Changes (standard:Creative non-fiction, 720 words)
Author: Irina Delfino	Added: Jul 01 2005	Views/Reads: 3767/0	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
This story is about a girl lost in a point of her life as she attends a new school and how she finds herself again.

Changes 

She was sitting quietly at her desk. Her look was absent. Her mind far
away. Around her, everybody was screaming, yelling, laughing. She 
didn't hear it. The noise of the messy classroom didn't get through her 
wall of isolation. Now and then her look returned to reality and she 
observed the room. Like mime artists were her classmates moving their 
mouths and distorting their faces to laughter. The teacher was 
screaming over the students, trying to keep control over them. He was 
sweating. She could nearly count the drops on his forehead. His glasses 
sat slopping on his nose. A smile surrounded her lips while she was 
observing the spectacle. But soon the pain reminded her, that this was 
just a quick moment in which she forgot. Forgot all the difficulties, 
all the pain, and all the fears. Just a quick moment, worthless. Her 
look became absent again, her ears shut down and her attention went. 
She hardly noticed when the other students started to leave the 
classroom. Only because a girl hit her out of her way, reality fetched 
her back. Disorientated she packed up her stuff and followed her 
classmates. The bell hadn't rung yet.  Wondering where they were going, 
she looked above the many heads, searching for an answer. She didn't 
want to ask. They would just look at her very strangely and say: “Don't 
you ever pay attention?! Clean your ears and listen.” She could do it 
without. About two meters away there was an announcement at the wall. 
Her answer. It said: INTERNATIONAL DAY! ENJOY FOOD AND DRINKS FROM 
DIFFERENT CULTURES! COME TO THE GYM! Great, she thought and closed her 
ears again. Anew her look drifted away. She turned back to her innerst. 
 To her broken home, that teared herself into pieces. That didn't allow 
her to stand up again. She followed quietly the other students. In line 
to get into the gym. In line to get away, she thought. Another voice 
inside her head whispered: “In line to get your life back.” Shut up, 
she told herself off. Hope was the last thing she could use. It would 
only disappoint her again. Trying to ignore her surrounding, she stood 
still in line. Waiting. So turned into herself was she, that she hardly 
noticed the hand tipping her shoulder. 

“Hey, hey. Do you hear me?” a voice asked. 

Frightened by the sudden voice that got through her isolation wall, she
jumped around. 

“Wow. Calm down.” Said the voice. 

It belonged to a boy. She recognized his face. He was in her English
class, sitting next to her. Staring at him, she didn't notice that he 
was talking. 

“What?” she asked brashly. 

He held up a book. 

“Can I put it into your backpack? I left mine in the classroom and I
don't want to carry it all way.” 

She kept on staring at him, then shooked her head and said: “Yeah, of
course. Yes put it in.” 

She turned around and he put the book into her backpack. 

“Thanks” he said. “I'll search you later to get it back.” 

And he went. She nodded. 

The lesson was over and he didn't come for the book. The day was over
and he didn't come for the book either. So the book remained in her 
backpack. In the evening, when she had done her homework and her father 
had gone to the bar to get himself drunked, she found the book again in 
her backpack. It was small and blue and very old. The title was 
illegible. She opened it. The pages were also illegible. She leafed 
through the book and could only read three words. Faith, Hope and Love. 
She closed the book and looked at it strangely. When she went to bed, 
she heard her father coming back and hoped he wasn't too drunked. 

The next day in her English class, she waited for the boy. She didn't
shut her ears nor drifted her look away. When he came she gave him back 
the book. 

“Oh, I forgot it yesterday. Thank you.” He said and smiled. 

“You're welcome.” She answered and smiled back. 

It was just a quick moment in which she forgot. Forgot all the
difficulties, all the pain, and all the fears. Just a quick moment, but 
every second was valuable. 


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