Hey guiiiyyysss. Terrribly sorry that I don't update. But I don't get any reviews. :\
I'm just putting this short story out there for to to tell me if I've still got it.
It might be a little dry and weird, but it was an English essay on drink driving. I didn't really capture the drink driving part. Haha
Oh well, love from Mads.

Mum and Dad. Those two words should never be put together in a sentence. Not when your mum runs off with another guy. Ryan. Or was it Justin? I can never tell. Maybe I wouldn't have hated her so much if she was around more often, but Dad. That was the one that really got me.

Dad was my shoulder to cry on, my rock. I could talk to him about anything and he worked so hard to make sure we had money, even if we only just scraped through with this month's rent. He tried to give me everything he could. Then one morning he just wasn't there. No note. No nothing.

"Lara. Lara! LARA!"
"Sorry Miss. I'm a bit out of it." Miss Mills leant forward, towards me.
"Maybe you should go see Belle. We're not doing much in this class anyway." A paper plane flew past her head, and sailed into the bin to prove her point.
"Kay. Thanks Miss." I sighed as I packed all my stuff together. So not in the mood for Belle right now.
As I reached the door, I looked to my best friend Zeke, who gave me a 'sympathy smile'.
I chucked him the bird, grinned, and walked out of the classroom.

I walked to my locker and fiddled with my lock until it opened. I shoved my books in my locker, not caring if when I opened my locker next, they fell out. I was seriously not in the mood. I grabbed my bag and slammed my locker shut. As I walked up to the place I hated the most, in the place I loved the most, and stood in front of the door of my personal Hell on Earth all I could see were the letters spelling out where I was; WELFARE AND COUNSELLING OFFICE.

I hate talking to counsellors, they assume. I hate talking to counsellors about myself. It makes me feel shallow. But above all, I hate talking to counsellors about myself, because I know that they could be doing something more important. They could be talking to someone who's being bullied, having a hard time at home, being abused. They don't need to sit there and listen to me say 'my parents left me'. I don't need to talk. I'm fine. Everything's fine.

The door swung open, and there she stood; the nightmare behind a beautiful face. Belle. She motioned to the couch.
"You know what you gotta do."
I sat on the couch, trying to not take up as little space as I could. Belle sat on her chair, stared at me for a couple seconds as if trying to uncover my darkest secrets by looking through my eyes down to my soul.
"So," Belle chirped loudly, "What's the 411? What's been going on?"
I shrugged my shoulders, nodded my head.
"Okay. How about Paul, Jenny and Blair? How are they?" She was referring to my foster parents and their 2 year old son. My foster brother.
"They're fine. Everything's fine."
"Fine. Okay. Have you got anything planned for the weekend?" She's really grasping at straws here, to keep up the conversation.
"No Belle. What about you?"
"Well, I'll be going to the zoo with Darren, Kelly and Tom. Do you like the zoo, Lara?"
"You know what Belle? You could be doing something much better with your time, rather than asking me about the zoo and how I feel. I'm fine. Why can no one grasp the fact that I am fine? I'm perfectly alright!"

I snatched up my bag, and stormed out of the room without giving Belle any time to say or do anything. I almost ran out of the school gates but not before I heard my name.
"Lara. Lara!"
I turned and ran into a wall of warmth, arms pulling me close to his chest. That's when the tears came.
"Bub? Bub, what's wrong? What happened?"
I said nothing. I just pulled him closer to me, breathing in his smell. The smell that said "Zeke". And Zeke meant comfort. It meant home.

We sat on a ledge for so long; Zeke holding me, and I was just sobbing. Then it'd all came back and I would burst into tears again and repeat the cycle. Zeke just sat there, taking in what was happening. Rocking me back and forth, back and forth. He knew me well enough to not ask me anymore questions. I could not be more thankful for that. When I'd finished crying, Zeke grabbed my bag and said "You need to see Mum. Now." He bundled me into his car, threw my bag in the back and gunned it out of the school car park.

Now would be a perfect time to see Carryn Baker.

"Mum!" Zeke yelled as he walked through the front door.
"Why are you home, Zeke?" Carryn yelled back as she walked around the corner, wiping her hands on a tea towel. She stopped, took in my appearance, which I imagine was terrifying in itself, and then shrieked.
Zeke mumbled in the corner, "That's why I'm home." But it wouldn't've been heard over the violent sobbing of his mother. She was my mother's best friend, and the only part of my mother's life that I didn't hate with immense passion. When my mother left, she became my surrogate mother, and when my father left she tried to gain custody of me, but lost and I was sent to a foster family. Luckily, we only live 6 blocks from each other, so I was still able to see her. And Zeke, outside of school.

Carryn sat me down at the dining table and disappeared for a second. She returned quickly and quietly with a bottle of whiskey, nearly full.
"One drink," she said. "One. For medicinal purposes only."
I took the bottle and downed half the liquid. Carryn looked at me, then looked at the bottle, then pressed the back of her hand to her mouth and began to giggle. I looked at her, puzzled.
"Jill used to be able to do that. She'd had a good cry than we'd down a bottle of whiskey between us." Carryn spoke almost as if she was there again.
I looked at the bottle in my hand, and put it down on the table. I didn't want to be anything like my mother. At the moment, Zeke walked into the dining room. He had changed out of his school uniform into trackies and a hoodie. He saw the bottle of whiskey, his mother laughing and me looking murderous towards the bottle. He quickly snatched up the bottle, took a swig, screwed the lid back on and walked into the other room to hide the bottle. Carryn and I laughed as we heard him trip over the uneven lino in the kitchen.
When Zeke returned, he gave us a massive black look.
"Since you're being so mean to me, maybe I shouldn't tell you about the party tonight" he sighed. "I didn't want to go alone, but I might have to."
"Cut the crap, Zeke. Whose party? If it's Kelly or Marnie's, count me out."
Carryn tsked. "Don't be such a party pooper Lara. You might find yourself a bloke tonight."
"Oh yeah right, Carryn. I'll stick with Zeke. He's my man." I grinned.
Zeke grinned back. "It's Emily's actually. Out at the old Windsor farm, her parents pulled some strings."

3 hours later, I was dressed in my new leggings and one of Zeke's hoodies and we were travelling down Windsor Road towards the shearing shed, where Emily's party was. You know you're in the country when a party is in a shearing shed. Zeke and I were belting out the tunes on the radio, when we saw the bright lights out of the windows of the shearing shed and the orange glow of the bonfire out the front.
"This is gunna be some partaaaayyy!" Zeke whistled and jumped out of the car. I followed suit.

The first person we sought out was Emily (ie. the girl Zeke has a crush on, the size of Australia). We found her leaning against the classing table. I walked up to Emily and squeezed her hand and shouted "Great party."
"Thanks. I didn't think so many people would turn up" she laughed. "Where's Zeke?"
"He's right behind me...?" I turned to see that Zeke had vaporised into the sea of bodies. "That little sneak! Come on Emily. Let's go find him." I grabbed her hand, and pushed through the sea of bodies.

We found Zeke throwing rocks onto the bonfire with some of his mates.
"ZEKE!" I screamed. "Look who's here."
Zeke sent me a dark look. "Hi...Emily. Uh, great party."
"Thanks" was Emily's only reply. She looked at her feet.
"Zeke, why don't you go show Emily your car? She's really into cars." I grabbed Zeke and Emily and pushed them in the direction of Zeke's car.
"Yeah, I love cars."
"Sure, that sounds good."

Satisfied with my match-making I stumbled back into the shed, only to be met by my two least favourite people in the world, above my parents. Kelly and Marnie Lowe.
"Hey Kelly, look who it is. It's Forever Alone." Marnie sneered.
"Oh, hi Lara. Heard from your parents lately?" Kelly spat.
"Hey Kelly, hey Marnie." I spoke sickly sweet. "How are you? Wait, I don't care."
"That's alright with us, charity case. No one cares about you either."
"Yeah, charity. Why do you think your parents left you? You can't even be classed as a person, you're not pretty. You're so ugly and stupid. You have no friends. You're a depressed slut. No one wants to be near you or talk to you. That's why your parents left you. You don't deserve to live."

Something inside me just snapped. So many words rushed around my head, but none of them made it to my mouth. I could feel the tears coming. I ran outside to Zeke's car, I needed Zeke. But he wasn't there. I opened the car door, stupid Zeke had left the car keys in the ignition. Idiot. I gunned the engine and ripped out of the car park, tears in my eyes as I flew down Windsor Road. I saw a tree. Suddenly it made sense. I jerked on the steering wheel suddenly and hit the tree.