Close As Strangers // c.h.

2

*Ren's POV*

I walk over to my bookshelf. It is filled with trophies, medals and other mementos from my childhood, things that really don't even mean anything to me any more. I crouch down to the bottom shelf to look for a specific book.

I finally spot what I'm looking for, it was crunched in between The Fault in our Stars and Divergent. I slowly pull it out not wanting to rip out any of the pages from within.

Once I have it all the way out I stand up and take a good look at the book that used to be my whole life. Back when I was still using it, It was my best friend and my best source of medicine.

I glance at what was written on the front and say it out loud to myself:

'Rens Journal'

It instantly brings back floods of memories. Some that make me smile, and some that I don't even want to speak of anymore. But that didn't matter, I'm not reading to remember events, I'm reading to remember someone.

I plop myself down onto my bed and read the first page:

"Today is the day I realized I have a crush on my best friend. Today was also the day that I decided to start writing in this journal. I'm not 100% sure but I'm actually okay with the idea of writing in this thing. I feel like something good is going to come out of this, maybe not today but someday this will help me, or maybe even someone I care about."

I read that first page over and over again realizing that this journal may bring me somewhere closer to my mother.

Just thinking of her makes me want to cry.

Once I pull myself together, I begin to read the second page.

I had no idea how much I needed this until now.

"May 2014

It's starting to really get hot, and I'm excited! Because that means it's almost our vacation! I don't think that I have ever been so excited to leave the hell hole that my parents force me to go to everyday. The only upside to school is I get to see my best friend, Calum. We met a little over a 2 years ago when I first moved to Sydney all the way from little Menasha, Wisconsin.

My life pre-Australia, as I like to call it, wasn't all that interesting, but it did get a tad bit rocky when my parents lost their jobs.

My dad worked for a sales company before he got fired from his job, this left us without any money and two unemployed parents. Luckily my aunt and uncle lived in Sydney and had a house large with no kids. Only one week after my dad had been fired we decided to move to Sydney. My dad was not happy with this plan, he didn't like that we had to rely on my mom's sister for housing and food. Long story short, he didn't take the plane ride with us to Australia. Although I was really upset with my dad not coming with us, this plane was an opportunity to start over, a plane to my new life. I didn't have many friends back in Wisconsin so it wasn't a hard move, and I was actually super excited to move here.

When we arrived, I had exactly one week before my freshman year at my new high school, and I was scared out of my mind. I had to make new friends, get used to a new school, and put up with the bullies that may or may not exist.

I pick up my head to see someone standing in my doorway.

"Fuck Kel, you scared the shit out of me."

"Sorry love, I just wanted to see how you have been holding up. I know that you haven't been faring well these last couple days." my aunt states.

I appreciate her noticing my mental absence, but I have felt like this for longer than a few days. It has been 6 months since the boys left and about half way through that time I sort of gave up on them coming back. That's when I started acting down.

I desperately want her to be able to come and hug me and make everything okay, but this time around, this time it's a bit bigger than both of us and it's not something that can be cured with ice cream and a movie.

I don't know where she has been for 3 months, but I put on a smile for her and told her what she wanted to hear.

"I'm doing fine what are you talking about?" I flash a smile to indicate that I am okay. She looks like she's really worried, but in all complete honesty, she would have no idea how to help me even if she did know what was going on.

I love my aunt more than the world, even though I end up snapping at her sometimes. She is my best friend and I tell her everything. That's probably why she is worrying so much right now.

"Alright, I just worry about you Ren."

I look up at her and kind of give her the look that signals I want to be alone. She quickly understands what I meant, she then quietly apologizes and leaves the room directly after.

I sigh and look back at the journal that used to be my source of security. I continue to read what I wrote that very first day.

"On the first day, I walked in with absolutely no friends. No one would look at me or even give me the time of day, talk about a terrible feeling in the pit of your stomach. When I went to my first hour class, which happened to be English, I spotted three guys sitting in the corner. One was extremely tall and blonde, then there was one with sweet, colorful hair and then there was another one that I couldn't quite see from my angle. Before I could've gotten a closer look, the bell rang. I sat down in an open spot in the very back of the room and looked for the three boys that I had spotted earlier. Once I found them, I realize that they are all staring back at me. I turned away embarrassed and put my eyes down onto my desk.

The class never seemed to end. Every time I looked over I saw at least one pair of eyes staring right back at me. When the bell finally rang. I waited for everyone to clear out before I got up to leave. When I did leave I was ambushed by the 3 boys that were staring at me earlier. They all came up to me, but the one with the colored hair did most of the talking.

He asked my name, I answered and then they told me theirs. The tall blonde one's name is Luke, the talkative one with the colored hair's name is Michael, and the Brunette one's name was Calum. They all seemed pretty cool and for the time we had in between classes we talked a little. They asked me where I was from and why we moved. I told them a brief overview, skipping parts like my father left us both for whatever he thought was back in the U.S.

We then exchanged schedules and realized that I had classes with at least one of them every hour, and that we all had a called 'Music Exploration' together. This is basically a class where you can do whatever you wanted, as long as it had to do with music. This made me happy though, knowing that I have at least one person I know in every single class."

I read the last couple paragraphs a few more times to myself, and that's when the tears started to flow. The memories of the last four years are all coming back to me, but it's strangely making me feel better. The tears are from the happiness that I have been lucky enough to receive these last few years and they are also from the crappy moments that I wish would just go away. All the memories from the first day of school came flooding back, a flood that could not be controlled, just tolerated. I remember how sweet all of the boys were to me and how they helped me really adjust to my new life.

Just thinking about them, especially Calum, made my cry even harder. I felt my cheeks turn red from the anger and sadness that was overcoming me.

I decide to take a shower to cool off, so I grab my laptop and my comfiest clothes and head to my bathroom to take a cold shower and hopefully calm myself down from whatever I was experiencing. I am alone at this point and time and no one is here to help me.

A/N

This is chapter is a real downer...

This song is remotely based on Close As Strangers by 5sos, so if you know that song you know kind of the mood of the story.

#CloseAsStrangersFF