As a young child, she was always happy. It didn't seem as if anything could dampen her spirits. She wasn't popular, but seemed content with her few close friends. She

had confidence in herself, and liked herself as she was. Because of this, she could turn away the kid's taunts and teases. That is, until HE came...

HE was her evil step-dad. Funny, you usually hear about an evil step-mothers...but no, she had an evil step-father...and in many ways, he was as bad as Cinderella's evil step-mother, as you will see. She was always working, doing "chores", once he started ruling things. At the age of 6, she was expected to be able to keep the entire house clean, including the mess HE made, seemingly on purpose.  One of her younger sisters, Jessy, helped her out some. Her youngest sister, Emsilia, did nothing, but that was because she was a baby. Or, at least, that's what she and her sister thought.

The years went by, and the work got harder. And also, if she could not complete her work, HE would punish her. He wouldn't beat her...no no no, he could get thrown in jail for that, plus those wounds heal too quickly...HE would yell at her, call her a worthless peice of shit, say she didn't deserve to live, all while she stayed up late to finish her work. Her mom tried to get him to calm down, but he yelled at her too. Eventually, after a few years straight of this, she became very depressed, and began to beleive that she actually WAS worthless and a peice of shit, and that she actually in fact DIDN'T deserve to live. At the age of 8, she became suicidal for the first time. She lost the will to live, and would have killed herself then, had her mom not come in the room and scolded her for "playing" with a sharp knife. She recovered, but she was never quite the same again.

At the age of 9, she was finally allowed some freedom. Somehow, she was allowed to play outside...somehow, she was now able to go outside and play with her friends...that is, once she made one. You see, she had just moved to a new town, so she knew no one. Plus, before she moved she had no friends, because she had always been forced to work so she didn't have much time to make friends. Plus, she didn't socialize much, seeing as she had been convinced she didn't deserve to live. She was able to go shopping with her grandmother and pick out her own clothes for the first time. She got all the newest styles, and in school quickly fell into the "popular" crowd. She couldn't beleive her luck!! She was able to play outside at times, and she had many friends. She still didn't beleive she was worth anything though, because her friendships weren't very close, as the friendships she had had before were. Yet, she learned to put up a facade of being happy and having tons of self-esteem. She learned to act the part so well that she began to beleive it. And yet, through this all, her sister, who was now as old as Jessy was when she started working, was treated as a princess and never had to work. One of the things the girl and her sister had to do was wait on their youngest sister, all because she was HIS daughter. HE had told them he loved them all equally, but looks like some children were more equal than others...

Then one day, the next year, she found out she was a joke to her so-called friends. They talked about her secrets behind her back and laughed about them. She was crushed by this, but didn't show it. She started hanging out with the so-called "freaks" of the school, and made some close friendships with them. For the first time, her happiness wasn't just the facade, though most of it was, as was all of her self-esteem. But again, she played the part so well that she fooled her friends and herself, although she noticed she DID feel a little better. All the while he kept calling her worthless and such, now sometimes adding in the name "bitch". She now learned how to tune him out.

Life went on this way pretty much until she was 12. Then, as a Christmas present (even though she didn't celebrate Christmas....she had become a Wiccan, it seemed more beleiveable than Christianity to her, but the only person who knew was her mother), her Grandfather bought her a computer. Then, as a present from her mom, she was allowed to get the internet. She was allowed some time each day to go online. Now she and Jessy's duties were split up equally, and Emsilia still did no work and by now had become a little spoiled brat. But now we're getting off topic. The girl...wait, why do I keep calling her the girl? Her name was Colette...quickly downloaded 3 of the top messangers. One day, a friend from school introduced her to a friend online. His name was Mike. Colette found herself wanting to talk to Mike more and more, and finally realized she was in love with him. She was pleased to find out that when she told him she loved him, he said he loved her back. He would tell her, "Collette, I love you so much. I don't see why you like me, I mean you're so perfect..." and Colette would protest, but he would insist that she was.  This is how her self-esteem became boosted. She became proud of who she was, proud to be called a freak. He also encouraged her to stand up against HIM. At first she was afraid, then she realized the worst he could do to her was hit her, and she could report him to DCF for doing that. It all started by him calling her a bitch. She stopped working and stood up. "A bitch is a female dog....I'm a human, not a dog, and if you're talking about looks, you're the dog....Also," she went on, "the letters can symbolize words....B means beautiful, I means Intelligent, T means Talented, C means Cunning, and H means Horny....I prefer the second use of the word, so hell yeah, I AM a bitch!" his jaw dropped as he stood dumbfounded. She laughed, then went up to bed without finishing her work, and he was too surprised to stop her. Then her friend Alice got her to listen to Marylin Manson, and Colette found she liked rock music. She stopped listening to pop music, and decided to go along with Alice and call all pop stars "corporate whores". She began to see that pop songs had to real meaning, and she realized they didn't mean the songs they sang, especially because they didn't write them. She and her friends also strongly suspected that they weren't really singing and were just really good actors. They also began hanging out with the "goth" kids, which Alice was a member of, and Colette found out she fit in there too. She then took on the goth tradition of calling the so-called "popular" people preps.

Sadly, HE eventually got used to Colette standing up to herself, and threatened to take away internet time and such if she didn't finish her work, and made her finish her work before going online. But she finished it, and quickly, so that she could go online and talk to Mike. That was her reason for living. That was the reason for her exsistance. She beleived she had found her soulmate, it didn't matter that he lived far away from her or that she was only 12. She had found someone who loved her for her, and that she loved back. For the first time, she was truely happy.

All went smoothly, until about a year later, when Mike dumped her. She found out from a friend that Mike had dumped her partially because he liked Alice. Colette was furious at Mike for awhile, and then just sad. She could not find it in her heart to hate him, no matter how hard she tried. As for Alice, Colette actually told Alice to go out with Mike if she wanted to. Alice wanted to, but she was afraid that she would hurt her friend, even though Colette tried to assure her that it would be OK. Eventually, Alice decided not to go online anymore so that she wouldn't have to make a choice.

Anyways, in a few months, Mike saw the error of his ways, and asked Colette to be his girlfriend again, since they has stayed friends. Colette agreed, but something seemed...off...missing somehow...then Colette found herself longing to hug him, hold him, kiss him, or at least to see him or hear him like all the other couples did. But sadly, he lived too far away for them to meet during the weekends. They were still close, yet they seemed to somehow drift further and further apart, till they barely talked, which made Colette sad. She tried to bring them back together, but it seemed useless. Also, another one of her friends from school, Kara, was starting to tease her. Kara had always jokingly teased her, but it seemed like Kara was becoming more and more serious with the teases, some being low blows that even the preps wouldn't dare. Despite Colette's pleas to lay off it for awhile, Kara kept it up. Only good news was that Colette's mom had divorced HIM. But, he was making their life miserable by threatening to call DCF if he didn't have his way, and calling the police saying he was worried when he knew Colette's mom had gone out to the store. Since Colette was 13, she was above the legal babysitting age of 12 and so the police left her alone and said he had no right to be doing that. But the combination of these things made Colette very sad. They made her become suicidal again. Many times she was almost pushed over the edge, and a few times she was, yet was stopped by someone walking into the room. If she was going to kill herself, she needed to die alone.

She HAD however, met a nice guy in her school. He had sat next to her in class, and she had befriended him because he was the new kid so he had no friends. He quickly meshed into the group of kids she hung out with. She had contimplated going out with him, because Mike hadn't been online in about a forever or so. The funny thing is, the new kid acted like Mike, was named Mike, but he couldn't be Mike, cause Mike lived far away. Also, if it were Mike, he'd definatly tell her it was him. He was supposed to come over and study tomarrow...er....today, seeing as it's 3 AM...because it's Saturday but they have a big quiz on Monday...

She shook her head. No more time for thinking about that. She applied pressure and slit one wrist then the other. She laughed some, the pain felt good to her, refreshing. She watched the blood gushing out of her wrists with glee, knowing she would no longer have to go through the agony of living anymore. This thought filled her with pleasure, and she was happy. She fell to the floor and lost conciousness from lack of blood, and there she died, at 3 AM, alone in her room, finally happy at last.

***********The Call***********

"Hi, you've reach the answering machine of Colette the insane....when you hear the beep of the clowns nose (although to you it might sond like a tone...) leave a message, and I'll get back to you, unless I'm angry with you or you're a stupid prep!"

**BEEP**

"Hi Colette...this is Mike....from school....well, I should probably tell you this there, but I don't want to be there if you're angry, so I'll leave a message....I knew you before school...I'm Mike, from the internet...I know, I know, I should have told you, but I wanted to make it a big surprise and stuff....well, I can understand if you hate me and never want to talk to me again....anyways, I guess you aren't home....call me when you get home...you remember my number, right? We were supposed to hang out and study today, remember? That is if you don't totally hate me now....I'll talk to ya later....bye!"