I made my way to my first couple of classes and then to lunch where I said my final good-byes to the few friends I had made here. It wasn't anyone special, no one I had really clicked with, just a couple of kids who let me copy their homework, a couple of kids who I made small talk with during class-shifts, just some kids I sat with at lunch everyday, but didn't really know much about. I never really had a best friend, someone to tell all of my secrets too and laugh at absolutely nothing with. Making friends wasn't easy for me, even when I was younger. I didn't talk to anyone unless I was asked questions especially directed at me, or talked too first. In the seventh grade, I met this one girl, Jasmine. She had short brown hair and bright blue eyes, she was fun and outgoing and everything I wished I could be. We began to get really close. One day she questions a bruise that my father had left on my right forearm. I panicked and ended up telling her everything about my father and my home-life, she swore not to tell a soul and I believed her. The next day when I walked into class, everyone was giving me strange looks. Out of no where, a kid in the class loudly erupted with: "HEY STELLA IS IT TRUE YOUR FATHER BEATS YOU?" In that moment, it was like my whole world stopped. I felt betrayed, deceived, furious, like someone just slapped me in the face with my own hand. After that day, I got teased day in and day out for something I should have completely denied. I eventually transferred schools though it permanently scarred me. It wasn't the first time I was let down but it left a different type of wound, a different type of hurt. I started getting attention from boys in sophomore year when I grew out of my pubescent phase, developed a bit more, grew my hair out, and started wearing makeup. I dated a few guys just for fun, but they all had disgusting intentions. I eventually learned to not put my trust into people, in the end you're the only one you have, and that's the truth. Everyone leaves, or changes, or dies ,or betrays you. I had my mother, that's all I had and even she was hanging on by a thread. TJ always told me things would get better, and for a while things would. My father would stop drinking for a week or two, my mom was making dinner again and we pretended to be a normal family, and then things would go downhill and fall apart all over again.

I got off the bus and took my time to walk home. I passed the third house down the street where I would soon meet my mother to run away to a new life. I passed the blue mailbox TJ always used to run into on his bike. I passed people walking their dogs and continuing on with their life. I finally came to face my house and just stood in front of it. My house was a decent size, two stories with three more bedrooms than we needed. I studied the structured, brown roof and bulky glass door. I wondered if anyone could ever hear the screams of my family members at war, I wondered if they did hear but decided not to do anything about it because they simply didn't care. After ten minutes of analyzing my house I went inside. I quietly opened the door and looked around. It was unusually quiet. Normally when I came home, they were screaming at each other and my dad was throwing every inanimate object he could find towards my mother. It looked exactly the same from this morning, except the chandelier that used to be hanging on the ceiling of the den was laying on the floor, shattered. I shrugged and started to walk up the stairs, it wasn't much of a surprise to me.

I walked into my room to find nothing. Absolutely nothing. Every thing of mine was gone. My clothes, my shoes, my makeup, my posters, the few knick-knacks I had on my dresser, even the picture of TJ and I. I remembered my mom telling me it would be like this, telling me not to worry about it. But I can't believe she actually pulled it off. My dad would flip if he knew she was in my mere vicinity, I don't know how she had this much time.

I plopped down on my bed and looked at the time. It read "3:24 PM". Sighing, I kicked off my boots and crawled up in a ball. I pulled the covers over my head and decided I would try and fall asleep. Besides music, sleep was the only other escape from reality I had. It was like being dead, without the commitment. I loved sleep, I loved the idea of shutting the whole world out with my mind. I popped in my headphones and blasted the first song on shuffle, and fell into a slumber to run away from my life.

I woke up to screaming. I glanced at the clock to see that it was only seven fifteen. I got up and pressed my ear to the door.

"STEVEN PLEASE DON'T DO THIS, IT DOESNT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY" My mother shouted at the top of her lungs. Something was off. My mother never argued, she just took it.

"You... You worthless piece of shit, you. You're no good for anything. I should've listened to my mother," My father hopelessly slurred.

I reached to open the door to notice that I was shaking uncontrollably. This wasn't just the type of shaking you get when you're chilly, it was more. I was trembling. I had anxiety issues and things like this would always happen, especially listening to my dad talk to my helpless mother in the way he did. I knew she was on the floor, beaten, fighting for her life and I couldn't do anything about it. I had to sit and listen to it happen. TJ always knew how to calm me down, but most of the time he tried being the hero, and he got involved which only resulted in him getting a beating. I remembered my mom telling me not to leave my room no matter how bad things were getting.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Just please.. please don't do this, Steven." My mother said this quietly between sobs. Trying to compromise with my dad was like trying to take a bone from a greedy dog, you'll only get your hand bit off and it doesn't go anywhere.

"Oh shut up. You know, I often wonder why you haven't left yet," he was hard to understand for he was slurring everything. "But I've got it! I've got it" he said this in a sing-song voice and I thought I was going to up-chuck. "You are one disgusting, ugly, used, old, slut. NO ONE WANTS YOU! You useless hag" I heard my mother grunt, he must have kicked her.

"Please" she whispered.

"Didn't I tell you to.." He stopped for a second. "SHUT" kick. "THE" kick. "FUCK" kick. "UP"

I bit my lip to keep screaming. I didn't know what condition my mom was in but him kicking her didn't tell me it was good. I was worried about my mother. She always took it and she never argued, something had to be wrong. I cracked open my door and peaked out over the balcony. My poor, defenseless mom was on the floor, crying. One hand was on top of her head to protect her skull, the other was on her stomach. She was in a grey tank-top and shorts and I could fully see all of the damage my father has done. Bruise after bruise cascaded all around her body, some were black and blue, some yellow. She had multiple scars on her arms and legs and an open cut on her calf. My father was standing over her, beating her senseless. He used all of the force in his two hundred pound facade to knock every ounce of wind out of her. I remember the beatings TJ used to endure, they were the worst and this one looked exactly like one he would go through. I studied my father, he was wearing blue basketball shorts and no shirt, I looked down at his hands and that's when I saw the gun. His finger was laying on the trigger and he was ready to fire at any moment. "This is what you deserve." I heard him mutter over and over.

I scanned around my room for anything I could use as a weapon, anything I could use to knock him with or throw at him while I still had the advantage of being above him. Everything was gone and I was out of luck. I ran to the closet and saw an old TV. It didn't work and it was probably in the back of my closet for years, I completely forgot about it. I tried my best to quietly pick it up. It was heavy, probably about sixty pounds, enough to break someone's neck. I trudged over to my door and took a couple deep breaths. I don't know how I was going to pull this off. My Dad continued to scream horrid things at my mother as I listened to her plead for him to put the gun down. It was only making him angrier and this wasn't getting any better. I heard him cock the gun and a rush of adrenaline shot through me. I picked up the TV and leaned over the edge. He was only about four feet from my mom and I didn't want to hit her by accident, but this was my only chance and he was ready to fire. My mom was about to join my brother if I didn't act quick. I angled the best I could as my father continued to talk with fury and say his last words. I finally dropped the TV and the seconds it took to hit the floor, felt like years. It successfully knocked my father over. He laid there unconscious, with a large, black TV on his back.

I raced downstairs and kneeled to my moms side.
"Mom.." I said with hope as I furiously pushed the hair out of her face and turned her to me.

"Stella, honey" she slowly sat up and gave me a small hug. "I didn't think I would ever be able to say that again," I looked right into her eyes filled with so many emotions.

I turned around to look at my father, I'm sure he still had a pulse and I'm sure he'd be conscious again at any moment. I grabbed the gun from his open hand and put it on safe mode. I took the remaining bullets out and stuffed them in the bottom of the trash can, I disposed the gun as well. It might not have been the safest place, but my father was usually clueless and wouldn't care to check the bottom of the gabage can.

I helped my fragile, broken mother up and poured her a glass of water. She walked into her room and within a few moments came out in a pair of pants, a blue sweatshirt and three bulky suitcases.

"You recover quickly," I joked. It was probably unnecessary, but it was worth a shot to get rid of some tension left over. My mother ignored my comment and made her way to the front door as I followed.

"We're leaving, say good-bye to this house. Say good-bye to this life, because we are never coming back." She didn't look at me while she said this, she faced the door. I was taken by how okay my mother seemed. You would have never guessed she was about to be held at gun-point a few minutes ago. She opened the door and I grabbed a suitcase.

We walked to the third house down, just like she had said. I followed her as she walked to the back of the house and into a large white van with no license plate.

"Who's car is this?" I had never seen it before. It looked like something a rapist would drive.

"Don't worry about it," she didn't bother to look at me as she talked. "We won't be in it for long anyways," I was confused about this statement, of course we'd be in it for long. It was going to take a good week or two to drive to California. I decided not to ask any other questions, she seemed annoyed.

She pulled a pair of keys out of her pocket and unlocked the trunk. We threw our suitcases in the van and both got in. She pulled out of the neighbors property and we started to drive.

A half an hour into the car ride, we pulled into a strange security line with many other cars. I looked around and saw the words 'AIRPORT' on a large sign above the security line. I was completely taken by surprise.

"Holy shit, were FLYING to California?" My mom gave me a look of disapproval because of my language but I shrugged that away.

"Did you really think I was going to drive across the country?" She said this with a smirk on her face. I had never been to an airport before, born and raised in Florida, we never took vacations. It was structured and up to date.

"Where did you get the money to buy our tickets? And where are we staying when we get there? How are we getting the money to even survi-"

"STELLA" she cut me off as I looked at her with wide eyes.

"Don't worry about it," she stared into my eyes with a gleam of assurance and it immediately calmed me down. TJ used to do the same thing. "I'll explain everything on the way there," I nodded and from there I kept my mouth shut.

I looked at the time; "9:04 PM" Wow, Did two hours really go that quick? Time flies when you're in the midst of chaos.

We parked the van in a carport that stored several other cars and made our way to the inside of the airport. Everything was white, it had bright lights and many ceiling windows. It was freezing so I went into my suitcase and threw on a black glmr kills sweatshirt and followed my mom to security. All of the security technology was so convenient and savvy. My mom didn't speak a word as we went through security and her expression was plain.

She started walking to our gate and I followed. I probably looked like a lost puppy trailing along with her but I had never been to an airport and she definitely seemed to know what she was doing. We got to our gate and sat down in a seat to wait to bored the plane. My mother picked up a fashion magazine that was lying on the desk and I decided to pop in my headphones.

"What times our flight?" I asked this slowly; I didn't know what mood she was in.

"Ten o' clock," she answered blankly and continued to flip through her magazine. I looked at the time. It read '9:34'. I chose it would be best to not talk to my mom until she was ready to talk to me. She didn't seem mad, rather very irritable. I sighed and closed my eyes to block out everything but the music. This was going to be a loonng flight.