Marley wasn't normal, even before she found out about her heritage. Her given name was Merlot, for god's sake! She was the only thirteen year old at Musburger Junior High with mint green hair, the only person who was proud of a B-, and the only student who'd been to three other schools before that one. Merlot "Marley" Lexyon was, in a word, unusual. She was also unfortunate.
Her mother was an heiress, and a real party girl before she'd gotten pregnant with Marley. She'd never met her father, and probably never would, even though he wasn't dead. Her mother had met him at a party, and they had a one night stand before he jetted off to Paris or England or somewhere, never to be seen again.
Marley wasn't entirely sure her mother knew she had a daughter. Sandra Lexyn had married Newark Lexyn when Marley was three years old, and left Marley with a nanny while she was out seeing the world. Marley had only seen her mother once since she turned ten, and she was turning thirteen tomorrow. She hoped Sandra would remember, but after the past two years she'd learned not to get her hopes up.
Going to school on your birthday is always the worst. Margrite, her nanny, had tried to make it better by baking a cake for her to share with her 7th grade class, but Margrite didn't really understand how unpopular she was at MJH. She was quite possibly the most hated kid in the 7th grade. Other kids didn't like the fact that she had weird purple eyes or was small for her age or acted like she was a teenager when she was only twelve. This one girl, Kelly Jenks, had been picking on her since kindergarten. She would pick on little things, like Marley's looks and the way she acted, but if Kelly was having a really bad day she'd bring up Marley's mom and get one of the 8th grade boys to shove her in a locker. It didn't matter anymore, she could've fought back, and won too, but that never did anything but make them angrier. Besides, she was used to it by not.
On that day, November 21, Marley walked into school dreading the worst. And, perhaps because of that, the worst is what she got. For the entire walk to her locker, no one even looked at her. Her classmates had spent most of their 5th grade year pretending she didn't exist, an idea Kelly had gotten fromDiary of a Wimpy Kid, so she was used to it. Still, there's nothing worse than the anticipation before you get beat up.
"Hey, Puke!" Kelly was waiting for Marley beside her locker. On the first day she walked into school with her new hair color, some kid had asked 'what's on your head, puke?' and it had stuck. Marley let out a sigh when she saw two girls come up on either side of Kelly. She didn't recognize them, but they were in cheerleading uniforms, which in Marley's experience meant that they wouldn't say no a little game of 'emotionally ruin the unpopular girl'.
"What's up, Kelly? And who're your new friends?" Marley sighed the questions. She swung her backpack off her shoulder and spun the the combination lock to open the ugly yellow lockers, effectively ignoring the three idiots beside her.
"You've got no team spirit," one of the cheerleaders scolded, "We'll have to teach you some." she and Kelly started to advance but the other cheerleader, who looked more like an 8th grader, stopped them.
"That can wait 'til Gym, girls. Now come on, we have places to be!" she smiled brightly and motioned down the hallway with her head, toward a bunch of cheerleader look alikes crowded around Charity Bueller's locker. They must have all been shadowing or something, but they were wearing MJH cheerleader uniforms. Weird.
Kelly's voice shook Marley out of her thoughts. "Yeah, Gym. You've got a real surprise coming for you, Lexon," she started walking after her two cheerleader friends, but threw a parting remark over her shoulder.
"Just think of it as a birthday present!"
