It's long.

It's long and grey and so neutral with those sharp dark corners. Is that carpet on the ceiling? I'm not exactly sure where I'm going but the lady next to me does. She's dressed in the same dark grey.  Hair pulled back, her wrinkles are noticable due to stress. Of course, why would I be noticing this. I'm just a little girl. A little girl with rosey cheeks and pale skin, long brown hair and a sweet hand-made calico dress.

I reached up to take her boney hand but she ignores me and walks faster. It's not like I wasn't having trouble keeping up already.

I liked holding hands. I've seen the kids on the playground do it, they'd sing and dance and smile and giggle. It looked fun.

My dad wouldn't hold my hand. He'd pat me on my head and pick my brother up and spin him around, all laughs and smiles.

I'm not sure when it started. When I'd run to him, or to her, and they'd turn or say they were too busy.

I just wanted a hug. I just wanted to hold hands.

I guess there was something wrong with me. Maybe my eyes were too far apart or I because my nose was too big. Maybe because I couldn't tie my shoes?

My mom and dad would watch my brother play outside in the mud. They seemed to like him. They'd hold him and kiss him and talk to him. So I thought, "Maybe I should act more like him". It made sense.

When I tried my mother got upset at me for ruining my dress with mud.

I stopped wearing dresses. I wore pants and T-Shirts of unusally bright colors and digging in dirt and rolling around in the grass. I was helpful and I had amazing grades. Mrs. Dodge told me so. I was even doing good in made, and math was hard!

But nothing changed.

I'm 10 and and 11/12ths.

The woman I reached out to is my Mom. We reach the correct door. I can feel my heart beat and the lights are getting bright. My mom opens the door and I walk in.

She doesn't follow.

I talked to the lady inside. She was old with a stern face and a crooked nose. She looked like my grandmother but my grandmother didn't have eyes like needles.

She scared me. I lied.

I wanted to do everything right. Because then they'd notice me. I wanted to be perfect, like my brother, like them. Because isn't that the point of living?

To be perfect.

It had been ten days after I talked to the old woman. My birthday. I got a CD.

My cousin bought me a CD player, a cheap one, bright yellow with black stripes on it with chunky headphones, so I could listen to it.

I listened to it for a long time. I'd sit in my room on weekends and listen to it. On Sunday when we went to church and I had to put on my uniform and go to Sunday School I brougt it with me. I hid it in my coat pocket and sat in the back so I wouldn't get caught. My long hair covered the heardphones.

I liked the music. It was kinda scratchy and loud and fast. I didn't understand the words much, but I could feel what they were trying to say. For the first time in my life I didn't want to be perfect.

The CD broke a week later. I asked my cousin if she could fix it but she said she couldn't. My cousin was nice. She baby-sitted my brother and I when my mom had to work. She held me and said I was nice and helpful. She let me hold her hand.

She asked me if I knew who was on the CD and I told her I didn't know. I asked my friend but she just told me she wasn't my friend anymore and walked off.

My cousin started taking me and my brother on errands in her car. She'd play a lot of music- a lot of loud music that my mom didn't like and my dad didn't listen too.

I kind of liked it.

She bought me more CDs which I listened to a lot, but with every CD, it wasn't the CD I still wanted.

I'm 12 and I relived the gray halls again today. Like something out of a horror movie- plastic windows with long shadows and sterile floors and dingey staircases. Offices lined the dark walls and I felt the tips of my fingers buzz with numbness and I don't want to go in there but I half to because if I don't I'll get in trouble but if I do what will I say? What if it's that old woman again? I don't want to keep lieing. That's all I'm good at. Making up stories.

I enter the room and sit down, alone.

My mom is waiting outside.

It's only an hour.

It's an old man this time. I stick my hand in my pocket and hold Revenge close.

I didn't lie. I didn't need to. I didn't need to impress anyone. Please anyone with my awnsers. I wasn't perfect, but nor was anyone else.

I held my mom's hand when we left. She didn't protest this time.