"You're my... what?"

"Never mind. It kind of slipped out. Anyway, it was nice talking to my future world leader, but now I have to go back to my work. Bye."

"No! Wait!"

She faded out of existence, leaving me baffled in agony. I opened the door, kind of surprised to see my mom home. She's usually busy with work or phone calls at home, but she seems to be on break now.

"Mom? What was my past like?"

"I can't be the one to tell you, sorry."

"What? Why not?"

"Because I said so, okay?"

Not okay.

I walked upstairs, silently fuming and went into her room. My parent's room were usually somewhere off limits, but I was looking for any evidence of my past. My instinct was to look under the bed, and not very surprisingly, I found a boring shoe box. I took the shoe box and placed it on the drawer, hastily opening it.

Pictures.

So many.

They were of a girl I was not familiar with. She kind of had features like mine, but weren't exactly on point. There was a tape that read "VALERIE."

    Taking the tape, I put it in the dvd player and a recording of a baby popped up instantly. She got up off of her feet, making her first steps before tumbling again. The next clip shown a slightly older version of her blowing out 4 candles off of a cake. She kind of looked like the girl in the photos. Clip after clip, there was a bunch of birthdays, sleepovers, etc.

   Then there was the hospital.

   The girl looked like me, but paler and skinnier. She was holding a baby, and so the person holding the camera asked her, "What will you name her?"

   "Amaryllis! It means sparkling... uh... something!"

   Wait.

   What?

   A guy that I've never seen before walked over to her and held her hand. The baby started crying and holding their hands out, like it was trying to reach out for something.

  The next clips were of Amaryllis growing up. The same stuff, but a much different variety. I think I was the one holding the camera this time. Her first steps, her first food, her first day of school, there were lots. There was a clip of her riding a bike. It was good at first, until she let go of the handles.

   "Mom, look at me! No hands!" She giggled, throwing her arms in the air.

   "Amaryllis, be careful!"

   "Mom, you worry too much!"

   The bike took a sudden swerve towards the road, and she tried to grip onto the handle again and accidentally fell over. The camera was bouncing as I guess I was trying to run to her, but then there was a truck that drove right in front of her before the camera got dropped and cracked the screen. The screen went blank.

   "What are you doing?" My mom shrieked.

   "Why'd you keep all of this away from me? Why didn't you tell me I had a daughter?!"

    "I didn't want you to know! Maybe you would've have a more normal life! Maybe if you weren't messing around and getting manipulated by your stupid boyfriend, you wouldn't had gotten pregnant at such a young age! I gave him the boot for a reason! I moved away for you!"

   "Why do you think we have history class, mom? We look at our past t make sure we don't make the same mistakes."

    She sighed and walked into the bathroom, closing the door. I walked out of the house to try and relieve myself with the night sky. Unlocking the backyard door, I ran into the forest, but not very far. Hitting my back against the trunk of a tree, I slid down and started shaking. Strange yucky hiccups were coming from my throat, and the only thing I could do was curl up and let the tears fall. I'll just carry on tomorrow, I guess. For now, I'll just wail with the stars.

"It's okay to be a glow stick. Sometimes you have to break before you shine."