Once I hit junior high, the trends changed and the kids’ words got more mean and more hateful. I tried to adapt to the other girls, but no matter what I did, I still didn’t have friends. Until Garrett Rhodes came to our town.
Being a military brat, he moved around a lot with his family, and our town happened to be a few minutes away from the base that his father had transferred to. Since Garrett was the new kid, he was kind of an outcast like me and we clicked. Once Garrett started to mature and become more a man, the girls started to notice.
Garrett was a grade ahead of me. By the time he was in eighth grade, ready to embark on high school, I started to worry about what my final year in junior high would be like without him. He assured me that it wouldn’t be so bad and that we could still hang out every day after school.
He was wrong. My eighth-grade year was terrible. The girls were nastier and the boys were harsher, and I soon realized exactly why they would make fun of me all the time. Until then, I had never put two and two together.
Apparently, my mother being a flower-loving hippie meant that she was all about “free love,” or whatever. They would tease me, calling my momma a slut, a whore, or easy, and since apples don’t usually fall far from the tree, the same had to be true for me.
I started to develop into a woman that year—getting my first visit from “Aunt Flo,” as my growing breasts and widening hips gave me more curves than any thirteen-year-old girl should ever have. Instead of Kyle pulling flowers out of my hair, he was snapping my bra or slapping my ass anytime I passed. Without having Garrett around to protect me, I was on my own, helpless against my tormentors.
My only comfort during those brutal nine months was the fact that every day, after the bell rang, Garrett would be waiting for me in front of the school to walk me home. I didn’t know if he knew that the other kids were so disgusting toward me or if he just wanted to walk with me, but he always came and it was the best part of the day—the only part I looked forward to.
Then the worst possible thing happened that summer. Garrett’s dad was transferred to a new base, and I was left alone to fight off the wolves. My only friend in this entire world was moving over an hour away, far too distant for him to ride his bike to my house or walk me home from school. It doesn’t sound like much, but the distance might as well have been in light-years. My heart was shattering, and I didn’t know what to do or how to act.
My world came to a standstill, and everything around me just kept moving. People were growing up and getting more mature, except for me. I was still that little girl having her first heartbreak. Looking back now, I wonder if life could have stayed as simple as it had been at that time. If only the little lessons that life teaches us were as simple as a thirteen-year-old’s broken heart. Life would be a whole lot more manageable.
Love stories you’ll never forget
By authors you’ll always remember
eOriginal Romance from Random House
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