Woo," I breathed as I wiped away the beads of perspiration that had begun to form on my forehead. Despite my thin sliced form I still had somehow managed to haul up to my room five heavily loaded boxes. Not to mention the arduous task of overcoming the stairs while doing so. Not bad if I did say so myself.

But even still I knew that if I was going to piece together this new room of mine, unboxing and hanging up clothes was going to be only half the battle. The real battle was going to be putting together the tragedy that was my bed. It was no mystery that my poor mattress had seen better days with it's worn out springs and tattered cloth. But despite its' rag tag appearance it was still useable, hence why it has still to this day served as the center piece to my bedroom.

I glanced up as someone knocked lightly against my door. "Yeah?" I asked. It was my mom with my angry birds backpack in hand.

"You forgot this in the back trunk sweetheart," She said as she placed the bag on the floor near my nightstand. Gently she lowered herself onto my computer chair as she gazed around my new room; approval evident in her appreciative eyes.

"I have to admit I had my doubts about moving out of state cold turkey like we did, but I have to say we've done quite well for ourselves haven't we?" I could hear the tinge of pride that was so evident in her faint smile.

"Yeah," I sighed as I stretched out my back. "It's a lot bigger than my old room, I can actually fit both my feet inside the room now," I joked. Mom playfully pushed me as she giggled.

"Yes well, new city, new state, new start. Things are going to be functioning around here mighty differently from now on." Mom determined.

"Sounds good to me, anything is better than before," I sighed, recalling our past years of ill mistreatment. Mom looked at me apologetically as she stroked the back of my head.

"I know things were tough after your father's passing sweetheart, but I promise you things will be a lot different this time. Here is where our new start begins. No one here knows us or of our past, and so long as we keep the cat inside the bag everything will work out for the better for both of us," Mom resolved. I shrugged feeling a bit indifferently about the whole issue.

"Alright, how about this, you finish up here while I start on the kitchen downstairs and then afterwards I'll call in and order us a pizza?" I nodded.

"Yeah, I could go for some greasy sourdough after a day like today," I joked. Mom laughed as she patted me on the head and walked out of my room.

With a sigh I flexed out my arm and rolled up my sleeves as I prepared myself to tackle the strenuous task of folding and hanging up all of my clothes. We were smack dab in the middle of the dog days of summer and since our central air hadn't been installed yet that meant the muggy air was free to burden us as it pleased.

..............................................................................................................................................

An hour and so later a freshly baked piping hot pizza pie with extra cheese was delivered to our doorstep. Mom paid the delivery man while I took and sat the pizza box on top of the kitchen table. Glancing inside the box I was vaguely impressed with how well dressed the pizza was. The even distribution of the pepperoni was especially eye catching. A cat like smile graced my lips as I thought: "I'm gonna like it here afterall."

"You know Camren school is right around the corner, are you nervous?" Mom asked me trying to keep the unnerving silence at bay. Since we didn't have the cable or the internet hooked up at the moment the only noise made available within the house was from the low drone of the refrigerator and the sound of our own breathing.

I shrugged. "Eh, being the new kid on the block doesn't necessarily intimidate me anymore. Its the dealing with the resident tough guys that's probably gonna get on my nerves the most," I said before taking a big bite out of my slice of pizza.

"Ah yes, the big and bad bully. How ever could I forget those years," Mom sighed. Mom was a lot like me when she was growing up and going to school. Like me mom didn't have many friends and she often times got bullied relentlessly by her female peers. And Like the saying goes "Cursed be the product from the womb of a cursed woman." And cursed I am. Unlike mom I literally didn't even have enough friends to even form a circle. But a small part of me still naively hung on to the faint hope that maybe, just maybe I could make at least one friend at my new school.

"It'll be fine though, I only have two more years, then it'll be adios high school and hola college," I muttered.

"That's the spirit, always keep a positive spin on the negative and you can't go wrong in life," Mom grinned. I smiled back in return. Yeah I could tell that the time to explore new horizons had finally come.

A/N: A bit of a boring and slow start but eh...