A Day and a Bit in The Life of Me, chapter 1
Picture a girl of a about thirteen years, slightly tall for her age with a slender figure and reasonably full chest. Her eyes are large, brown and sad, delicately framed by long eyelashes and outlined with heavy black eyeliner. Her lips are rather fat and soft, with a smooth cupid's bow. Her nose is in perfect proportion with the rest of her face, but in profile a slight bump and downwards curve is visible. Her shoulder-length brown hair is pulled messily into two small pigtails. A thick side fringe falls over her left eye, almost concealing the tear rolling down her face, pulling a dark streak of eyeliner with it.
She is wearing skinny black jeans, tattered black Chuck Taylors, a black t-shirt that says 'I sold my soul for rock'n'roll' and a dark grey hoodie that is much too big for her.
This girl is sitting on her garage roof, with her legs hugged tightly to her chest. She rests her chin on her knees and gazes into the distance, past the tall gum and pine trees, past the quaint houses and past the boundaries of reality.
As you draw closer to the girl, you enter the aura that surrounds her. You begin to see things from her perspective and you know what she is thinking. Her mind is a frantic traffic jam of thoughts. She tries desperately to order her thoughts; think them out one by one. But she can't. She is longing to speak her thoughts. She feels a familiar ache in her heart as she thinks about her best friend, over in California. She would have done anything to have her best friend, Eliza beside her at that moment.
She feels a wave of guilt about the fact that she hadn't yet told eliza about her depression. She felt as if she had betrayed her in a way.
The puts her head on her knees and feels a tweak of satisfaction as she lets her tears fall. This brief moment passes, and she mentally kicks herself. She had lied again. She knew that she was, quite discreetly, a terrible liar. Sometimes she even lied to herself.
It was as if a black cloud of betrayal was lingering above her head. She constantly reminded herself "You are Paisley." She began to picture the delicate fabric after which she had been named. How very appropriate. She tried so hard to escape the fact that she was emotionally delicate, but her strong will wouldn''t let her forget who she really was; a lonely, missunderstood, delicate girl.
Paisley carefully lowers herself off the roof, but scrapes her stomach on the edge of the tin roof. She ignores it and goes into her room.
She despises her room. A constant reminder of what she has, what she wants and what she will never have. It is quite a large room, with hideous maroon walls and two thin calico curtains hanging limply in front of the large window. One wall is covered with posters, mainly of Green Day, with glow in the dark stars scattered here and there amongst them. There are two large Green day posters: one is a promo shot of Billie Joe, Mike and Tre posing on front of the heart grenade and zappy guy. The other is a 'Rolling Stone' magazine cover with a picture of the guys and the caption 'GREEN DAY how the brats grew up, bashed Bush and conquered the world'.
Paisley looks at the poster and thinks about her hero, Billie Joe. She sees a lot of herself in him. She lies on her bed and wants to rip up the orange bedspread. It is like a bright beacon amidst the darkness of her depression. She takes off her jacket and throws it atop the pile of clothes on her chair.
She takes a purple notebook out of a drawer in the bedside table and scribbles down part of a song she had thought up while she was on the roof. She humms a slightly sad, catchy tune as she writes:
Staring off to the distance
Despite my lack of home
I feel a little different
Sort of torn
Between two very different things
I don't know why I'm crying
I guess I'll never know
But right now this feels
A little more like home
When she is done, she closes the notebook and walks into the family room. She is about to turn on the computer and put her song in a journal on GSB, but thinks better of it. She has a better idea...
Paisley goes back into her room, opens her notebook and begins to write. She records in great description her feelings, thoughts and actions. She tries as hard as possible to record these things in full truthfulness and detail. She is planning to submit her descriptive story on GSB. She wants to let it out, to try to explain the burden she feels thrust upon herself. As she finishes writing, she plans the general format of her story. She is getting tired of writing, but is determined to record every one of her thoughts before she puts her notebook away for the night. She closes off, snaps the book shut and lays on her bed, staring at the ceiling and thinking things over.
*
Paisley is sitting on a bench at the train station, waiting for the bus. She is listening to her ipod. The song she is listening to is 'Coming Clean' by Green Day. The switches off her ipod and puts it into her schoolbag, and out comes the purple notebook. She writes out the chorus to the song she had written the day before:
So let me cry and let me bleed
I suppose that now I'm taking heed
But will never really be sure where I belong
So let me wish and let me dream
It's so unfair I wanna scream
But now I'm living
In a different world
Her bus is late again. She reluctantly closes her notebook and gets up. She has to catch the schoolbus again. Oh, how she hated the schoolbus.
*
Paisley is sitting on a desk, in homegroup. The teacher just handed her a pink slip. Oh joy, another detention. This time it's for talking in chapel. Paisley hates her school with a fiery passion. As she writes her account in the purple notebook, she curses her school; It's authority, it's religiousness.
*
It is first period. What a wonderful start to the day, double maths. She cried again that morning. she sits, writing and fights back tears. She had cried on the schoolbus, while she listened to 'Good Riddance.'
"Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road," It is.
"Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go," That line had provoked her tears. "It's not," she whispered to herself.
"So make the best of this test and don't ask why, it's not a question but a lesson learned in time," Why, why, why?
"It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right, I hope you had the time of your life."
If that wasn't depressing enough, chapel really did the trick. Everybody sitting up straight, like clones. They were forced to watch a video about how much God loved and cared for them. Paisley had wanted to puke. She had also felt superior to those morons; she knew there was no god. After all, if He really was so loving and caring why was he dumping everyone's burdens onto her? Paisley's eyes filled with tears.
Paisley's friend Ruby, rips the notebook out of Paisley's hand.
"Stop doing that!" she said bossily. Boy, could she be a bicth. Paisley snatches her book back and continues to write. The idiotic maths teacher doesn't notice Paisley is paying no attention to her stupid lecture on fractions.
"What is your problem today?" asks Ruby. Paisley ignores her. The teacher notices Paisley's notebook and tells her to put it away. She does so, folornely.
Ruby says "Why did you write 'gullible' on your arm?" Paisley picks up a pen and writes 'gullible' on her arm. Paisley was feeling too tired and depressed to talk. All she felt like doing was going on GSB. GSB had been down the previous night and already Paisley was missing her cyber-life. She starts to think of painless ways to commit suicide. She plans what she would write in her suicide note:
I have decided to end my life, but don't be sad because you will get over it quickly; you won't even notice I'm gone. Tell Eliza I love her and will always be with her..."
She had actually thought of most of it in the bus that morning.
Paisley sits at a table near the canteen, waiting for Ruby. Her friend Sam sits next to her and says "What are you doing?"
"Writing something," says Paisley, not wanting to go into detail. Ruby arrives and Paisley shuts her book.
The goal of discipline is to develop a form of discipline that respects each person's dignity and helps to build them into a responsible adult...
Paisley is in detention, being forced to copy out a sheet on discipline. She scoffs at the lines she has to write. She doesn't want to be a responsible adult, goddammit, she wants to be a rockstar! A familiar thought crosses her mind.
"Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go," She touches the thin scars on her wrist and fights back tears again. Time wasn't grabbing her by the wrist and she had no idea where to go. Paisley forces herself to close her notebook, as there are lines to be written. With a sigh, she starts to copy out another chunk of text.
Once again you see a girl sitting on the garage roof. The same girl that has revealed to you her thoughts and feelings over the last day and a bit. She is once again writing in her purple notebook. But now, amidst her depression there is a small shimmer of triumph. As she closes off for the last time she feels satisfied. She types her journal into the 'submit story' box on GSB and clicks the 'submit' button. Her soul, all summed up in a hyperlink.
You have just spent a day and a bit in my shoes.
THE END
She is wearing skinny black jeans, tattered black Chuck Taylors, a black t-shirt that says 'I sold my soul for rock'n'roll' and a dark grey hoodie that is much too big for her.
This girl is sitting on her garage roof, with her legs hugged tightly to her chest. She rests her chin on her knees and gazes into the distance, past the tall gum and pine trees, past the quaint houses and past the boundaries of reality.
As you draw closer to the girl, you enter the aura that surrounds her. You begin to see things from her perspective and you know what she is thinking. Her mind is a frantic traffic jam of thoughts. She tries desperately to order her thoughts; think them out one by one. But she can't. She is longing to speak her thoughts. She feels a familiar ache in her heart as she thinks about her best friend, over in California. She would have done anything to have her best friend, Eliza beside her at that moment.
She feels a wave of guilt about the fact that she hadn't yet told eliza about her depression. She felt as if she had betrayed her in a way.
The puts her head on her knees and feels a tweak of satisfaction as she lets her tears fall. This brief moment passes, and she mentally kicks herself. She had lied again. She knew that she was, quite discreetly, a terrible liar. Sometimes she even lied to herself.
It was as if a black cloud of betrayal was lingering above her head. She constantly reminded herself "You are Paisley." She began to picture the delicate fabric after which she had been named. How very appropriate. She tried so hard to escape the fact that she was emotionally delicate, but her strong will wouldn''t let her forget who she really was; a lonely, missunderstood, delicate girl.
Paisley carefully lowers herself off the roof, but scrapes her stomach on the edge of the tin roof. She ignores it and goes into her room.
She despises her room. A constant reminder of what she has, what she wants and what she will never have. It is quite a large room, with hideous maroon walls and two thin calico curtains hanging limply in front of the large window. One wall is covered with posters, mainly of Green Day, with glow in the dark stars scattered here and there amongst them. There are two large Green day posters: one is a promo shot of Billie Joe, Mike and Tre posing on front of the heart grenade and zappy guy. The other is a 'Rolling Stone' magazine cover with a picture of the guys and the caption 'GREEN DAY how the brats grew up, bashed Bush and conquered the world'.
Paisley looks at the poster and thinks about her hero, Billie Joe. She sees a lot of herself in him. She lies on her bed and wants to rip up the orange bedspread. It is like a bright beacon amidst the darkness of her depression. She takes off her jacket and throws it atop the pile of clothes on her chair.
She takes a purple notebook out of a drawer in the bedside table and scribbles down part of a song she had thought up while she was on the roof. She humms a slightly sad, catchy tune as she writes:
Staring off to the distance
Despite my lack of home
I feel a little different
Sort of torn
Between two very different things
I don't know why I'm crying
I guess I'll never know
But right now this feels
A little more like home
When she is done, she closes the notebook and walks into the family room. She is about to turn on the computer and put her song in a journal on GSB, but thinks better of it. She has a better idea...
Paisley goes back into her room, opens her notebook and begins to write. She records in great description her feelings, thoughts and actions. She tries as hard as possible to record these things in full truthfulness and detail. She is planning to submit her descriptive story on GSB. She wants to let it out, to try to explain the burden she feels thrust upon herself. As she finishes writing, she plans the general format of her story. She is getting tired of writing, but is determined to record every one of her thoughts before she puts her notebook away for the night. She closes off, snaps the book shut and lays on her bed, staring at the ceiling and thinking things over.
*
Paisley is sitting on a bench at the train station, waiting for the bus. She is listening to her ipod. The song she is listening to is 'Coming Clean' by Green Day. The switches off her ipod and puts it into her schoolbag, and out comes the purple notebook. She writes out the chorus to the song she had written the day before:
So let me cry and let me bleed
I suppose that now I'm taking heed
But will never really be sure where I belong
So let me wish and let me dream
It's so unfair I wanna scream
But now I'm living
In a different world
Her bus is late again. She reluctantly closes her notebook and gets up. She has to catch the schoolbus again. Oh, how she hated the schoolbus.
*
Paisley is sitting on a desk, in homegroup. The teacher just handed her a pink slip. Oh joy, another detention. This time it's for talking in chapel. Paisley hates her school with a fiery passion. As she writes her account in the purple notebook, she curses her school; It's authority, it's religiousness.
*
It is first period. What a wonderful start to the day, double maths. She cried again that morning. she sits, writing and fights back tears. She had cried on the schoolbus, while she listened to 'Good Riddance.'
"Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road," It is.
"Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go," That line had provoked her tears. "It's not," she whispered to herself.
"So make the best of this test and don't ask why, it's not a question but a lesson learned in time," Why, why, why?
"It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right, I hope you had the time of your life."
If that wasn't depressing enough, chapel really did the trick. Everybody sitting up straight, like clones. They were forced to watch a video about how much God loved and cared for them. Paisley had wanted to puke. She had also felt superior to those morons; she knew there was no god. After all, if He really was so loving and caring why was he dumping everyone's burdens onto her? Paisley's eyes filled with tears.
Paisley's friend Ruby, rips the notebook out of Paisley's hand.
"Stop doing that!" she said bossily. Boy, could she be a bicth. Paisley snatches her book back and continues to write. The idiotic maths teacher doesn't notice Paisley is paying no attention to her stupid lecture on fractions.
"What is your problem today?" asks Ruby. Paisley ignores her. The teacher notices Paisley's notebook and tells her to put it away. She does so, folornely.
Ruby says "Why did you write 'gullible' on your arm?" Paisley picks up a pen and writes 'gullible' on her arm. Paisley was feeling too tired and depressed to talk. All she felt like doing was going on GSB. GSB had been down the previous night and already Paisley was missing her cyber-life. She starts to think of painless ways to commit suicide. She plans what she would write in her suicide note:
I have decided to end my life, but don't be sad because you will get over it quickly; you won't even notice I'm gone. Tell Eliza I love her and will always be with her..."
She had actually thought of most of it in the bus that morning.
Paisley sits at a table near the canteen, waiting for Ruby. Her friend Sam sits next to her and says "What are you doing?"
"Writing something," says Paisley, not wanting to go into detail. Ruby arrives and Paisley shuts her book.
The goal of discipline is to develop a form of discipline that respects each person's dignity and helps to build them into a responsible adult...
Paisley is in detention, being forced to copy out a sheet on discipline. She scoffs at the lines she has to write. She doesn't want to be a responsible adult, goddammit, she wants to be a rockstar! A familiar thought crosses her mind.
"Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go," She touches the thin scars on her wrist and fights back tears again. Time wasn't grabbing her by the wrist and she had no idea where to go. Paisley forces herself to close her notebook, as there are lines to be written. With a sigh, she starts to copy out another chunk of text.
Once again you see a girl sitting on the garage roof. The same girl that has revealed to you her thoughts and feelings over the last day and a bit. She is once again writing in her purple notebook. But now, amidst her depression there is a small shimmer of triumph. As she closes off for the last time she feels satisfied. She types her journal into the 'submit story' box on GSB and clicks the 'submit' button. Her soul, all summed up in a hyperlink.
You have just spent a day and a bit in my shoes.
THE END
