Freak

They call me Freak because I wear the same outfit every day. Black sweatpants and a black hoodie with the words Dead Inside printed on the front in huge block letters. They call me Freak because I listen to My Chemical Romance and Paramore and YUNGBLUD. Because my nails are always painted black, and my hair is dyed red at the tips.

They call me Freak because someone found out I have a criminal record and decided to broadcast that news to the whole school. Everyone thinks I’m a psycho thug. They even painted black stripes on my locker to show me I should be behind bars.

When the police came to my class to talk about gang violence, everyone turned and stared at me the whole presentation. As if wearing black is now a gang symbol.

They don’t know why I was arrested. They don’t know it was just a mistake, that I’m not a real criminal. But they see what they want to see.

They call me Freak because I wasn’t allowed to graduate last year. I’m redoing grade 12 right now. But getting held back wasn’t my fault. I’m not some slacker who cheats their way through life. It was all a misunderstanding.

They call me Freak because I make art pieces with macaroni and sunflower seeds. They don’t know who taught me how to see the beauty in food. They don’t know making art is therapeutic for me.

They don’t know how I got the giant scar on my neck, or why the words Thanks Dave are tattooed underneath. They just assume and judge and call me Freak.

They think they know who I am from the way I look. But they don’t know me at all. They don’t know my story.

My father left when I was ten. He drove me to a gas station, told me to go inside and get him a chocolate bar, and when I came back out, he was gone. It was all very strange and sudden. I thought he loved me. We spent hours together making art projects in the garage. It was his dream to be an artist. He taught me the beauty of simplicity, and how little things like seeds and beans can be used to make the prettiest decorations. I still use his techniques when I make my own art pieces.

I think I was in shock after he left. I didn’t understand why he would leave a loving wife and daughter. I thought I had a special bond with him, but apparently it wasn’t special enough to make him stay.

Without my dad, my mother took a downward turn. She lost her job and would just sit at home staring out the window and smoking for hours. She didn’t speak much to me. She didn’t even cook meals or pay the bills. Eventually she stopped getting out of bed. It was up to me to care for the family.

My father’s friend Bill took pity on me and offered me a job working in the coal mines. I wasn’t technically allowed to work at the age of eleven, but I had to make money. Every morning before school, I would bike to the mines and work my butt off.

The coal stained my fingers, and kids started to make fun of me. The teachers questioned why I was dirty when I showed up for school in the morning. I started to paint my nails so they couldn’t see the grime under each one. I didn’t want them to find out about my home situation and take my mother away. I knew she would get better with time.

Unfortunately, my mother wasn’t a patient woman. She didn’t want to get better.

I was fourteen when she died. I came home from a late shift at the mines and the police were outside my house. The whole lawn was cordoned off with tape. They were carrying her out on a stretcher. They hadn’t bothered to cover her with a sheet.

When I saw her body, I threw up on her dead face. I just couldn’t contain myself. The police thought I was some random hooligan and arrested me for obstruction of justice. Apparently, I had “vandalized evidence.” As if they were investigating her death or something. As if they didn’t know how she had died. The bullet in her skull and her fingerprints all over the gun made it pretty clear what happened.

After they realized I was her daughter, they let me go. But I still have a criminal record.

I was sent to a foster home the first night. It was terrible. The people there fed me blackened sole and glazed kale, as if a fancy dinner would make everything better. I don’t even remember their names. The next day I went to a different home.

I floated around homes for years. Some were nice. Others were cruel. Most didn’t care about me, but they gave me a bedroom and a couple of meals a day, and that was all I needed to survive.

I took to the streets to find some sense of belonging. I probably spent more time in alleyways and on park benches than in school or at home. I made a lot of friends. It’s interesting how people are so afraid and disgusted by homeless people, when they’re really just human like the rest of us.

There was a boy, a year older than me, named Josh. I met him at a market downtown. He told me he’d been living on the streets since he was nine. He was skinnier than a pole, and his golden curls were tangled and matted. He needed a shower and dinner. I decided to bring him back to my foster home.

I thought my foster parents would help Josh out. Just give him something to eat and maybe point him in the direction of a shelter.

Instead, they kicked Josh out before he even had time to take off his ratty red converse.

My foster dad at the time, Dave, got enraged. He shoved me into a wall and started beating me up. He punched me until I was dizzy. He even took a kitchen knife and tried to slit my throat before his wife pulled him away. That scar on my neck is from Dave.

Last year I finally found my “forever home,” as they call it on TV. The Moore’s are a kind, stable, and loving family. After staying with them for a few months, they decided to adopt me. I had no objections. They’re completely different from my parents, but they’re the best foster family I’ve encountered so far.

Ken Moore likes rock and punk music. He exposed me to bands like My Chemical Romance and Paramore. I showed him YUNGBLUD, who he immediately loved. He has a bunch of old records in his office that he taught me to set up and play.

Amelia Moore is a reporter. She’s one of the coolest people I’ve ever met. She always wears leather jackets and black jeans. She’s loud and bold and kind of bossy, but I don’t mind. She’s the one who bought me the Dead Inside hoodie. She doesn’t care what I wear, as long as I’m happy.

The Moore’s tried to help me get better grades. We discovered that if I actually try, I’m decent at math and English. I was so good at math I was allowed to enter in an exclusive math competition. I had to drive across the province and study with flashcards and everything. It was the most work I’ve ever put into something.

I was so excited when we arrived. We got to stay in a hotel with a pool. A bunch of other students from around the province were there too. We had a big dinner on the first night to get to know everyone. I felt so professional in my black blouse and ironed pants. Amelia had even given me a manicure so I could look extra good for my big moment.

The next day was the competition. It was held in a huge amphitheatre. The contestants had to go up on stage and answer a series of questions in a certain amount of time. It felt like a gameshow. For the first round, everyone was paired up. Whoever won the round got to move on. The loser had to go home.

“Ashley Moore,” the announcer, a balding man in a blue suit, said.

My turn. I ascended the steps to the stage with grace, proud to finally be good at something. I had a family now, a roof over my head, safe arms to hug. I was a senior in high school with straight A’s. I was shocked I had even made it that far.

Butterflies fluttered in my stomach. I took my place at the podium beside a boy named Travis. I sized him up. I was ready for this. I could take him down. Math was something I understood. It was all just numbers.

“Ashley, you can’t have a bag with you,” the announcer reminded me.

I was still wearing my backpack. I quickly unslung it and jogged back down the steps to hand it to Ken. Both the Moore’s were here to watch me perform.

“Could I see that for a second?” the announcer said before I could make it down the steps.

I handed him the backpack, confused. Other than a water bottle, my phone, and my Dead Inside hoodie for good luck, there wasn’t anything interesting in there. Or so I thought.

The announcer pulled out a wad of crinkled paper. “What’s this?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never seen that before,” I said, concerned. It was a thick stack of paper. Paper with writing and numbers. Paper with markings in red pen.

“This is the answer key to the math questions,” the announcer said, scanning the page with his eyes. He looked up and glared at me. “How did you get this?”

“I didn’t,” I said frantically. “Someone put that in my bag. That’s not mine. I’m not a cheater.”

The announcer thought otherwise. I was marched out of the amphitheatre by security guards. Ken and Amelia scrambled behind us, flustered and obviously disappointed in me.

I was held back from graduating that year. No cap and gown for me.

Now everyone thinks I’m a cheater. They don’t believe that someone framed me. They’ve already decided who I am. They think they know me, but they don’t.

They don’t know both my parents are dead to me. They don’t know I wear black nail polish to cover the coal stains from the years I spent in the mines, providing for a mother who couldn’t bother to get out of bed. They don’t know I wear black because the dark colour matches my mood most days. They don’t know how I got the giant scar on my neck, or why it says Thanks Dave underneath. They don’t know me at all.

Yet they call me Freak.