A crack in the cement? Maybe you have seen one before. Somehow I can guarantee that you haven’t seen one before. I know at the moment, in your head you may be asking yourself, what is her point but, I’m not exactly being literal. I think I’m referring to a fifteen year old girl, Marina. She is overall a nice person. She is tall, slim, and athletic and is a natural tan color from her parents who are mixed race couple. Her dad is Nigerian and her mother is Dutch and German. Marina was born in France and lived there until she was two and a half then moved from France to California. Now, I have shared a little about her but, lets get into her thoughts now.

To me, being a mixed person kind of gives me a chance to date white, Hispanic, or black guys. So it won’t look as if I’m in a biracial relationship, which of course doesn’t matter to me.
I’m not really a boy-obsessed kind of girl. I haven’t even gone out with a guy. Honestly, from what I hear, a boyfriend is not really worth it. My friends, Kate, and Jane have gone out with guys before. Especially Kate, she has been dating since she was in third grade. She literally goes out with a new guy every week. She breaks up with these guys and she keeps telling me how I should go out with a guy at least once. She makes it sound like dating is just fast and like musical chairs. Maybe I might find a guy I may actually like although I don’t really spend a lot of time thinking about it. It is my first day of high school and my birthday was yesterday. I started school pretty late so I’m usually always the oldest person in my grade.
I don’t even know what to wear today. I grabbed my long Knicks tee from my closet hanger and held it up in front of me by the shoulders and threw it on the bed. I couldn’t find anything until I dug through my closet and found my skinny jeans. I slipped them up over my spandex and in a hurry I buttoned the two buttons at the top. I grabbed my Knicks tee and slipped it over my head. I put on a pair of shoes and ran out of my room grabbing my backpack while I quickly made my way downstairs to the dining room. My mom made a huge breakfast: bacon, eggs, pancakes, and morning style home fries. I was very surprised because, my mother is not really the best cook in the world. In fact, she is a terrible cook but, everything looked so good. I remember when my mom tried taking this cooking class but she was sent home because she almost caught the test kitchen on fire.
Anyway, my older brother was sitting at the table with a mouth full of food. What a pig!

“Since when do you cook’’
“Just sit down and eat”, she narrowed her eyes at me.

“Can’t. I don’t want to have a watermelon stomach on the first day of school. Thanks ma”, I grabbed a cup of Greek yogurt and picked up my backpack. My brother and I go to the same school now. Lucky me. My brother gets up from his chair and grabs his backpack and duffel bag.
“You have a game today”, I asked. My brother plays football and is alwaystalking about how much work it is to be a quarter back.
“Look, do me a favor and don’t talk to me while we are in school”, he was trying to start an argument.






“Whatever.”
"I'm just saying"
"Okay, fine lets go before were both late", we ran out the front door of the house and sprinted to the corner of our street. The bus pulls up in front of us and we both jumped on eagerly up the steps.
The bus is almost full and people are yelling and laughing. The conversations were running through my ears as I walked down the walkway:
"Are they dating..."

"You know what i'm..."
"I heard she is..."

"Let me see your math..."
"My mom took away my..."
Finally, I found an empty seat by Kate. She had earphones in her ears with her eyes closed and her head was leaned back on her seat. Her backpack was next to her, maybe to save me a seat. I picked up her backpack and gently put it in her lap so I wouldn't scare her but, she still jumped a little bit. Her eyes were wide open now and she shot a look at me.
"Hey Mary", sometimes she calls me Mary instead of Marina.
"Sup", I sat next to her and slip my backpack between my kness and the back of the seat. "Whatcha listening to".
"Pink, her new album is great", she pulls one earphone out of her ear and looks over at me smiling. Oh no, that her bad girl smile.
"What, Kate"
"Nothing", her voice started to go high pitched.
"Kate, I know that smile", She looked at my brother who was sitting next to a blonde girl.
"What are you talking about"
"Don't act like you don't know"
"Okay, okay I think I like your brother"
"It figures. He is older than you though.Your a freshman and he is a sophmore"
"So what"
"Anyway, so Kate, are you excited about your first day of high school", I said as we pulled up in front of the school.
"It's already started", she smiled.
"We have no classes together, though", I pouted.

“That’s okay, just try your best to meet new people. We can still hang after school”, she was right although, for me it’s not that easy to make friends.

The bus stopped, and the squealing of the brakes caused Kate and I to cover our ears and close our eyes tightly.

“Alright, everybody get off”, the bus driver yelled. Everyone ran off the bus leaving papers and wrappers all over the place. Kate and I were the last people toexit.
An half an hour later, I walked to my locker with my schedule in my hand. I opened my locker and put my backpack inside and took out my math binder. As I closed my locker, my brother walked up to me.
“What do you want”, I grumbled.
“Don’t talk to any guys if they come up to you”
“Why the heck are you telling me what to do, Trevor”
“Cause I can”
“No you can’t! Ugh, Just leave me alone”
“I’m telling you for own good. I don’t want any guy talking to you or touching you”, before he could even finish, I walked away flicking him off the way he usually does to me. I can’t really trust my brother anymore. Especially, after Trevor told my crush in the seventh grade that I had herpies. The guy kept running away when I said, “hi”.

I was walking down the hall looking for room thirty-eight B because, that was my math class. The school is huge and is so much like a mall. A lot of things in California are like that. The school has a Z Café and a uniform store inside. The school doesn’t wear uniforms unless we go on a field trip. I stopped at almost every door, walking up and down each hall twice in a row. People were starting to empty the halls. Some people were even chasing eachother through the halls, sprinting through the halls like crazy people. I started to get a headache.

“Hey”, I bolted my head around a little scared. “Calm down, you just look lost”, it was a boy with dark brown hair, he was wearing a shirt from Banana Republic. I knew this because, I go there every week and I remember looking at this shirt. He was Very tall, maybe six five. Im six two, so his height wasn’t intimidating for me.
“Hi”, I kind of studdered. He was pretty cute. His eyes were a light brown color and his skin was a crisp tan color. He was smiling at me but, his eyes were smiling even stronger at me.
Just looking at him made me smile and it wasn’t even an effort for me to smile. I just did. “Um. Im looking for Mr. Bernards classroom.”
“Oh, im going there to. Are you a freshman”
“Yeah”
“Me to. I just moved over here from Maine”
“Cool um, sorry but, I need to get to class. I don’t want a detention on the first day of school”
“Oh, Sorry. Sure. Follow me”, the guy turned around and started walking.
“So, what’s your name”, I mumbled in curiosity. No, why did you ask that, Marina. You messed up.
“My name is, Anthony”, he looked back at me with a smile. “What’s your name”
“Um, uh, my name is Marina. People usually call me Mary”
“Cool, Mary”, I felt him smile. He stopped in front of me and looked right into my eyes. We stood there for a while. “Um, Mary”, he said while pointing inside the claassroom while, holding the door open.
“Oh, sorry. I wasn’t paying attention”, He quickly gave me a smile. Jeez, this guy smiles a lot. I quickly walked in the classroom embarassed. Why did you say that, Mary! Your such an idiot.

I sat down in a seat and Anthony slid in a seat right behind me. He leaned forward in his desk and I could feel his breathe on my neck.
“I’m a little nervous. You’’, he mumbled. I nodded my head, yes.

After school, I was walking towards the bus with my brother. Anthony ran up to me and tapped me slightly on my shoulder and I turned around swiftly. Something about him was kind of bad.
“Hey, Mary”, he winked at me.
“Hi”
“Do you ride the bus”
“Yes she does”’ my brother stood in front of me.
“Trevor, go away”, I rolled my eyes at him. I walked from behind him and grabed Anthony by his shirt and walked away from Trevor. “Don’t mind my brother. He is just over protective”, Trevor turned around and boarded the bus.
“Well, I wanted to know if maybe you wanted a ride home. You probably don’t-“
“No! I want to”, I said a little to loud.
He did that smile thing to me again. So beautiful!

I started walking with him to his car not looking back for my brother. Anthony opened the front door to the car and I sat down. He closed the door and I heard him laughing. It was quiet while he was walking to the other side of the car. He had a red Toyota Camry.
Out of no where a pair of hands covered my mouth.
“Say a word or move or I will shoot you right in the side of your head. I swear to God”, a deep male male voice came from behind me. He had a gun pointed at
me below the window so no one could see it. Anthony got in the car and looked right at me while half my face was covered. I felt a tear run down my face. What’s going on, Mary? He smiled at me. I showed him with my eyes that somone one in the car but, he just looked at the person and smiled. My head started to hurt again.
“Hey, Mary”’ he sounded so evil. “What the eckwere you expecting from a guy like me. To fall in love. To be together forever. Ha! Well, You might want to change those thoughts right now’’, he narrowed his eyes at me.

He drove off and we drove on the road for two hours. I kept looking at the clock in his car. We were in a forest. I had no idea where we were. Anthony got out the car and came over to my side. He opened the door on my side of the car and grabed my arm really hard and yanked me out of the car. He pushed me on the ground and mud splashed all over me. I started to cry out loud.
“ Shut up”, Anthony yelled at me. I tried to get up but he kicked my hip and I fell on my back. I rolled over and started to get up using my arms but he kicked me in the face and punched me in my stomach after I rolled over. I coughed and tried to grasp for air. He picked me up by my hair and I could feel patches of my hair releasing from my head. I screamed and he started dragging me along the ground by my hair. He dropped me on the ground and tied my hands and feet with rope. He kicked me again and I landed in a ditch feet first.
It’s been hours and i’ve been screaming at the top of my lungs for help. My throat was in pain but, I didn’t stop screaming. It started to rain and the rain was coming down hard and fast. The ditch started to fill up with water and I started panicing hoping it would just stop raining but’ it didn’t. I screamed even louder. I could hear and feel my throat starting to give out.

A few hours later, the water was up to my neck. Tears were rushing down my face like a river and my voice had given out. The water seemed to fill up the ditch even faster now. I tried to wiggle my way out of the ropes and then I realized the water was now above my lips. I lifted my chin above the water trying to breathe normally. The water from the rain was relentless. My mouth and my nose were both below the water even when I lifted up my chin and standing on my tips of my toes. I couldn’t breathe. I could feel my brain pulsating. I tried even harder to get out of the ropes but it was no use. I quickly started to get weak and couldn’t move anymore. This is it, Marina. It’s your time.

I felt a pair of hands pull me out of the ditch. It was Trevor. He was on the ground pulling me out and pulled me in to his lap as, I gasped for air. He kept saying my name.
“Trevor”, I coughed and I could feel a burn in my throat.
“Your safe now”

That was the day I vowed I would never fall again. I’ll never forget it. You never know who people are. They could be nice in disguise and the turn around and try to hurt you. They devil messed with me. Ill never fall in love with him again. I’m the crack in the cement and the rose died all because, the Rose Petals Have Fallen.