Killing Me Slowly

I stood in the middle of my bedroom and I stared down at the photograph that I was holding in front of me. It was me; well at least it used to be me. It was taken a year ago, but a lot has changed since then. Gone were the braces, along with the huge black glasses that resembled Harry Potter's glasses. Gone were the boyish clothes, and my bad, crazy, curly hair. Now when I looked at myself in the mirror, I saw someone different. I saw someone beautiful instead of the girl everyone made me believe that I was: a freak and worthless. Well, not everyone, at least. Not everyone knew me that well. I was invisible -very much invisible- until he came along. That is: Jordan Tyler. Even saying, or thinking, his name made me feel goose-bumps against my skin.

As I looked myself in the mirror, I felt ready.

My name is Abby Janette Collins, and I was different. More ready than I've ever been in my entire life. I was short -about five feet and four inches- with soft, tan skin, -thanks to the Californian sun- and curves in all the right places on my body. My hair was a soft, clear brown down my back, passing my shoulder blades, and my eyes were a light diamond blue. Currently, I was wearing baby-blue jeans that fit my body perfectly and to the core, a white shirt that was sexy but at the same time conservative, with black converse sneakers.

Slowly, I turned myself around and face the window. The sun was shining high in the sky with cotton-white clouds forming different shapes as they floated around the never ending sky. I smile at the breathtaking sight in front of me, and then nodded my head.

“Please, God, give me the strength today,” I prayed to myself as I took a hold of the silver necklaces and clasped it around my neck.

The door of my room swung open then, revealing my mother’s (Helen was her name) face, with a bright, open, warming smile on her face.

“Are you ready to go, honey?” She asked me, really wanting to know the answer.

I breathed in and out, then nodded my head. I walked toward the nightstand next to my bed and open the top drawer. and laid the picture inside. I shut it close. Picking up my black school-bag from the bed, I walked toward my mom.

She laid a comforting hand on my shoulder, then stroked my hair away from my face -which was down reaching my back- then touched my cheek softly.

“You look beautiful, as usual,” she said with pride.

“Thanks, mom.” I said as I shifted my balance, somehow feeling self-conscious.

“Let’s go before we're late,” she stated, and we both walked out. As I closed the door behind me. I followed her down the stairs and then out of the house. Patiently, I waited as she locked the front door of the house then we walked along side each other as we strolled to her grey SUV parked in the drive way.

I walk toward the passenger door and open it. I slid myself inside the car then closed the door and put on my seatbelt.

“Ready?” My mom asked with a cheerful expression coming across her face as her hand was on the key that was already set in the ignition. Her eyes -very much like my own- were sparkling with happiness.

“Ready.” I agreed, smiling as she turned the key in the ignition and drove away toward the endless streets of my beautiful New York.



When my mom parked her car in the school parking lot, I felt myself getting sick to the stomach. Was I ready for this? I thought to myself, wanting to know all of the sudden. I shuddered, then moved my head from side to side to clear my brain of any bad thoughts forming, then step out of the car.

As I walk with my mom toward the school office building, I notice that the bell had already rang, since there was not a soul of a living person outside. It was quiet and peaceful, instead of the usual loud noises of students chatter. I walked up the steps then held the door open for mom to follow me in. We walked in, and instantly a flashback of high school kids from every corner were laughing as they pointed at me like I was the idea of a joke.

“Honey, are you okay?” my mom's voice asked, waking me up from the unexpected memory that flashed before my eyes.

I blink my eyes twice and it all became clear. No one was laughing at me. The hallway itself was entirely empty. I shook my head, bringing my arms around me as if I were hugging myself from a nightmare.

“Honey…” my mom started to say, but I blurted out before she even finish: “I'm fine!”

“Are you sure?” she asked, concerned voice wanting to know. “Maybe we should go home?”

“No, I'm okay,” I said as I shifted my gaze to look up at her. “I can do this. I have to, mom. I'm not the same girl as I was before. . .” Tears started to sting the backs of my eyes, but I hold them back with all the courage that bored inside of me in the heat of the moment.

“Okay, then let’s go.” She said and she moves her hand up and down my back offering comfort. She took a hold of my hand, and we both walked down the hallway together - toward the office.

I looked around as we both continue to walk down the hall. It was clean, which was, to be honest, hard to believe, knowing how students are on the first day back to school. There was the trophy case, that I now remembered filled every little inch of the shelves with trophies of every club or sport. I suddenly froze as I looked at the wall next to me and gasped in surprise. My eyes landed on the row of pictures as I instantly recognized the hot, dreamy guy in the picture that was displayed for the entire world to see. It was him. Jordan Tyler. He was smiling in a dreamy way to the camera, and his eyes looked anything but beyond this world. It hit me before I could stop it. All the painful memories that thrived within me for the past year . . . of the pain he had caused me.

I shut my eyes, chocking back tears, and looked away from the picture telling myself that when I saw him, it was going to be different this time. Very. Different.

“Hmm, this handsome face . . . sure does look familiar,” my mom said as she too looked at the picture closely.

“It’s Jordan, mom.”

“You mean the one that . . .” She started to say.

I nodded my head.

“Oh, my poor baby girl!” She said, her arms grappling around me and she hugged me tightly to her body.

“Mom, I am not a little girl,” I cried out honestly, and she let me go.

“I know. I am just . . . mad. Lets go before I change my mind to bring you here in the first place,” she said, taking a hold of my arm making me walk with her as we head to the office, which was only a few paces away from where we were standing.

“I convinced you to move back, remember.”

“I know.”

“It’s something that I have to do.”

“I know that too, sweetie.”

“You didn’t have to come,” I said knowing that much was true. I was only here to pick up my class schedule, and start the day as a new, welcome-back student.

“Now, what kind of mother will I be if I let my daughter walk into her doom all alone?”

“A normal mother; who loves her daughter - very, very much.” I said, smiling at her.

“Nice try, kid.”

I burst out laughing somehow feeling now at ease and hopeful. The relationship between my mother and I somehow never changed, even after everything we've been through together, while I was suffering my first, real heartbreak: she was suffering with the fact that my father wanted a divorce so he could marry his true lover. Talk about harsh, huh?

Once inside the office, I feel like I was coming home once again. We walked toward the lady in the front desk as she flash a welcome friendly open smile on her face at the sight of us.

“Good morning, I'm Jenna. How may I help you?”

“Yes, I'd like to pick up the schedule for my daughter. I registered here a week ago, but was told that her schedule should be picked up the first day of school - which is today,” my mom explained, getting to the point at once.

“Oh, OK. May I have your daughter’s name?” She asked as she typed on the computer keyboard in front of her.

“Abby Collins,” I said quietly, looking at her and making her aware of my existence once again.

“Oh yes, Abby. Welcome back!” She said as she finished typing, then moved her desk chair back. She picked up a few stacks of papers from the tray behind her. After flipping through some of them, she pulled out a few papers. She rolled her desk chair back to the desk -with very squeaky wheels- and handed me the papers along with some sort of book.

“This is your class schedule and map of the school in case you get lost.” She said, and she went over the papers with me, explaining what most of them were. “This is a booklet with all the rules, laws and so on of the school here in the district - and your new agenda.” She added handing all the papers to me.

“Great,” I said as I picked up the papers in my hands and looked over at them. I frowned at my class schedule then smile happily when I look down at my schedule. My first of the day was English Fourth Honors -which I was sad to be missing at the moment- followed by AP Calculus.

“It’s there something wrong, sweetie?” Jenna, the lady at the front desk, asked me.

“No, everything's fine,” a friendly smile spread across my face as I look at her.

“Ok, then. Thank you so much, Jenna,” my mom said honestly.

“Your welcome.”

“Have a nice day,” I said as me and my mother walked toward the door.

“You too. Good luck on your first day back!” Jenna called after us, waving good-bye.

When the door closed behind me, my mom turned to look at me with a serious expression on her face “Are you going to be okay?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“OK. Call me on your cell phone if there's anything wrong,” She reached toward me and hugged me tightly. I hugged her back as well, then pull back and she kissed me on the cheek soundly. “Good luck, sweetheart.”

“You too, mom,” I waved good-bye as she started to walk away.

I breathe out as part of me flooded with relief that she didn’t have to baby me anymore. I reach up and wipe off the stain of her pink lipstick off my cheek.

“Pick you up at 4:30!”

“Okay!”

A few seconds later, I couldn’t hear the sound of her high-heels against the white cement floor. I took a few steps forward making sure that she really had left, and sighed. I walk in the opposite direction, while looking at my schedule and map at the same time.

As I continued to walk around the endless halls of the school, trying to figure out where my classroom was, I heard voices down the hall. I walked toward them to see if I could ask whoever it was to help me find the classroom I was looking for . . . but I stopped dead in my tracks.

“Come on, stay for a little while!” A girl’s voice pleaded about something.

“No, I really shouldn’t. It's just the first day, and I really can’t miss it, Kristen,” a guy’s voice. It was deep, sexy, and irresistible . . . but most of all charming and seductive.

“But what about me, I am dying here.”

Wow, this girl was really desperate about something . . . more like doing something naughty - with this guy.

The guy chuckled at that. “I'm sorry, Kristen. Maybe we could meet up later? Y'know after school.”

“Do you promise?”

“I don’t make promises, Kristen.”

I hold the laughter that was building within me, not believing at all what was I hearing? I cover my mouth with both of my hands to hold it in even more since I was about to lose it completely.

“Maybe I can change your mind. . .”

“I seriously doubt it,” this guy -whoever he was- apparently was just messing around with her by teasing her.

OK, that’s it. I'd had enough of this conservation. I was lost, and these two were driving me insane. I open my mouth to speak, when pair of green eyes flashed me with hatred. Then I realized it was the girl looking at me.

Opps.

“Can I help you?” She asks with a deadly glare in her eyes.

“I-I . . .” I started to mumble, without even thinking about it, shaking my head.

“If you can’t speak, you may go. Can’t you see we are busy here?”

“Will you give it a rest, already? Can’t you see that she's lost, and in need our help, babe?” The guy said, voice sounding impatient with the girl already. I heard him breathe out, then he turned around to face me.

My words and everything were lost. I couldn’t think -much less breathe- at that moment. It was him. Even though a year had passed by like the wind, I knew that it was him. I never forget a face - much less his. Jordan Tyler’s face was sculpted like a god from heaven himself, if it ever existed. Along with the way his brown hair fell down his unforgettable, hypnotizing blue eyes -that were like an instant electrifying magnet to anyone who looked at them- and then there was his mouth - with his lips full, they begged to be kissed them all. He was built like a warrior - full of hard muscles, but underneath he was soft, too. His skin was a little lighter than mine. He even looked like prince charming himself. If anyone didn’t know any better. Wearing black, well-fit pants with a dark red plaid shirt rolled up at its sleeves and amazing black designer shoes. I guess -being the rich boy of the school- does have its perks now and then. He was the devil himself but look like one hundred percent angel.

A heart stopping smile appeared on his face as his eyes continued to look at m:, “Can I help you?” He ask politely.

“I . . . well, ahh,” I started to say, not sure if I was ready for this or not.

He smirked, somehow loving my reaction to him. He ignored the girl name Kirsten as he walked toward me and stopped right in front of me. He leaned toward me, to my eye level. I knew I wasn’t anywhere near ready for this. Not even a little bit.

“Can I help you?” He asked again this time in a playful tone.

“No, I am sure I can find my way around.” I said strongly. A positive, right choice of words at that moment.

“Are you sure? You seem so lost earlier,” he said as he reached out and took my schedule out of my hands.

I leaned forward with my hand to reach for it back before he could take a sneak peak and regretted it. His intoxicating cologne filled my nose up, alerting my senses immediately. I ignore it for the time being since I was about to discover. I look him in the eye, directly, and smile seductively to him trying to somehow achieve a distraction. His eyes trace every inch and corner of my face and since he was close to me, I heard him take a deep breath at my being near him, which gave me the advantage. I took the edge of my schedule paper, and I continued to look at him and pulled it out before he could even look at it.

Ha, take that.

I slowly walk by him, -and the girl he was toying with- feeling proud of myself. I felt like jumping up and down in front of them, but I didn’t.

Jordan Tyler was about to get the biggest surprise of his life.