Discovering I was Beautiful

In 1998, my family moved to the city Absanie.  I transferred to a new school.   I promised myself that I was going to become a new person.  I tried to fix up the old clothes that I had.  I even tried to fix myself up.  I tried a new hairdo.  I was feeling pretty good about myself on the first day I was supposed to go to my new school.  Then I got a crushing blow from my younger brother, he told me, "I doesn't matter what you try to do to yourself, you are still Martha the Monster."  I ran into my room crying.  I didn't even want to go to school.   My mother came in the room and tried to console me, but it didn't help that much.   She finally convinced me to go to school.

I was so hurt and sad when I got to school.  I was walking with my head down and I wasn't paying attention to where I was going.  I bumped into a girl that was in the hallway.  Her name was Ronda Green.  She was about to go off on me, but her friend, Unice Lacey stopped her.  I took one look at the group of girls, started crying, and ran into the restroom.  I was in one of the stalls crying my eyes out.

A few minutes later, Unice Lacey and a girl named Jayzmyne Calhoun came into the restroom.   Jayzmyne said something smart to Unice and I, then she left the restroom.   Unice started talking to me through the stall door.  I wasn't really paying any attention to her.  She kept talking to me.  She missed her homeroom class that morning talking to me.  I finally came out of the stall.  My face was messed up.  I looked a mess.  Unice wet a paper towel and wiped my face.   She asked me what was wrong, but I never told her.  She walked me to my homeroom class.  She left to go to her class.  I really didn't know what to think about her.  No one had ever been that nice to me before.  Everytime she saw me in the hall that day, she spoke to me and asked me was I okay.  I figured she was setting me up for some big embarrassing joke or prank.  Things continued like that for about a month or two.  After awhile, I began to feel better about myself.

Things changed for me when Unice came over to my house one day.  Still to this day, she has not told me how she got my address.   I was told by my sisters that someone was at the door to see me.  I couldn't figure out who it was because I didn't have any friends.  I went to the door and Unice was standing there waiting to see me.  She came in and we went to my room.   She started laughing and said, "How many of y'all are there?"  I just looked at her and said, "Ten."  She just laughed.  She told me that she needed some help with Chemistry and the Chemistry teacher that we both had told her that I would be able to help her.  I said sure and we went to work.

About halfway through our tutoring session, Unice asked me, "What was wrong with you that day the you ran into the restroom crying?"  I went back into my cocoon at that moment.  I told her that I didn't want to talk about it.  She wouldn't leave me alone.  She kept bugging me.  I still refused to tell her.  She refused to do anymore studying until I told her what was wrong with me that day.  We didn't study anymore that day.  We just sat there, her staring at me, and me staring at the floor.  She left that day.   She was mad at me.  I knew that the next time we were at school, she was going to ignore me and act like I didn't exist.  I prepared myself for the worst.

The next time I saw her at school, she spoke to me as she had been doing in the past.  I thought for sure that Unice was crazy.  To my amazement, Jayzmyne Calhoun even spoke to me.  Ronda Green just kind of looked at me funny.  I think she was still mad at me for bumping into her.  All three of them continue to do the same thing for the next few days.

Later on that week, my sister hollered at me that someone was at the door to see me.  I went to the door.  It was Unice.  She said that she needed help with her Chemistry homework again.  We went back to my room.  She looked at me and said, "Alright, you are going to tell me what was wrong with you that day or there will be 11 kids in the family tonight."  I looked at her and told her that I didn't want to talk about it.  She pestered me until I got mad at her and yelled at her to get out of my house.  She looked at me and said, "You sure have a strange way of treating your friends."  I was shocked.  I had never heard anyone say they were my friend.  I said, "What did you just say?"  She stared at me with a strange look on her face and said, "You sure have a strange way of treating your friends."  I sat down on the bed and started to cry.  She sat down beside me and hugged me.  At that moment, I felt something that I had never felt before.  I began to spill my guts and told her everything.  I mean everything.  She sat there and listen to me.  When she left, she said, "Anytime you start feeling like Martha the Monster, just call me."  I knew at that moment, I finally had a friend.  Actually I had three friends, but I didn't know until the next day at school.

When I got to school, Unice met me at my locker.   Ronda and Jayzmyne were with her.  They grabbed me and told me to follow them.   I thought to myself, oh well, here it comes.  I thought I was in for a big mess.  That was not the case.  We went into a classroom and all three of them hugged me and started talking to me.  They told me that I was their friend and that any time I felt bad or wanted to get away from my family, I could call anyone of them and stay over at their house.  I looked at Unice.  She had told the other two girls everything I had told her.  I was mad for a brief moment, but then Jayzmyne said, "Hey, sometimes you got to tell more than one person so you can get the help that you need to overcome.  Don't worry about anything.  We won't tell anyone else."   That day, I felt like the most special person in the world.  I had really never had a friend before and that day, I had three friends.

I finally left my cocoon and became a butterfly when this guy named Darrell Jackson asked me out on a date.  I was sitting with Ronda at lunch when he came over to me and asked me out.  I told him no at first, but Ronda told him that I would go out with him.  I looked at Ronda and made a face at her.   She told Darrell to pick me up that weekend over at her house.  And that was that.  Ronda told me to shut up  before I could even say anything.  Then she told me to come over to her house that weekend.  The day of my date, Unice, Ronda, and Jayzmyne were at Ronda's house.  They had went and bought me a new outfit.   They took me to the beauty shop and I got my hair done.  They fixed me up for my date.  I looked so good that I got scared and didn't want to go on the date.   But they wouldn't let me back out of the date.

Darrell showed up to the house.  He had some flowers for me.  We went out and had a wonderful time.  All night, guys kept staring at Darrell and I.  I asked him, "Why does everyone keep staring at us?"  He replied, "Because I have the prettiest girl in the world on my arm."  Then he kissed me on my jaw.

That's the moment, I went from a caterpillar to a butterfly.

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