"Perfect," Casy says, forcing a smile. I reply in kind.

I don't like the "forget-about-everything" agreement we've reached, but it's the best for both of us—at least, for the moment.

"Do you want to do something? I have the afternoon off," she proposes, while playing with her hair, as she always does when she's nervous.

I mull over the question. Is it a good idea? I mean, whenever we do something together, something goes wrong. At least that's what these two days have shown me. Anyway, I do want to go out with her—if we don't go out together, how are we supposed to get to

know each other and become friends?

"Yeah sure, let's do something. What do you have in mind?"

"I was thinking maybe.... you could come to my house. We can watch a movie together, you can even stay over," she proposes, this time smiling her usual smile.

Stay over? I don't know if it's a good idea... my mom will surely go crazy and start asking me millions of questions if I tell her that I finally made a friend—or a kind of friend—and that she invited me to stay over. I know what she's going to say: you've known her for two days, you can't go to the house of a person you've known for such a short time. What if something happens to you? What if the parents are drug dealers? What if you feel uncomfortable? What if she does something to you? I roll my eyes at my mom's paranoia. I can't blame her, though. Last night when she wasn't home, I started thinking that she might have been hurt or robbed; things that a person who isn't paranoid or exaggerated would think. Sometimes my mum and I are more alike than I allow myself to think.

I'm still debating whether or not to go to Casy's house. The plan appeals to me and I really want to go, but what do I tell my mom? I could tell her I have a study group and that we need to study for a test and if it gets late I could sleep there...no, that sounds lame. I could tell her about the study group, but I'm not staying over and we'll leave that for next time. I'll think of an excuse for that later. Plus I have to think of an excuse for this Friday... The party! Okay, I know Casy and I just agreed not to talk about any of that a few minutes ago, but this is a topic we need to discuss and it has nothing to do with her personal life... right?

"Yeah, I can go to your house, but I can't stay over, I've... things to do," I lie. I don't want to tell her that my mom is so strict that she won't let me go to her house and stay the night—she might think I'm a "mommy's girl" and I'd already create a bad reputation at school. Again.

"Okay, perfect. We'll take a rain check on

the sleepover, don't worry," she smiles at me again and we leave the ice cream shop.

Come to think of it, we never ordered an ice cream, and no one from the ice cream shop came to tell us anything either. Weird.

We walk through downtown, both of us in silence, eyes fixed on the cement that covers the streets. I debate whether or not to bring up the subject of the party. After a few minutes, I decide it's better not to. I don't want to ruin my first chance to do something typically teenage. I can't afford to do that. I'll bring it up later—I have until Friday for that.

***

I bite my bottom lip as I stare at my closet, deciding what to wear. I don't have that many clothes and I'm not really into fashion and all that shit either, but I do like to look relatively nice. I'm just more into classic colors and simple, plain clothes, without any extravagant designs.

I rummage through shelves, drawers, hangers and still no luck—I have absolutely nothing to wear. I really never cared about this shit because I never went out with friends, so I didn't care how others saw me. I just wore my school uniform and a simple casual outfit to run errands with my mom, but that was it. Now I see that that was a problem, because now that I'm finally going out with someone, I have nothing to wear. This is so frustrating.

After spending another thirty minutes rummaging through every inch of my closet, I give up. But then it occurs to me that maybe my mom does have something to wear, so I head to her room. Luckily, she's not home, otherwise, she wouldn't let me in her room, she's very strict about that matter—well, about all matters.

I open the door and see that everything is very messy, which is strange coming from my mom, since she's a very clean and tidy woman. However, that's not what surprises me the most, what does surprise me is to see a package on the unmade bed, wrapped in a very colorful paper with a bow on top. It appears to be a gift, obviously, and it has a little card hanging on the side. I walk over, sit on the edge of the bed and take the package in my hands. I take the card and read:

To: Hannah, From.

And that's it, the rest of the card is torn, leaving the part where the sender's name should go, blank.

For me? A gift for me? For what? My birthday isn't until September and it's only March. And more importantly, why did my mom have it? And why was the card torn right where the name of the person who sent this to me should go?

It doesn't make sense.

I examine it for a couple more minutes, coming to no conclusion. I have no idea who could have sent it, and I have no idea why my mom has it either. One thing is clear to me, though, and that is that if I suspected before that my mom was hiding something from me, now this confirms it—there is definitely something that woman knows that I don't.

Furious by all the things people hide from me, I tear the paper of this beautiful package, leaving a white box in sight. Curiosity gets the better of me and makes me open it. It is a medium-sized box, so its content must not be very big. When I open it all the way, I see that there is a bracelet. It is silver, thick, and rigid. I take it in my hands and look at it. I can see that it has the date of my birth engraved on the back: 09/04. On the front it says: 

By your side, always.

By your side, always, I repeat the phrase a couple of times in my head. It sounds very familiar, but it's true that it's a very common phrase and anyone could have written it for me. Well, not anyone, of course someone who has a sentimental relationship with me, but who?

I quickly go through a quick list I compiled in my mind of possible senders. I discard most of them. I'm left with only two "suspects"—my mom and Casy. My mom could be, I mean, the gift was in her room after all and the

message could be from her, but she's not very affectionate and if it's really from her, why is the sender's note torn? Doesn't make any sense. Ruled it out.

On the other hand, there's Casy. She could be, although it's still not entirely clear to me. If it was Casy my mom obviously wouldn't have the gift in her room. The name of the author of this gift, though, was broken, which would explain my mom finding out about this gift and tearing up the card to keep me from finding out it was Casy who sent it to me. Sounds twisted, and unlikely because my mom doesn't know her and besides, I just saw Casy a few minutes ago, so when was she supposed to have sent me this gift if she was with me? Maybe she did it before seeing each other? Nothing adds up.

I put on the bracelet and stare at it for a couple of minutes. Who the fuck could be the sender? Who the fuck... and that's when it hits me. There is a person who is very likely the owner of this package. It pains me to think that it might be him, it even hurts to remember him, but all the pieces fit together perfectly. Although... no, it can't be possible. My dad is in Boston and I'm here. There's no way he remembered me these past three months and sent me this gift from the States. He doesn't give a shit about me and I'm sure he doesn't even remember me.

I take off my bracelet and leave it inside the box. I stand up and open the closet door, concentrating on picking out clothes to go out with Casy, which is why I came here in the first place.

I grab the first thing I find and put it on, I don't have the energy to think about clothes. At least not after seeing that gift and thinking about that man who abandoned me only three months ago. As much as I have tried to forget about him these past few days, the memory of him leaving me and my mom is still very hard to forget. I tried to be strong and forget about everything that happened three months ago, but I can no longer pretend that it doesn't affect me, when it really does.

A tear slides down my cheek, and so more, soaking my face. Sobbing, I kneel on the floor and bury my face in my hands, crying harder and harder, letting the pain I tried to hide these days take over me.

I cry, and sigh. I cry over my dad; over how little love my mom gives me; over the way everything has to be complicated when it comes to Casy; over how badly my "new phase" at the new school started; over my past; over everything. And it feels good, it feels good to let out everything that's been tormenting me these days. However, the pain I feel at this moment can't be compared to the pain that will come later. This is just the beginning of my story; a story as full of pain and disappointment as it is of love. The story of the storm that is my life, and the calm that maybe one day will come to it.