Jessica Sorensen - The Prelude of Ella and Micha (The Secret 0.5).pdf

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THE PRELUDE OF ELLA
AND MICHA
The Secret 0,5
Jessica Sorensen
0
Prologue
Ella
I remember when I was younger and everything seemed
so simple. Not that my life was ever simple, but there
was a time when I didn‟t have to worry about the future
or how my life would end up. Only the day ahead of me
mattered. As long as I knew the sun would rise in the
morning and set in the evening, everything would turn
out okay. There was a sense of freedom in that, in the
lack of concern in what lay ahead.
“If you beat me through the sprinkler,” my best friend
Micha shouts from across the front lawn of his house,
“I‟ll let you have the last piece of cake.”
“But my mom said not to get wet!” I holler back,
inching across the grass. “I don‟t want to get grounded
again!”
“Where‟s your daredevil side?” Micha yells back,
leaning over as if he‟s on a track, getting ready to race.
Water rains across the grass between us, daring me to
do it, daring me to get wet even though I know I‟ll get
in trouble.
“Fine!” Without warning, I sprint across the grass, water
soaking my bare feet, shorts, shirt, and hair.
Micha laughs as he runs into the spray with me. “You
cheated!” he calls out, chasing after me as I dance
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around in a circle, staying just outside the sprinklers‟
reach. “That‟s not fair.”
“No way!” I laugh. “It was totally fair and now you owe
me a piece of cake.”
We laugh as we keep running around, chasing
something that can only be seen by our childlike minds.
There‟s an invisible sense of freedom, with no regard to
the consequences of what will happen after I have to go
inside and show my mother that I disobeyed.
That freedom was something that stuck with me for at
least a year or two.
But then I got older.
Wiser.
The complications of life that I was blinded to at such a
young age became painfully visible. It didn‟t happen
slowly, but as quickly as the beat of a heart, like a
blindfold had been ripped off my eyes. Suddenly, I
could see that bad choices sometimes equaled
irrevocable outcomes, and I spent a long time blaming
myself for what happened.
Looking back, I realize the painful events I went
through weren‟t in my control. Sometimes things just
happen, and we can‟t change them. Nor was it always
my fault. But at seventeen years old, my mind wasn‟t
ready to grasp the concept. If it had, maybe things
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would have been a bit easier. Perhaps I wouldn‟t have
fled and left everything—everyone—behind.
In the end, I did run, and it irrevocably altered the entire
course of my future.
Chapter 1
14 years old…
Ella
I trudge home from school an hour early with a dark,
bluish-purple bruise splattered across my cheek, a thin
cut across my bottom lip, and a pink detention slip
inside my backpack. It‟s not the first time I‟ve been sent
home over a fight, and I‟m sure it won‟t be my last. I
have a knack for fights. Not because I‟m a bully. In fact,
I‟m the polar opposite and tend to get into fights with
the bullies whenever they‟re picking on someone. I‟m
not trying to be a hero or anything. I just have a vast
dislike for people getting picked on. Plus, I like the rush
that comes from jumping in and doing something
instead of standing by and watching.
There are always consequences for my actions, although
not usually from my parents. By the time I get home,
my mother will probably be sedated from the intense
meds she‟s on for her Bipolar Disorder. And my dad
will either be at work or at the bar trying to drink away
the fact that my mother has a mental illness. Neither of
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them will care about the condition of my face or the
detention slip.
No, my ass is going to get reamed by Micha Scott, aka
my best friend since forever. Aka my best friend who
thinks I‟m his responsibility for whatever reason.
I still have a couple of hours before school releases and
he shows up at my house so when I arrive home, I
decide to de-stress after chores. The first thing on my
to-do list, though, is a painkiller to alleviate my
headache.
Going into the kitchen, I drop my backpack on the table,
grab a bottle from the medicine cabinet, and pop two
pills into my mouth. Then I fetch some ice from the
freezer and place it on my eye, holding it there while I
hurry and pick up the week‟s worth of garbage littering
the floor. Most of the contents that end up in the trash
bag are empty bottles of vodka, tequila, and beer. I do
find some stale takeout wedged between the fridge and
the counter along with a few pots and pans on the table
that are caked with month old grease. The fridge was
open when I entered the kitchen, probably left that way
by my mother. Thankfully, there‟s hardly any food
inside that could have spoiled.
After I shut the fridge, I sort through the past due bills I
collected from the mailbox and try to figure out which
ones to pay this week. Then I make out the checks,
leaving the signature line blank for my dad to sign
whenever he gets home. It‟s exhausting thinking about
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