Alright, let me begin with the first day of school. I actually showered and dab on an expensive perfume that morning. A perfume my dad brought home two days prior to school. Don't know how he got a hold of it though. Can't say he stole it, or maybe he did.

I mean, my dad works as a garbage collector, and let me tell you, the salary barely bought us enough food.

The garbage collection company is privately owned, so businessman tactics. They pay less and earn more.

I wore a blue faded dress which mother got from the help store. Help store is a place where people who has nothing, can grab any stuff for free. Most of the time, they are just garbage that people doesn't want anymore.

Garbage for them, treasure for us! The dress my mom got was pretty decent and still wearable. I wore black flats bought from a dollar store to match the dress and tied my hair back with a blue rubber band. All in all, I think it looked okay.

But enough with that. So I stood under the lamp post in second lew. That's the street name, weird isn't it? But hey, they can name the streets whatever they want.

For the first time, I waited for the bus. It came three minutes before seven. The bus looks so clean and shinny, it made me feel like shit. The yellow color and black linings on that damn machine looks more vibrant than the dress I wore.

When i was about to ascend the three flights of stairs to enter the bus, a boy, probably my age, ran past me, almost knocking my frail body down.

He didn't look back, he swept up the bus without a single apology for me. Story of my life!

Well, who was i to complain. He probably paid a big sum for the bus services, unlike me who joined as a pauper, using the service for free.

When I got inside, the bus was almost full. So, I stood on the Isle, just as we agreed upon, and the bus started to move.

It took about 45 minutes before we arrived at Saint Joseph. The school is a three storey building painted in red and white. The windows are rectangular in shape which are draped with white curtains. The front door is made of metal, with two doors that opens in opposite directions and meets in the middle. I stepped inside, hoping to be invisible, like air.

And I was air. I thought I'l be alright, but as the days went by, every person found a crowd, a friend and a person to hang out with, except for yours truly.

It wasn't supposed to affect me so much, but when activity groupings began, that's when I found the need to get a friend. I tried, and guess what? I failed!

I was stupid enough to approach a pretty girl. I thought she was nice and friendly. She looked so perfect, she was like the barbie doll I never had. Unfortunately, she hated me for approaching her. She looked at me, like I'm some kind of dirty pebble on her shoe.

It's not that I was ugly, no sir! I was pretty. Maybe that was the reason she hated me? My blue eyes always catched attention. Someone even commented once how beautifully contrasting my ebony hair was with my curelean orbs. My lashes were long and it fanned my eyes perfectly. It got me into a lot of trouble with the girls though. They hated me for it.

That's when the second chapter of bullying began, the pretty barbie initiated it.

I thought I was over that, but I guess I was a sitting duck for bullies.

I never fought back though. I didn't know how. I feared getting in trouble. I didn't want to worry my parents. Besides, even if I had told them, even if they wanted to do something. What can they possibly do? We are the scum, the rejects of the city, the rats that lived off of people's garbage.

Who will take us seriously?

Was I too weak? I guess I was. Looking back now, I was weak, poor, friendless, and gloomy.
But I had no expensive clothes to polish my look, nor did I have enough food to put in some meat, on my scanty features. If I had, maybe I stood a chance again the bullies, maybe they never would have bullied me.

All I was capable of, was to accept everything.

Anyway, four months after school started. My life was a series of home, bus, school, bullies, bruises, growling stomach, endless school work and sadness.

Did you think I managed to brush everything aside and keep chasing the sun? I get swallowed by the darkness every now and then. I cursed my life, my family, myself and the entire world.

But, I always managed to get back on my feet. Who was I anyway? Just some dirt trying to latch unto dentiny's  polished shoe. Being that, I needed to have a mind of steel and a warrior's heart.

***********************************

Anyway, things began to take a 360 degree turn in my life.

How?

Well, it happened on the sixth month after school started. I remember it was a Thursday. We were supposed to bring a round fruit for an activity.

Remember, I'm poor, so I brought the only thing I had, and that was a tomato.

When class began, everyone sat with their fruit placed neatly in front of their desk.

They all had apples, proudly perched on their desk.

And my tomato? Well, its thesame as me! Pitifully shoved at the back of the classroom. My fruit on the desk, me on the chair, positioned on the far left corner of the room.

Luckily, no one noticed my tomato. Its not needed until the fourth period, so no one saw. Besides, I was air, who would care to throw a glance at me?

Lucky tomato! If it belonged to someone else, it would have been the subject of scrutiny. But since it belonged to me, it too, became air.

Fast forward...

It was the end of third period. Everyone went out to have their 15 minute break. I, on the other hand, stayed behind. No surprise there right? I had no friends to hang out with, no money to buy snacks, no worth to be noticed.

I laid my head sideways on the desk infront of me. My tomato, looking as  haggard as I was, lay motionless beside my bent head.

I don't know, I must have dozed off. But that's not what matters, what matters is when I woke up, my tomato was gone.

I was about to panic, but that's when the first weird incident in my life began.

In place of my tomato, was a perfectly round Fuji appe. It was big and shiny, it even have a stem and leaf attached to it. It looked like it just got plucked out of a tree, because the dew on its stem was still dripping!

You probably think I was weirded out.

No...

Sorry, but at that time, I barely made anything out of it. My head was immidiately consumed with one word... Food!

You probably think I questioned who it came from? Where it came from? Is it mine to keep?

Noooo.

What I did was picked it up and shoved it inside my bag. I glanced around, not to search for the owner, but to pray no one saw me.

Hey! It was free food. For a very poor person. If free food comes rolling infront, you don't say who owns this?

no...

You shove it inside your pocket and pray the owner doesn't come searching for it, and even if they did. Deny, deny, deny!

When fourth period came. I was so proud of my apple. It was the best looking piece out of the bunch.

When the weight and texture experiment was done. I kept the apple inside my bag.

It then became my dinner.
It was tasty, crunchy and oh so sweet, but most of all, it was free!

So, fist incident done. Let's get back to the bus driver, Mr Saturnino. Remember when I said he was too friendly. It wasn't in a weird kind of way, the Caucasian was actually nice to me.

It is him who offered me a part time job.

The job?

Cleaning a cemetery!

Scary? Well yeah!

The pay was good though, so I accepted.

That's when Vincent first came into my life. Well, I'm not sure! I think it was.

Yeah.. It probably was

But don't get your hopes up! We didn't actually meet, He was there but I was oblivious.