AN So yeah this happened, I would have liked it to be longer but oh well and no I don't own anything - all mistakes are my own. WARNING: Self harm implied
She had a pretty rough childhood; later, when she was older and stronger (and working for a top secret government agency), she would find out why. But at that moment in time, at eight years old, she just thought she was unloved, unwanted, damaged, never to be repaired, fated to be forgotten. Mary Sue was a joke of a name to anyone and everyone who heard it, which is why she tried so hard to change it.
When she was six there was a meteor shower one Saturday November night, because of the rare and special occasion (and the fact there was no school in the morning) the nuns had let everyone at the orphanage stay up past their bedtime to watch it. The whole group was outside in the thickest, warmest clothes they could find, but with having no money most of them were still cold so they were all huddled around a small fire which kept them slightly warm despite the harsh, sharp wind. But Mary didn't want to sit with them, despite being the coldest of the lot, instead she was a few meters away – close enough that the nuns were happy but far enough away that she didn't have to listen to the loud, constant chatter of the others. She lay on her back and stared up at the sky, above her the stars twinkled and danced about as if putting on a show for the world below. Oh how she wished she could touch them but no matter how hard she tried she couldn't. You had to be special to touch things as important as stars but she wasn't special, she was just a poor, lonely orphan who had just been sent back from her fourth family. Closing her eyes and taking a deep, calming breath of the cool midnight air she focused on the surrounding sounds. Faint murmurs of people chatting, the slow whistle of the wind, the rustle of the tree leaves of the surrounding forest some distance from her. Somehow she could even hear the drum of the traffic over a mile away, almost as if it was vibrating towards her.
Hearing a collective gasp from the huddle by the fire Mary opened her eyes, in the vast, almost black sky above there were dozens of streaks of light, almost raining down on them, sparks threatening to set them on fire but never actually doing so. She thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world – even more stunning than an orange sunrise or purple sunset – and as it captured her gaze all she could think about was the golden bands of glittering light and how she wished to be closer to them, be next to them and fly with them to wherever they went, see how they were made and destroyed, to dance among the stars.
The whole thing only lasted a few minutes though, all too soon it was over and everyone was complaining as they were being ushered inside out of the cold. It made sense to her that beautiful things couldn't last forever – if they did, beautiful would become normal and people would stop seeing the wonder in the world, they would become miserable and dull. Walking through the main door she was the last inside and had to close and lock it, before doing so she glanced back at the clear night sky and tried to burn the image of the dancing stars into her mind so she would never forget. Switching off the downstairs light she made her way upstairs to her shared bedroom, all the while thinking about the strips of light while, for the first time in years, she smiled.
After that night she used to secretly sneak out of bed after lights out and just sit and watch the stars from the downstairs kitchen window. Sometimes she was even lucky enough to see the full moon, undisrupted by the murky clouds that were floating around. On those nights she used to make up stories about visiting the moon and other planets, maybe even meeting people from different planets.
For the next two years she had wished on the stars every night that she be allowed to touch them; but her wish never came true and every time she mentioned her it to someone she constantly got laughed at and told it was impossible, that she was being stupid, so she settled for just being next to them. For being the Skye. It was a pretty name she thought, something she had heard once before, years ago, and loved instantly. No one took her seriously when she said she wanted to be called it though. They just thought she was trying to get attention. The pain of rejection was too much on top of also feeling like she shouldn't exist. What made it worse was that all the others just had to say that she shouldn't exist to her face. As if she didn't already know.
To cope Skye did the only thing she could think of, she dealt with the pain by masking it with more pain; pain of her own creation, and blocking everything else out.
After a while (and three more families that sent her back) she gave up on the new name. No one was going to listen, she wasn't ever going to be called Skye – no one cared enough about her, she would be forever known as Mary Sue. Mary Sue was such a hollow name and the person associated with it had long given up on life. Pain was the one and only thing that grounded her and that was more than unhealthy.
Then, one winter night at age 12 she was locking up downstairs for the night and through the kitchen window she saw a single shooting star. White flecks of light trailed behind a glowing ball of bright white light which lit up the whole night sky. The night of the meteor shower suddenly flashed through her mind; images taking over and almost making her stumble with the impact of the memory. She remembered being happy, not a care in the world, lying on the muddy grass and gazing up at the wonder above. Just like that night, for the first time in years she smiled, and not just an upturn of her lips but a full, bright, shining smile.
She stopped creating her own pain that night, over the next few months she taught herself to code and at 15 she finally escaped the never ending cycle of being rejected. She grabbed her backpack from under the bed and shoved everything she owned into it: a couple pairs of clothes, a hula girl, the small amount of money she had managed to earn through small jobs and her treasured laptop which one of her teachers had given her when she said she was teaching herself to code. She then shoved the bag back under her bed and waited until it was dark. When the clock struck midnight she knew everyone would be asleep so, just like when she was younger and used to watch the stars, she crept quietly down the stairs and out the door. Taking one last look at the place that had been her home she turned away and walked down the long, winding path.
She quickly found that no matter what she had learnt, creating a whole new identity was difficult so she just kept to the basics: Name, money, fake ID. Finally after nine years she got what she wanted, Mary Sue was completely erased and she got to be close to the stars. The world was about to meet Skye.
AN2 Did you see all the references I made? :) Please review, like, follow :)