The Long Journey Ahead

If I told you that after a couple weeks, I finally feel something that's close to feeling okay, would you believe me? Yeah, I wouldn't believe me either. Yet, I do honestly feel fine. I can sleep now without feeling the extreme emotional pain that I felt when I first came here. I don't know why, but I'm doing just fine.

Maybe that's what scares me too. I expected to block myself out from the world and just mope about my problems. My plan didn't go accordingly. I began living again. I'm still sad because I miss my family but things...got easier.

The smell of cookies baking made me finally get out of bed. I sat up, stretching my arms. I looked around in my new bedroom. The walls were off-white, a simple table sat next to my bed, and an old dresser was at the other corner of the room. Mrs. Iero really did do her best to give me an actual room to sleep in. I asked her on many occasions what she kept in this room but she told me it was of worthless value or needed to be thrown away. I stopped asking afterwards since she would never tell me the truth anyways.

She even offered to buy me anything I wanted or needed. Of course, I told her no. She's so generous. It's already too much that I'm going to be living here. She doesn't need to waste all that money to buy me things I could buy on my own with the job I have now.

Slowly, I pushed myself across the soft carpet and into the bathroom. The need to take my time brushing my teeth brought a weird relaxation to my brain.

After getting out of the bathroom, I stalked into the kitchen to see if the cookies were ready. There they were, on a big plate sitting on the table. I ninja-ed my way to the table and quickly grabbed a cookie.

Triumphantly, I kept the cookie in my mouth and ran up to my room. I didn't get too far. I bumped pretty hard into something blocking my way. I looked up to see Frank smiling at me. He took my cookie and ran up the stairs with it!

"Frank!" I hissed. He didn't look back. I rolled my eyes and ran up after him.

He was sitting comfortable on his bedroom floor once I reached his room, panting. I rolled my eyes and sat down next to him. I looked down at his lap to see an Algebra 2 textbook and a notebook on the floor next to his thigh.

I stayed silent while he tried his best to figure out the problems before a thought rushed to my head. "Frank!" I whispered and poked his arm.

The pencil dropped out of his hand. "What?"

Letters. Alex loves letters. I should write one to her. "Can I write a letter to my sister?"

The pencil he just picked up dropped again. He looked down at me. His brown eyes made me scared. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. I won't give them the address or anything! You could even read it after I'm done! I just want to talk to her."

He closed his eyes, trying to make a decision. He re-opened them and looked into my eyes. An undecided look was still in his gaze. Sighing, I nodded and pushed myself to my feet. With my head hung low, I shuffled back into my room.

I was beyond sad again. I just wanted them to know that I'm okay and that I'm not dead. That obviously wasn't going to happen. I should have known that I wouldn’t be able to ever see or even try to keep in contact with them again.

I heard my bedroom door creak open. I opened one eye to see Frank walking towards my bed. He smiled crookedly at me before engulfing me into one of his hugs.

If that hug didn't leave me speechless, the words he would say to me next would. "Of course you can write to your family. I'm not going to tell you can't. I know you miss them. We'll just use my friend's address."

I squealed, jumping out of bed. I was dancing like a little leprechaun for a few minutes before I remembered Frank was in the room with me. "You're the best!" I screamed, kissing his cheek and hugging him again.

I ripped out paper in a notebook on top of my dresser and jumped onto my bed, already beginning to write.

I really was too happy to realize that I just kissed Frank.