I see his face enter the room and begin to run. Run from everything that could hurt me. As he tries to reach me, I run, faster and faster. Down the streets of a lost town where no one cares. As the time rushes by, I push myself more. I can’t plead for someone to help me, they don’t care. My lungs weave loudly as I try to breathe. The tears rush down my pale face. I can’t stop now. I can just barely hear his footsteps over my heavy breathe. The farther I go the more my body shakes and weakens. Fear has overcome my body. Fear that he will catch me. Street after street he chases me like a game of cat and mouse. My body is so close to giving up. I can hear his footsteps get closer and closer. Just then my legs go numb and begin to collapse. I hit the cold, damp concrete with my face. His footsteps are no longer behind me, only beside me. There’s no saving myself now. He has caught me………..
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My name is Megan. I’m not like you. I may wear the same brands of clothing as you, go to the same school as  you, look normal like you, but I am not like you. I wasn’t always an only child. My sister died nine years ago in a plane crash with my mother. My father and I were home when we got the news. When he picked up the wired house phone I knew something wasn’t right. His eyes began to water and his voice was choppy. He ran to his room, leaving the cord hanging on the wall. I stared at it wondering what was happening. He didn’t come out of his room for hours. When he did I was in the living room watching tv. He went to the tv and shut it off. I looked at him madly. He came to me and began to tell me what was happening. He told me that mom and Abbie were gone and that they weren’t coming home. All of my emotions ran down my face as I walked away from the couch and into my bed that I laid in for days.
It’s been seven years since then and now I’m sixteen. My father has gotten worse since then. He drowns his pain in bottles of whiskey. Instead of being a father to me he is just a roommate that I never talk to. I have to raise myself. He blames me for it all. It’s my fault they’re dead and it’s my fault he is now an alcoholic. I do his laundry, my laundry, his dishes, my dishes, clean up his messes, pick up his bottles, and attend a prison five days a week. I can’t have friends over because I’m scared he’ll act out and scream at them. This pain has turned him into a horrific man. I can’t go to someone else’s house because I can’t leave him alone. If I leave him alone, he may hurt himself or get angry and do something stupid. He may be a horrific man, but he is the only family I have left.
As I walk through the same halls you walk through five days a week, you see me as a typical student. Teachers adore me for my early work and fantastic effort, but the mirror sees me as a broken child. I walk from class to class sitting as far from people as I can. “Do you mind if I sit here?” I look up from the fragile, gray textbook and see his brown eyes almost covered my his light brown hair. “I guess not.” As the minutes tick by, my cheeks start getting hot and I just hope he can’t see them. I hear the bell ring and rush out of the classroom. She hesitated to answer me and I thought she may tell me no. I watched her movement as the other classmates listened to the teacher.  I couldn’t help see the colors in her face begin to shine brighter like a dead body coming back to life. She always sat in the back of the class away from any human interaction. She tries to hide herself  under her long dark blonde hair, but I see her. I see her knowledge leak onto her papers and her eyes shift from her textbook and back to her paper.
The next day I walk from class to class as normal, but when I enter Biology there he is sitting in the same spot as yesterday. I walk over to the table. “Hey hope you don’t mind if I sit here again.” I could feel the heat rising in my cheeks again. How could I say no to him? I don't want him to sit there because I want to be alone, but it's not like he bothered me. “It's fine.” I sat down quickly. I couldn't help but watch her again. She is more nervous today. As I was watching her do her quiz, she looked up at me and looked down fast when she sees that I was already looking at her. When the class got over, she rushed out faster than the day before. I continued to sit there day after day. She didn't talk much, but I kinda liked the quiet that surrounded us.
Days went by and the more they did the more my feelings grew. Today is Friday and I'm glad the week is over. I walk into biology and he's sitting there as normal.
“What’s your name?” He whispers to me while the teacher is talking.“What?” I couldn't understand what he said. “Tell me your name.” He said curiously. My name? Why would he want to know my name?
“Megan.” “Kevin.” he said extending his hand to shake mine. I couldn’t shake his hand! He’d think that I’d want to kiss him or something and I can not have that kind of drama in my life right now. It was almost time to go when he asked “You wanna maybe hang out? It could be just a friend thing. I’m not gonna try to kiss you or anything.” I craved to hang out with someone and he seemed nice. I almost said yes, but then I was reminded of my childish father.
“I’m really busy tonight, maybe tomorrow?” I said not wanted to completely blow him off. Before I could react he took my hand and wrote his number. “Call me then” he whispered before walking out of the classroom. When I woke up Saturday I wondered why I thought I had to be the one here all the time. My father is old enough to take care of himself! He’s 45 years old! Why do I have to babysit him and never get to go have fun! That’s it I told myself I’m going to hang out with Kevin today and he isn’t going to stop me!
It was one o’clock a.m. before I got home Saturday night and my room was a destroyed! My clothes lay all over the ground, my things that were hanging on the wall are now all over the floor in small pieces. He walks into my room staring at me. I want to scream at him for ruining all of the things that I earned, that I created, but I know that it won’t help anything. He won’t remember any of this tomorrow. I begin to clean and stop when I see a picture of my mother on the ground ripped into shreds. My blood boiled with anger and before I knew it I was screaming at him. I screamed at him for everything I could. He just stared at me dumbfounded. Finally when I was done screaming he said “That is no way to talk to me. You are grounded and you will be cleaning this entire house by yourself.” “You’re calling that my punishment?! I clean this house everyday!” He walks away. My body is trembling from anger. I’ve screamed so I much my head feels like someone is punching my skull. I clean the mess he made before going to sleep in my now almost empty room. I awake the next day with a very sore throat. It’s 9:27 a.m. and I get up so I have time to clean the rest of the house. I walk to the living room and see that he has knocked down or dumped anything that he could on his way to bed. I fill with anger once again. I’m tired of holding all of this anger inside. I stormed across the house to his bedroom. He was still sleeping when I entered his room. I quietly closed the door and picked up my jacket before closing the front door.
I woke to the sound of my phone vibrating on the my pillow. “Hello?” I answered in a groggy tone. “I’m sorry did I wake you?” I jumped out of bed not expecting to hear her voice. “Uh no you’re fine, what’s up?” “I need to take my mind off of something. Do you mind if I come over?” “I guess not. Just come on in when you get here.” “Ok perfect cause I’m pulling into your driveway right now.” She said before hanging up. Crap! I don’t even have my shirt on! I could hear her coming up the stairs to my bedroom. As I try to put on my shorts, I can’t find my shirt anywhere. “Kevin?” I hear her call from the end of the hall. “In here!” I yell. I find my shirt in the corner of the room and manage to put it on right before she reaches the door knob.
I hung out with Kevin most of the day, but at 5:13 p.m. I decided that I should probably be going back home so I have enough time to clean. When I walk into the door he is standing there waiting for me. He screams at me for leaving. I begin to scream at him back, but before I can he punches me. My keys fly across the living room when I fall. I stand up and run out the door before he can grab me. I run a few street away and then decided to hide. I walk into a diner and sit down behind a big group of people. The waiter asks me if I would like anything to drink. I ask for a glass of water with ice. I gulp down the glass before the waiter can even set it down on the table. He asks me if I would like another and I say sure. Before the waiter can get back with my ice cold water, I see his face enter the room and begin to run. Run from everything that could hurt me. As he tries to reach me, I run, faster and faster. Down the streets of a lost town where no one cares. As the time rushes by, I push myself more. I can’t plead for someone to help me, they don’t care. My lungs weave loudly as I try to breathe. The tears rush down my pale face. I can’t stop now. I can just barely hear his footsteps over my heavy breathe. The farther I go the more my body shakes and weakens. Fear has overcome my body. Fear that he will catch me. Street after street he chases me like a game of cat and mouse. No one asks why. My body is so close to giving up. I can hear his footsteps get closer and closer. Just then do my legs go numb and begin to collapse. I hit the cold, damp concrete with my face. His footsteps are no longer behind me, only beside me. There’s no saving myself now. He has caught me………..
He shoves my fragile body into the back seat of his Jeep. I can hear him rambling to himself in a very angry tone. I’m terrified and don’t know what he is going to do to me. When the car stops he yanks open the door. “Get out.” I try hard to get my legs to work, but I have taken so much energy out of them that they won’t move. He jerks my arm and pulls me into the house. I hit the hardwood floor of the living room. He starts to scream. He tells me that I took my mother away from him and that now I must pay for it. He leaves the room and comes back with a shovel. He sets it down on the couch while he tells me what a horrible person I am. I try to concentrate on getting my legs to move so I can call the police, but they won’t move. When he begins to pick up the shovel I remember my keys that had flew out of my hand earlier. I begin to look hoping that I can find them before he does anything. I search and finally find them about 2 feet above my head. I’m trying to reach them, but I can’t. I see his feet come closer to me. He bends down and whisper to me that if I haven’t understood yet what’s going on that he is going to kill me. Before he can hit me I reach my keys and use them for defense. They go into his chest and he falls to the ground, dead. I lay there on the cold floor soaking in all the possible things that could happen to me now and tears begin to rush down my face.