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Author's note
Soo this is my first story on here so pleaseee pleaseeeee do not be to hard on me??
Thanks XXXX
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I wake up to the 6:30am train rushing past my house. Pushing myself off my firm bed and stumbling over to the bathroom I share with my father. I get out of the ice cold shower,shivering, as I sigh as I look at myself in the mirror. I tie my dark brown hair back in a ponytail, not knowing what else to do with it. I think briefly about applying makeup but quickly decide against it. With one final look at my pale reflection I head to my bedroom. Wrapping the wet towel around my slim body I looked through my tiny closet and spot my mother’s old sweater, inhaling the scent of it, it still smells like her. I think that it will cover up the bruises and scars from a few days ago when my Dad just snapped. Heading downstairs I quickly rushed past my father who is passed out on the couch. I heard him come in late last night and decide against waking him up. He is always in a bad mood after a night of drinking, and I do not want any more bruises while I go to school today.Quickly walking past my kitchen, I have no desire to eat anything. Everyone at school makes fun of me for being so slim but I have no desire to do anything that keeps me alive. I walk onto my tiny back porch and take a deep breath of fresh morning air. I pull on my black toms and walked over to my bike. It is an older bike. It has a few scratches and the back tire is slightly lopsided, but I like it. Mom had bought it 3 years ago for my 13 birthday. I reluctantly start my ride to school. I know what is ahead of me today, and I am scared. I do not want to deal with them today. I try to direct my thoughts towards my mother so that I would not worry about them so much. I think of the time when I was younger and we had some ice cream at the pier, the time that we decided to plant a garden and accidently planted flowers. The time that Mom, Dad and I had all gone on that road trip into the mountains. All the happy memories with mom always make me smile, forget my worries. Mom had always been happy no matter what was happing. When Dad had lost his company she was still optimistic, when she had to start working two jobs she still always smiled. When Dad had started drinking and hurting her she never showed her pain. She was the glue that had held our little family together.
“Oh, look who it is, Ella!” Somebody yelled causing me to snap out of my thoughts. “Ella, oh Ella come over here sweetie” Somebody else taunted “Ella what kind of tacky sweater is that?” I know that this is only the beginning. I know that as soon as I reached the school it will be worse. But if I slow down now the group will only terrorize me more. I keep my current speed as a pass more and more people. The insults become worse and worse, as they do every day. When I finally reach class I am almost in tears. I think about nothing in class, I hardly ever pay attention in school, I do not care about school; I just want to pass and get out of there as soon as possible. Lunch comes and I decide to go into town to avoid the others. It is better to go into town anyway; nobody looks at me funny for not eating anything, and also nobody makes fun of me – to my face at least.
I hurry past everyone outside and I get on my bike and start my ride uptown. I didn’t notice them following me, but when I did I just rode past my favorite café. Following, like cats stalking there pray. Attempting to avoid any conflict I rush down the nearest ally, hoping that maybe they will just walk by, or not notice me. Unfortunately for me that is not the case. They were counting on it. I look near the end of the alley and notice people weighting there. I have only a few critical seconds to get out of this alley. I turn my bike around in record speed, and pedal as fast as my scrawny weak legs can carry me. Sadly I was not fast enough. One of the boys in the ally grabs my back tire and pushes me into the wall; I hit the wall, hard. I hear the noise of something braking as I slide down the cold hard wall. I feel a sharp pain in my left wrist and I try to support myself on my right arm. Looking over to the opening near the main street I notice more people coming. I try to push my bike off me, but I fall back instead. I hear a course of cruel laughter behind me. “What’s wrong little Ella? Are you not strong enough to even stand up?” A male voice sneers “Oh what is it Ella, you going to cry?” I try to hold back tears as they all grouped around me and kick at me and shout insults. They push me further against the wall “Ella you are worthless.” One screamed “This is what you deserve, you worthless b***h.” Another screeched as she kicks me right in my gut. I curled up into a ball and hold back tears. I will not beg for them to stop. That was what they want. I will not let them have that victory over me.
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“Mom, you don’t understand, I can’t stand up to them! They do this every day, you were never bullied growing up!” My thirteen year old self sobbed as my mother cleaned my cut and bloody face. “Oh honey what makes you think I was never bullied?” Mother softly asked. As she squeezed the blood and water mix out of the cloth she was using into our bathroom sink. “Well, I - I it’s just that you have so many friends and you are just so happy all the time, I would have never -” “Oh honey don’t get worked up okay?” mom coaxed as she wiped more blood off my face. I nodded at mom to say that I would not. “Yes I was bullied,” She continued “Quite badly actually, I won’t get to into the details but I will just say this; I was bullied throughout my whole adolescence and I was hurt a lot by it.” Mother brushed my hair back as she placed a medicated cloth in my hand, I held it to my face and mother gave me a sympathetic look but continued “Ella, oh my sweet little Ella, I cannot tell you why they do this to you; I do not know them. But honey I do know you and I do know that you need to stay your beautiful self no matter what they say about you. I don’t care what they all think and neither should you.” I was about to say something but she shushed me with a gesture of her hand. “Now honey I need you to promise me one thing okay?” ” Mom grabbed my hands “What’s that mom?” I asked giving her a questioning look “Well Ella I want you to promise me that you will always, no matter what. Try your best to be somebody who has the morals and self-respect” I looked down at my bruised knuckles as she continued “Promise that you will try to walk away from something as frivolous and stupid like a fight, Ella you are too good to get caught up in something as dumb as that. Maybe right now it looks like you are a chicken, but trust me okay? In the end it is better to walk away then keep getting hurt like this.” Mom had never been a very serious person, but in that moment I knew that I would have to hold to the promise that she wanted me to make. This would mean that I could not fight back, that I would have to take beatings, not stand up for myself. This would not just be an empty promise. It would change so much. Eventually after long silence I raised my bruised head and looked my mother right in the eye “I promise mom.”
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Remembering that, I stood up and looked around at everyone sounding me. They all had something crazy in their eyes, I realized then what mother wanted of me. She did not want me to be a chicken and back off; she wanted me to show these people what they were truly hurting and making fun of. I made direct eye contact with the boy who had pushed me into the wall before and grabbed my bike off the ground with my good hand. I nodded slightly at him, then turned and looked from the boy who had made fun of me for crying to the two girls who had kicked me and shouted insults at me while I laid there on the ground, unable to do anything. I simply nodded at them as well. Then I turned to the rest of the people present to witness my beating. I thought about maybe saying something to them all about what lesson they had just truly taught me, but I decided against it. They would not listen anyways so I simply turned my back to them and limped out the alley, my bike on my right, my left hand throbbing from the fall, my sides acing from the kicks. I could hear everyone shouting names at me that had previously hurt me, calling me a chicken, saying that I was pathetic. When I had reached the opening in the alley one of the boys yelled after me and told me that we would finish this later. The strange thing was the names did not hurt me, and the empty threat did not scare me. In fact I had never felt more alive.
