Sketchbook

Chapter 1

     Making terrible mistakes and struggling to solve your problems is all part of life. Sometimes we trip, sometimes we fall, and sometimes it's too hard to get back up. You think that no matter what happens to you in your life, you'll always get through it standing tall on your feet, but when you actually come across those dark valleys, you second guess yourself. You start to question how in the world people manage to get through these hard times. It can't possibly be this hard to do something that you once thought was so minor, so underestimated, and so normal. Life becomes too hard the older you get. You probably already know that, but always remember, you don't learn anything until you sit down in the desk and take it all in, learn to understand what it is you're talking about, and sometimes the lessons are easy, but the tests are never the same. My life turned out the complete opposite of what I expected. I thought my teenage years were going to be easy. I thought life was going to be easy. Well, life wasn't made to be easy, and mine sure as hell was never. My name is Jayda Joseph, and I'm gonna tell you the story of how my mistakes turned my life upside down.
     I'm from Denver, Colorado. I live in a very strict and religious home. My entire family are Christians. The rules in my house were always to pray before every meal and before sleep, read the Bible everyday, and you're only excuse for missing church is if you're sick. I never got sick, but still missed a few Sundays. Mother paddled me for it. I can promise you I never missed a Sunday after that. The reasons for my absence were either I was staying at a friend's house or I overslept. I was always responsible for being ready in time, so no one ever woke me up from sleep or called me at a friend's house.
Even though I was living with a strict family, I still got into trouble a lot. In school is where the trouble happened. When I was 13, I skipped two of my classes. I got detention for a week because I lied about it. When I started high school, just turning 14, I talked shit about this girl who got pregnant by her ex, who cheated on her the day she found out she was pregnant. I heard from a friend that she was planning on getting an abortion, so I spread the rumor around everywhere. I got away with it too.
     I was always stupid, without a doubt. I made a lot of minor mistakes, but my stupidity really came out when I was 15. I met this guy in my chemistry class that year. He was so cute. He looked like an angel. He always sat right next to me, and he would stare at me during the lessons. I couldn't help but stare back. Those beautiful blue eyes possessed me. His hair was like gold, and his gorgeous smile, damn, that smile. Any girl would drop dead over that smile. The problem with my whole feelings for him was that my best friend Anna would tell me to stay away from him because he's a fuckboy. She says he's selfish, rude, and doesn't care about anybody but himself. He only dates a girl so he can get in her pants. He was 18, 3 years older than me. He was a senior while I was a sophomore. I wanted him so bad. What made me not listen to Anna was his behavior. She said he was selfish and rude, but he treated me like I was his princess. Boy, I sure wanted to be.
His name was Charles. He was tall and very athletic. He was the captain of the soccer team. He was so popular. I wanted to be with him so bad, and with the way he would always stare at me in class, I felt more confident to ask him out. He beat me to it though. He came up to me in class one day asking me if I wanted to hang out sometime. Take a wild guess what my response was. Well, I tried acting cool about it. I tried my absolute hardest to stay chill. He came up to me and greeted me. I smiled and calmly said hello back, but my heart was racing. He kept looking into my eyes, and I had no choice but to look back. I immediately became flustered. After the whole "asking out" thing, we ended up making plans to hang out at his place that Saturday. I thought I was on top of the world. I felt powerful knowing that one of the cutest and most popular guys in school wanted to hang out with me. I had told Anna about this, eventually, which I believe was a mistake. I went over to her house that same day since we had plans, and I started bragging about it to her. She started yelling at me, telling me how stupid I was. Saying how she clearly told me not to, but I did it anyway. I got mad at her for not letting me be happy, constantly arguing with me over it for at least an hour. She hit me on the side of the head calling me stupid, and that's when a small argument broke out into a fist fight. After she hit my head, I slapped her. She then started pulling on my hair as I started punching her. Her dad walked in screaming at us to stop. He broke up the fight pulling Anna away from me, blocking her from my view. I gave up and walked out of the room. I looked back into the room and told Anna, "We're not best friends anymore." That was the last time I ever spoke to Anna.