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Ever have the feeling your life sucks?
Guaranteed that Amanda Evans’ is 100 times worse.


You see that girl? The class clown? The one who just got an F on her report card, and then glued Mrs. Brian’s chair to the ceiling? That’s Amanda. Amanda was so sick of it. Of everything. Of herself.
She laughed with the other students and started to walk home. She could barely take it anymore. She had been the loud-mouthed, childish, idiot of a prankster for 8 years now.
She let herself into the small cottage on the cliff by the sea. She took off her shoes in the entryway. She went upstairs and sat in one of the more comfy chairs in her private library. Many people would never believe that Amanda would ever even look at a book, never less a library. Truth was Amanda was a lot smarter than she let on. A lot smarter. If she was in the grade that corresponded to her intelligence, she would be in 11th grade, not 8th grade. Amanda opened her favorite collection of poems by Edgar Allen Poe. She was distracted though, by the small, quaint wardrobe that sat in the right corner of the room. She eyed the bright orange sweatshirt and green pants she was wearing with distaste. She put her book down and went to open the wardrobe. Inside were some of her favorite outfits. She changed into a pair of black pants and a dark blue shirt with a red spiral on the back of it. The spiral was almost hypnotic and whenever you were to look at it, it would appear to be changing colors. From a crimson to ruby to a nice blood red. She originally wore the neon, blinding colors of green, pink, and orange to stand out, or to hide. She looked at the many small scars and lacerations that decorated her arms, legs and neck. The residents of the small town of Brookshire never liked her. In all truth, they loathed her with utmost hatred. She had never done anything wrong, they just despised her with a fiery burning passion for no reason whatsoever. The kids of Brookshire felt their hatred, and acted the same way towards Amanda, cold and distant. To fit in, everyday she put on a sickly grin and stood out as the clown. She didn’t try in school, she simply became the class simpleton. For 8 years, 8 painstakingly long years she had done this. ‘Yet now,’ She questioned herself. ‘Can I do it?’ Everyday felt like a cruel blow to her heart, another pain to add onto her already long list.

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Ever had that feeling your life sucks?
Guaranteed that Ashley Sullivan’s is 100 times worse.


Ashley cowered in the corner as the two men advanced. ‘Why does the world hate me?’ She asked herself as tears streamed down her cheeks. She was thrown backwards from the strike of one of the men. She kept crying as the blows kept coming and coming, each one harder than the last. She tried to get up, she tried to battle the heavy strikes. Her vision was blurry from behind the tears. She winced as she was hit by a punch, and one man was hitting her with a metal bar. She flung her arm up and caught the bar, surprising both men. Not bothering to make a fist the pushed her other arm forward, hitting her own palm against the chest of the man with the bar. He flew backwards a couple of feet, smashing into the brick wall. The other man’s hits were now relentless, coming faster and harder than before. She screamed and the man was blown back by an invisible force. Both men struggled as the dirt from the road rose up into the air. Individual grains of dirt clumped together incasing the men. It pulled both men down into the ground and they were gone. Ashley brought her knees up to her head and curled up in a ball. Then she cried. And cried and cried, the only thing on the 7th grader’s mind was how to survive tomorrow.