Not Her Prince Charming

Chapter 1

It was the first day of 8th grade when I saw him...... My Prince Charming. He was so handsome that all I could do was stare. It was love at first sight.

I told all my friends about him, I went to all of his basketball games, sometimes staying at school for 2 days just to watch it. My mother doesn't have time to pick me up from school, at least that's what she tells me whenever I ask.

If you're wondering how the staying at school for 2 days works, here is how it goes: School closes and I walk around the neighborhood surrounding the school for about two hours, and head back to school to watch his games. After the basketball games, I would hide somewhere in school until the janitors go home and make my way to the theatre room where I sleep until morning time. There is a secret entry to the library from the theatre room, and I head there because I could walk out with the kids who came into the library when the bell for first period rings. Then I go home on the bus after school. My mom doesn't seem to mind.

This Prince Charming, his name is Minh. Minh Nguyen. And he is the most handsome boy I had ever seen.

Whenever I told my friends about him they would cry and tell me how ugly they thought he was. They would tell me bad things about him. I still loved him.......

.....but not all well ends well.

4 months after the start of 8th grade a girl in my gym class told Minh about my feelings for him. I had been telling the girls in my class everyday how awesome I thought Minh was. Everything he did was remarkable to me, but as I said: not all well ends well.

Minh told the girl that I was the most ugliest girl he had ever seen. He told her that he would never want to be seen in a relationship with a girl who looked like me. He also told her that he didn't date girls who looked like me, ugly. By the end of the school day the whole school knew about my rejection but me.

When I was walking to my bus back home, Minh didn't have a game that day, the girl stopped me to tell me the news. I was devastated, but I kept a smile on my face. I told the girl that I understood and that it wasn't a big deal. But the truth was that it was a big deal to me.

When I got on the bus, I cried the whole way home. When I got to my bus stop, I quickly wiped away my tears because if my mom saw my tears, I wouldn't get dinner that night.

I walked home from the bus stop, just in time to see my mom pull into the driveway with my little sister. My little sister was in the 6th grade and went to the same school as me, but according to my mom "she can't ride a bus full of germs." I greeted my mom but she ignored me and walked inside the house with my younger sister.

I went inside the house and went straight to my room because my mother didn't like to see my face. She says that "it is too ugly" for her to look at.

On the first day of school, my mom finally got me a bed set. We moved into our house when I was in the 5th grade. The only thing in my room was a mattress, until 8th grade. My sister's room was fully furnished while mine was empty. But I was happy, I always had to be happy.

When I got to my room I bawled my eyes out. The words that Minh said about me hurt me to my core. He was my first ever crush and he called me ugly. Growing up, everyone called me ugly, I had never been known as beautiful, my mom even called me ugly. I didn't take it as a bad term until Minh called me that word. It hurt me to the core. I knew ugly wasn't a good way to describe someone. Especially someone you should love. I cried for hours, I even did my homework in tears. I cried and cried until eventually, I fell asleep.

The next day the whole school was talking about me. People would laugh and point at me in the hallways. I only had 2 friends in the school but they both had their own friend group, so I had no one to console me.

One week after the incident, a girl in my classroom came up to me to tell me to stop bothering Minh. I didn't know what I did wrong, I was in the middle of doing a math problem when she had this request. I told her that I didn't understand what she was asking. I could tell that she was trying to keep in her anger. She told me that the girl who told Minh about my feelings was taunting Minh everyday, and going at him because he didn't like me. Then the girl left me.

I was in tears after she told me that. Even though she didn't see it, I cried. Later that day I told the girl to stop, and she did.

The last day of 8th grade rolled around. People still laughed when they saw me. Minh looked at me in disgust every time he saw me. People even came up to me to tell me about Minh. Turns out he talked about my ugliness, and how disgusted he was that an ugly girl liked him. It broke my heart to hear these things. I still supported him throughout 8th grade by  staying after school to go to his games, and cheering the loudest every time he got an award because the sad truth was, I was in a unrequited love and I didn't know why I still loved him.

When I got back home that day, my mom and my sister weren't there. Three hours after school they came home. They went to Olive Garden. My mom got me a cheeseburger from McDonald's on their way home, and I was grateful. It was the first time in months that my mom got me some fast food.

She never took me out with them because she didn't like the way that I looked. They all called me ugly, but every time I looked in the mirror all I could see was beauty. If no one could see beauty in me, I had to see beauty in myself.

Before bedtime, my mom called me and my sister down to give us a surprise "last day of school present." We opened our presents together to see what we got. I got a blackberry phone and my sister got the new phone at that time which was the iPhone 8 Plus. She told us that she decided to get it for us because my sister asked her to buy them. Although I had been asking my mom for a phone since I started middle school, I was grateful because this was the best I would get for a long time.

I went back to my room and before I went to bed I looked at myself in the mirror. Is life supposed to be like this? I questioned myself before going to sleep.