feelings down on paper and I make it no secret, why would you put your feelings on a place that is freely accessible for anyone to read? If you do that, you just give them the chance to get into your head and find out about your thoughts. Why would I want to do that? It is ironic that I feel that way, given the fact that one of the things I love doing the most is writing songs. But I feel like that's something completely different. First, I write about what I see and feel others go through much more than what I go through myself and second, I at least get to encode those things that way. 

Besides, I have no one to forgive at the moment. I start writing whatever that doesn't even have anything to do with the project, because the only ones who are going to be evaluated for it are Riley and her friends, so the only thing I have to do is pretend to do what I'm supposed to. I have no one to forgive, because when me and Missy were little, our mom was always against staying mad and holding grudges. She taught us to always forgive whatever anyone has done to us before the sun sets. It's written in the Bible as well, she read the passage to us many times. 

And I cannot really hold grudges, I care about others too much, about what they feel, and being mad at them would do no good other than standing in the way of helping them. Also, forgiveness helps you just as much as the person you are forgiving. Therefore, I have forgiven those robbers I have never met for killing our mom, although I don't know if they ever felt guilty for what they did, I got rid of my extremely illogical anger that I felt towards our mom for leaving us here alone, I have forgiven our father for not caring about us, I have forgiven our best friend Rebecca for turning her back to us and making sure we don't have any other friends, even the people who keep saying harsh things about me and Missy. I have forgiven Lucas for abandoning us, although that doesn't mean I will ever be able to trust him. 

Flashback to ten years ago (about two weeks after their mom's death)

Things are really complicated. Dad goes to work every morning, that is true. But he comes home very late and when he does, he barely ever leaves his room. He still refuses to talk to us, he doesn't even look at us anymore. I don't think he has done that once since mom's death. He left us a bit of money for us to buy some things we need, though. It's not much but it at least indicates that he's still aware of our existence and that we're much too young to earn any money of our own. 

I sometimes wonder why the cashiers in shops don't find it weird that two four-year-old girls are buying groceries all on their own, but this is New York. I guess people don't really care here.