Hey guys. i've been writting a story and i wanted to know what people thought of it. I'm working pretty hard on this story and i want to know if its really awful, so awful i should just stop writting all together. It's my first draft with no editting done to it. i haven't even come up with an ending yet, but if your feeling bored, read my story and email me or leave a comment telling me your thoughts. Your thoughts do honestly matter to me because i really need to know if i have any talent at all as a writter. Make fun all you like, hell get nasty if you want. I have to warn you though, im only fifteen and my writting skills aren't top notch. I'll be checking my e-mail daily so please read my story and comment. Think of it as your good deed of the year. have fun beeeyotches.
[HE NEVER HITS ME HARD]
It was another one of those days where nothing mattered. Days where you lounge around the house, smelling of chlorine from the pool you and your friends went to. Days where the wind fiddles with your hair as you swing back and forth on your hammock, playing connect the dots with your mosquito bites. Days where you and your friends sit around, asking the infamous question, “What do you want to do?” Only to hear the continuous response of, “I dunno. What do you want to do?” This is exactly what summer is all about. The feeling of complete freedom with no worries except whether or not your tan line was ever going to fade.
I was sitting in my front yard, breathing in the lazy summer air, and listening to my burnt Red Hot Chili Peppers CD. I cradled the CD player in my lap as I ran my finger down the small crack on the left side, next to the pause button. I’ve had the same CD player for almost eight years now and the scratched and dented cover proves it. My stepfather recently bought me a new one to replace my worn out one but I refuse to use it.
When he first gave me the new CD player, I accepted with a convincing smile and then shoved it in the back of my closet. I normally would have been ecstatic for the gift but in this case it was different because the CD player was tainted with the touch of my stepfather.
I hated that man.
I hated every curve of his face and every fiber of his body. I despised the way he moves his lips when he reads or the way his left eye is slightly smaller than his right. What annoys me most is how hard he tries to prove himself better than my real father. He was constantly fighting a losing battle for my love with my late father. It’s nothing but a game to him. I didn’t know what my mother could possibly see in him. I remember crying when I first found out that my 48 year old mother was pregnant with my stepfather’s baby. I hated my mother for getting pregnant. It’s like she didn’t even care about my father anymore. I can’t help but see the baby as a mistake but my mother keeps assuring me that it was nature’s way of expressing two peoples’ love. I cringed when I heard this.
That was almost nine months ago and now I was sitting in my front yard, enjoying my last few weeks of being an only child. Before I knew it, the sun began to set and the street lights twinkled to show that it was dinner time. I refrained myself from going into the house because I knew my stepfather was home. Instead, I picked up my CD player and crossed the street to my best friend’s house.
When I got there, I opened the door and walked right in, without bothering to ring the doorbell. Carmen and I have known each other for so long that I don’t feel the need to ring the doorbell anymore. I can’t even remember the last time when I actually used the doorbell. I slowly made my way to the kitchen and began to rummage through Carmen’s fridge. I grabbed a turkey leg and headed towards the stairs that led to Carmen’s room.
As I followed the narrow carpet up the stairs, I couldn’t help but look at the pictures that were lining the walls. I must’ve seen these pictures hundreds of times over the past years but there is this one picture in particular that I’ve always enjoyed looking at. The picture was of Carmen and me ten years ago when we were only five. In the picture, both she and I were dressed up in matching sundresses that our mothers had picked out. I personally thought that I looked like an escaped Oompa Loompa from Willy Wonka in my frilly, purple dress but I loved the picture nonetheless. What made the picture so special for me was the gentle man in it, the man who was holding Carmen and me, Carmen in the left arm and me in the right. The man was my late father.
“Hey Tara! Oh God, are you looking at that picture again?”
“Hi Carmen,” I answered as I walked into my friend’s room and flopped my lazy body onto the bed. “Why do you keep smiling like that?”
“Because the most gorgeous guy has just moved in next door! Go look for yourself,” shrieked Carmen as she pointed to the window.
I gradually picked myself up from Carmen’s bed and traipsed towards the window. What I saw didn’t excite me as it did Carmen. The streetlights obscured my view so all I saw was the weary appearance of a boy about our age who was carrying boxes with his father.
“Oh yeah, he’s gooorgeuos alright,” I said sarcastically as I made my way back to the bed.
“I know! Isn’t he?” responded Carmen, unable to detect my sarcasm.
I shook my head as I watched Carmen go back to the window to gape at the poor boy. I could never understand why Carmen always got so overly excited when it came to boys. Don’t get me wrong, I liked boys as much as the next girl but I could never see myself getting exuberantly excited like Carmen. I began to think about how much Carmen has changed since the first time I met her eleven years ago. Carmen and I used to play dress up together for endless hours. We used to dream about growing up and being able to stay up past nine. We wanted the freedom of being able to cross the street without holding our mothers’ hands. All that came to an end when two innocent girls grew into curious teenagers. We went from playing Barbie dolls and wearing Mary Jane Shoes to gossiping about boys and breaking curfew. Now it seems that I’m the one on the sidelines while Carmen works her magic to impress the boys at school.
I couldn’t help but wonder what happened to the old days when we both saw the world in black and white. Deep down I miss the days when we still believed in the stork and the tooth fairy. I knew all that was gone, gone with the innocence that we used to see the world with. Once you hit a certain age, all that just disappears.
****
I found myself sitting in my front yard again the next day, listening to my Bob Marley CD. I couldn’t help but feel repetitive so I got up and started walking towards the house, in hopes that my stepfather had already left for work. Before I could reach the steps leading to the house, a voice called out and stopped the momentum of my feet. I spun around, not knowing who I would see.
“Hey,” he repeated.
It was the boy that Carmen had been spying on a day ago, the boy who she had fallen in lust with. It was the same boy who was standing in my yard, looking anxious and nervous.
“Hi,” I replied.
The sun reflected off his curly brown hair as he moved a step closer.
“My name’s Dan. What’s yours?”
I traced his face with my eyes, stopping at his. He had the most amazing eyes I had ever seen, the green kind that you could get lost looking into. His eyes were almost like deep pools of pure innocence and soul, so deep you could drown all your sorrows in. Looking at them made gave me a slight chill. I couldn’t help but smile when looking at him. Somehow, I knew that he had a story within him that words could not describe and only his eyes could tell.
“Tara, its Tara,” I managed to mutter.
“You have intense eyes, Tara,” he said, taking the words right out of me.
“Thanks. You too.”
An unexpected cry from next door suddenly startled me and interrupted our meeting.
“DANIEL!!! WHERE ARE YOU?! GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE NOW!!!!” shrieked the angry voice.
“Guess I better go, my dad needs me. See you around,” responded Dan with a weary; almost scared expression on his face.
And with that he was gone.
****
I had trouble sleeping that night. I kept thinking about my encounter with Dan. I couldn’t seem to get his face out of my mind no matter how hard I tried. I constantly thought about his beautiful eyes as I tossed and turned in my bed.
Somehow I knew that there was something different about that boy, something special that made him stand out from other guys. I wasn’t sure what that special something was but I knew that I desperately wanted to find out. Even though I had only spoken five words to Dan, I could tell that he was far from just another ordinary boy.
Dan was amazing.
For the first time in my life I actually agreed with Carmen. Dan was gorgeous but unlike other guys, his beauty was far more than just skin deep.
****
I’ve always been shy when it came to guys. That’s why I felt strange when I found myself walking to Dan’s house the next morning. I knew that Dan was more than just another one of those puppy dog teenage crushes. My feelings for him were much deeper and stronger than that. I knew I had to see him again.
[To be Continued]
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