It’s the dawn , the sunlight has just began to appear so brightly , it is impossible to raise your head and look up to see the birds flying in the sky .. At the wood it is still dark , the trees are still sleeping , the birds are singing sad melodies and the day wood creatures are getting ready for the wake up call . Inside all of this routine , on a black stone next to the river , a little white tinny girl is laying there , her clothes are ripped , her very white skin is all covered by the blood , she is sleeping with her eyes opened , no ! wait .. Maybe she is not sleeping , maybe she is already gone , I mean she might be dead ..How is that happened ? who did this to this lonely broken angel ?
Let’s get back to the start when all of this has began ..
Chapter two-2-
SPRING OF 1990 , was the first date of a beautiful girl named Lisa and a popular guy of her old school named JAKE , they were lovers from the first sight , Lisa felled in love with Jake when she first saw him , and JAKE felled in love with Lisa when he first kissed her at their first date , they were young and they cared about absolutely nothing , they lived each day as if there is no tomorrow , 6 months after going out , they have realized that they can’t live without each other , so they have decided to live together in the same house , Jake was broke he didn’t have a real job so he didn’t have a real house , he was living as a roommate with his friend at a very small dirty studio in a gangster’s hood , he was addicted to everything : drugs , weed , smoke , alcohol but also to Lisa .. He has a mad love towards Lisa , she was his everything , she was the smoke of his cigarette . But Lisa was a bit different from him , yes she loved him in a insane way too , yes she lived life as an adventure , yes she had crazy mind , but at least , she had a job and a house , she was a waitress in a snack , her salary was good enough to bring her some food and maybe a cheap lipstick if she gets some good tips from men , and concerning the house , well , it belonged to her dead parents . So Jake moved on to LISA’s home and they lived there for the next seven years . Things were pretty much okay during that time , they used to fight a lot but no fight lasted until the next day , LISA was mezmorized by JAKE , but she still felt sometimes very tired , because she handled everything by herself , she was responsible of all the bills , she was even paying for drugs and alcohol for her boyfriend , while JAKE gave her nothing but his sincere deep love . At the seventh year , LISA was accidently pregnant , she was happy , she couldn’t wait to tell her lover , she waited for him all day and when he finally came and knew the truth , his reaction was not really delightful , and it’s on that day when everything changed … Jake was jealous of the unborn baby , and scared of the responsibility , so he made LISA to choose between him and their child , the poor woman was so shocked and sad , but she was mad too and disappointed as hell , so she chose the baby , broke up with JAKE , and moved to the city .
Chapter three-3-
WINTER OF 2010 , LISA was living with her new husband ‘’doctor lee’’ in the city with JAKE’s baby , she gave birth to a girl and named her NORA , Doctor Lee helped LISA at raising her child and loved NORA as if she was his real kid , of course NORA knew that he wasn’t her real father since Doctor LEE is originally from China , but she loved him so much .. LISA was grateful for the new life that she had with her new family , she used to always say that she was blessed to meet Doctor LEE because he literally saved her from trash , when she came to the city she was nothing but a broken hearted , broken pocket and pregnant small town girl , Doctor LEE found her sleeping at the street , he felt pity for her so he picked her up to his house , first she was working as his house keeper , but a few months later , he felt in love with her and married her .
It is true that NORA was living miles away from her dad’s town , and that she never met him , but she physically looked a lot like him , she had his blond hair , she had his green eyes , she had his very white skin , the one thing that NORA had not in common with her father ,was the beauty mark under the left eye of her face , in fact , it didn’t look like a beauty mark at all , it looked more like a burned skin , the rest of her face skin was so smooth and white and clean which only made her beauty mark look worse , because it was black , and big and covering almost the whole left side of her face , she called it an ugly mark because it only made her look ugly . The kids made huge fun of her when she was at primary school , they used to call her ‘’Ugly face ‘’ , no one wanted to play with her or even eat with her at the same table , she had a really hard time at making friends , but in the same time she couldn’t tell anything of what really happens to her at school to her parents , she lived as a lonely little girl for several years , until she finally met this girl Sara who was nice to her so they’ve become best friends , the presence of Sara in Nora’s life was very important , because NORA was too affected by the bullying and her skin problem to the point that she became really shy and not socially active .. SARA kind of changed that ….well , at least a little bit .
Chapter Four -4-
AUTOMN OF 2014 , NORA was 17 years old, she was a good student –already on her senior year - , she looked taller on this year , her woman’s curves showed up , her breast was bigger , her hair was longer , her curves was clearer the little girl was turning to a real woman , a real woman with no love life , she blamed her ugly skin for that , that left side of her face made her loose confident in herself ; at that time SARA was 17 years old too , but it seemed that she had more ‘’fun’’ in her life than her best friend , while SARA was going out every night to party with popular handsome boys , NORA stayed at home doing the exact same thing every single day : eating her dinner – studing for hours – grabbing some late night snacks – reading a book – eating again then sleeping at dawn . NORA was the first student in her class , she was getting smarter every night and fatter too ..i mean the second thing she liked besides reading books was food .
One day SARA was invited to this cool party at her boyfriend’s house , so she decided to bring NORA with her in order to make her feel a little bit more confident about her look , of course NORA was totally against the idea at first ; “why a fat ugly geek face like me should go to a cool party with you , they will hate me and you’ll get only embarrassed with my company ‘’ NORA said . Of course , SARA wasn’t the kind of girls that easily give up , so she came to NORA’S house the next day with a big bag full of make up and hair accessories , she putted the finest make up on NORA's face and did to her a really beautiful hair cut that covers the left side of her face , NORA was happy with the result so she wore her favorite dress and went with SARA to that party after spraying her hair several time in order to cover the Ugly mark .
It’s 10Pm , the girls are in the boyfriend’s house , SARA introduced NORA to some guy then left her and jumped in her boyfriend’s lap , the guy with NORA seemed to like her a lot , he was smiling at her , offering her drinks , and kind of making fun of her because that was her first time tasting alcohol , after three hours of a lot of drinks , NORA was feeling dizzy , the guy has used the situation to pick her up to a bedroom upstairs , he layed her down at the bed , and they started kissing , the guy looked right through NORA’s eyes , he couldn’t see all of her face , so he tried to take off the hair out off her face , and it’s in that moment when the drunk jerk guy was shocked and screamed :”what the hell is that , you are a freak ‘’ , NORA was embarrassed , she left the bedroom quickly and rushed to the stairs crying , she opened the door took a taxi and went home . NORA refused to tell her mother the reason of her sadness , all what she said was : ‘’ I’m okay mum , I just had a fight with SARA , please give me some space .’’ NORA was so sad she cried all night long ..
Chapter Five -5-
Days passed by at the same year, what happened at the party was almost like history NORA forgot about it and so as the guy , or at least she’s trying to forget about it too and keep moving forward ,
LISA was working with her husband as a nurse so they came home together every night to find NORA waiting for them at home . In one frozen night , it started raining , the storm was so strong , and NORA’S parents were already in the car coming back home , Doctor LEE was driving as safe as possible , but unfortunately that didn’t help him when a big van hitted his car and throw it to the river , the accident was so terrible , people were standing at the bridge looking at what happened , the police and the firemen were everywhere , two ambulances came quickly to pick up the couple to the hospital ; but they were already gone before arriving there ..
Nora was at her house that day , waiting for her parents who were late , few minutes after the accident ; some stranger called the little girl , and told her to come to the hospital as soon as possible . Arriving at the emergency room , Nora was lost in all that noise she was walking slowly in the hall watching all those sick faces staring at her , she finally got to the room , she opened the door , two nurses were there covering her parent’s bodies , they asked her : ‘’Are they your parents?’’ ‘’Yes’’’ she said , the nurses replied “I’m sorry for your lost , they are gone ‘’ . You can imagine Nora’s reaction at that moment , I don’t even have to describe how miserable she was , she cried rivers ..
Chapter Six -6-
A few days later , Nora went to meet her real father Jake, their first meeting was too awkward , he first picked her up from the airport than drove to his house .
Father : So this is it !
Nora : yea whatever ..
Father : Mm..i can see you are so excited to meet your old man ha !
Nora : you weren’t excited too to see me 17 years ago
Father : You right ! I’m an a**h*le . Anyway your room is upstairs it’s a bit messy but it’s better than nothing
Nora : thanks’ Jake .
The room of course was something more than a mess , it was dirty and dark ..just horrible ! But you know , it was also NORA’s last choice : the room or the cold streets ! Anyway , the awkwardness between the father and daughter lasted for a couple months , but then the father decided that things should change , he knew that he rejected his baby years ago but now he admitted to himself that he was wrong , that he regrets it , and he wants to make things right in the sake of his love to her mother .
Location : DaddyBurger’s
Time : Dinner time
Father : I guess we should stop eating in this place .
Nora : you’re right , I’m getting fat ..
Father : (smiles) you are as beautiful as your mother .
Nora : (acts as if she was trying to say something , but without saying anything )
Father : what ? I can see that you have something to say ..
Nora : (doesn’t look at her father , and doesn’t speak a word)
Father : I’m sorry .. I probably shouldn’t mention your mother , I don’t deserve to talk about her memory anyway ..
Nora : That’s okay .. I don’t mind talking about my mum , I actually love talking about her …Talking about mum makes me feel like if she was here , next to me ..
Father : If she was here , she would of probably kick my a$$ for giving you this junk food (laughs)
Nora : (Laughs ) no doubt ! Mm .. Jake ?
Father : Yes baby
Nora : did you …Did you really loved her ? I mean mum ..did you really really loved her ?
Father : let me tell you something ..I’ve loved your mother more than I loved myself , I was nothing , I was a pure failure , I used to be addicted to drugs , I used to be an alcoholic , I .....your mum was not suppose to meet someone like me , she was my candle , she lighted my dark life , she gave me a reason to live , to not kill myself , she gave me a reason to come back home every single night , I loved her , I loved her , I loved her …(tears in his eyes , looking down at the table , squeezing the empty ketchup bottle ) I love her very much , and because I knew that I didn’t deserve her , I had a phobia about losing her , I always though deep inside me that one day she’ll leave me , so I was so jealous of everything , I used to made scandals if I see her smiling to a client or..talking at the phone with one of her friends .. (raise his head and looks in the eyes of NORA ) I made her for me and only for me , she eventually lost most of her friends because of me ! I didn’t deserve her , I still don’t deserve her ; I will never be able to deserve her , and what I did to her ..to you ..to both of you kills me every single day ..
Nora : So that’s why you’ve rejected me back then , you thought that she’ll love me more than you ..
Father : I admit that , I did thought of that ..I was saying to myself a baby is a responsibility than I can’t take , so LISA will have to dump me someday because of you ‘cause she’ll loves u more …that was stupid ..i am an a**h*le .
Nora : was *
Father : what ?
Nora : (smiles ) you are not an a**h*le now (smiles again) .
Father : (laughs a bit ) thanks’ I appreciate that ..
Nora : you know .. I’ve always hated you even though I’ve never met you , and that’s why I’ve been acting awkwardly with you this couple months ..
Father : no worries .. I understand and I can not blame you for that .
Nora : it’s just that I ..you know ..(Don’t speak for while , take a deep breath ) I’ve been blaming you since I was able to talk ! I’ve blamed you for every bad thing that happened to my life ! I’m not that happy little kid that you think I am , I ‘ve never felt normal between kids or teens at my age , just the thought of going out scares me , that’s why I’m always home , I don’t feel quite good about myself , specially about the way I look …I’ve always been saying in my mind that I’m kind of ….i don’t know..kind of cursed or something ! (Tears in her eyes ) I mean maybe I deserve all the bad things in my life , I was not suppose to be born on that day ! (Cries a little bit ) you didn’t want me ! you preferred to throw me away while I wasn’t even born yet ! (Cries harder) I’m cursed and I look ugly with my burned skin because I shouldn’t exist in the first place , I’m an unwanted child ! unuseful human being ! I’m nothing but a girl with no life , no parents , no happiness , no hope ! I’m cursed because of you!!! (Cries harder and harder , then she suddenly stops when she realized that the other costumers were staring at her , she wipes her tears )
Father : (shocked , he doesn’t know what to say , he can’t stop the tears from falling on his face ..he feels bad , then speaks slowly ) no …No child ….No …, you are blessed my child , you are blessed ! you are far from being cursed , I am the one who’s bad , I’m the one who should feel like that ! plus , what the hell are you talking about ? what do you mean you don’t like how you look ? what’s wrong with your look ? Why are you hating your skin that much while you have the most beautiful eyes ! While you have the most charming cheek bones ! While you have the most beautiful smile ! While you have the most shinny hair ! While you are a small little tinny perfection ! You are beautiful ! You are my child ! I did a mistake once and I’m begging you now my child ! ( He sits on his knees and cries ) I beg you my child to forgive me ! I beg you to give me the opportunity to fix what I’ve done , to change the way you feel about yourself ! I love you just like I once loved your mum …
NORA : (helps her father to get up and gets back to his sit ) thank you …
Thank you for opening up to me tonight and for giving me the opportunity to open up too .. we both had a hard time before .. maybe it’s time now to move on , I have no one but you , you are what’s left of my family , and I’m what’s left of yours ….Dad .. Let me be your daughter one more time ..pretend that ..(cries a little bit ) ..pretend that I’m born again , for the first time .. raise me .take care of me , and I’ll take care of you when you get older ..I’ll be there when you’ll need me Daddy (cries harder) so be here for me now (keeps crying)
Jake hugged his daughter for the first time in his life , he kept saying ‘’I’m sorry’’ and she kept answering him ‘’that’s okay’’ …That was the first dinner that actually didn’t went wrong , as soon as they’ve finished eating they went back home .
From that day things changed a lot one more time , at first they were living as roommates , but now they are living as a true family , a small one , but a real one . Nora was feeling so much better than she did before , her skin wasn’t a trouble for her anymore , she finally accepted the fact that she is not cursed , and that she is blessed to meet her father and live with him…
Chapter seven -7-
It’s the dawn , the sunlight has just began to appear so brightly , it is impossible to raise your head and look up to see the birds flying in the sky .. At the wood it is still dark , the trees are still sleeping , the birds are singing sad melodies and the day wood creatures are getting ready for the wake up call . Inside all of this routine , on a black stone next to the river , a little white tinny girl is laying there , her clothes are ripped , her very white skin is all covered by the blood , she is sleeping with her eyes opened , no ! wait .. Maybe she is not sleeping , maybe she is already gone , I mean she might be dead ..How is that happened ? who did this to this lonely broken angel ? that’s ..that’s Nora’s face .. Nora is ..dead ?
No she’s not , that was a nightmare ... no actually it’s a dream , Nora dreamed about finding herself dead in the wood , and that reflected what happened to her in the reality , because even in real life , Nora died , or should I say ‘’old Nora’’ died …Nora was born again just like she promised her father , he was a brand new NORA , a happy Nora , that believes in love , in faith , in her beauty , but most importantly , she believed in hope ! A hope that will creates for her a happier life with her father . The old Nora was gone , the sad Nora was emotionally gone .
#Manel