"I had paid the room a lot of attention, but not the man in the suit. I studied him carefully. He had brown eyes and light brown hair. His hair was slightly wavy. I looked carefully at him. For some reason, I kept on thinking I recognized him. You’re hallucinating, I told myself. You don’t know him. How could you? You don’t know anyone as cruel as him. Still I couldn’t shake off the feeling. I looked at him even closer just to prove that I was hallucinating. But I wasn’t. I knew him. This man was once the closest person to me. I knew him well."
Chapter 1
I’m not sure when it started. All I know is that when it did, it happened fast. The screaming, the shouting, the slamming of doors, the pain, the rejection…The list goes on and on and on. No one wanted it to happen. It just did. And it felt bad. Life felt like a jail cell. Only thousands of times worse. It felt like an asthma attack, while having a stroke, while getting open-stomach surgery when you’re awake and fully conscious. Every breath felt like the last. Doing anything was too painful. Even thinking. And I had a lot I could think about. The first time it happened, the confusion and anger that followed. The last time it happened but surely not the very last. Everything drifted apart. At least, that was what it felt like. It was really jumbling together. My life was a mess. And it still is. I’m just too numb to feel it. Someone could slice me to tiny pieces and I wouldn’t feel a thing. I’m beyond pain. But that’s probably a good thing considering the situation I’m in. No one else has it worse. And I have only myself to blame. I’m the only reason I’m here. I can only be mad at myself. I can’t go back. I have to keep going forwards or get killed. Those are my only options.
I’m not what or who you think I am. I don’t even know myself that well anymore. I used to be the president of the student body at my school. Top student. Cheerleader. Pride of the family. Heiress. Big sister. Fun. Outgoing. I was on top of the world. I was everything everyone wanted. The model girls dream of being, the girl boys gawk at, the big sister everyone wanted and the child that parents dream of. I had everything. But I blew it. I unknowingly chose another life. I’m not on drugs and I’m not pregnant. From where I am now, those mistakes look like child’s play. Those mistakes are better than the ones I made. It doesn’t take a genius to know that.
My dad works for the CIA. My mom is a Secret Service agent. I was born in Canada. My younger sister is nine years old, six years younger than I am. My whole family has brown eyes. My sister and I both have straight, blonde hair, the colour of hay. My mom used to, but she dyed it red and got it curled. My dad has light brown hair that is slightly wavy. Except for our brown eyes, we were the classic American family. The ones that people always assume Americans look like. The kind that always looks nice even when they’ve just woken up or gotten into a fight.
Because of my parents, I knew a lot about things I probably wasn’t supposed to know. Terrorist attacks, attacks against the president… But it was my dad’s job that interested me. To me, it seemed exciting. It was what I wanted as a career. I had the skills and the brains for it. But being smart and clever aren’t always a good thing. It was because of them that got me here in the first place. Here, in this dreadful place that I’m dying in.
