Seldom

Life is hard. But its harder when you face things you have no clue about. Going down a path that is as strange as the color orange on a persons hair. My name is Dartania Scott, I am 19 years old and this is my story.

I was always quiet ever since I started first grade or school. At home when I was young living in London I was the wild child as my family called me, I was loud, smart mouthed, but also knew what kind of questions to ask and how to get the answer out of the people, all and all I was a force to be reckoned with. I got anything I wanted not because I was spoiled but because I knew how to get it so that made me dangerous than any other kid, well that's what my cousins used to tell me, but school changed all that.

Two weeks after first grade started I had begun school late because me and my parents moved to United States, so when I entered my first classroom with my first class mates I was isolated. Everyone had partnered up with one another and I had no one so I was left alone, that's where it started, I had no one to talk to, to laugh with, no friends period. So I became isolated my closest friends were my cousins but since we moved they were far away, we had an ocean separating us, and since I was young I had no means of reach them, so left alone I started to write on a journal which I named James, as you can see I have always been different from everyone else.

So every day after school, I would be picked up form school by either mom or dad, we'd have dinner I would do my homework, watch tv for about an hour and then run up to my room open a loose floor board in my room that I had kept a secret from my parents and take James out and write my daily activities. From when the kids would ignore me to when they would pick on me for being smart. After a while I started to write poems in side the pages that made James who he was, my friend, my first friend and my forever best friend. Of course my cousins were my friends but they were not like James who I could tell anything and he would keep it hidden from the world enclosed in his pages.

When I finished first grade I was very happy I had made all A's and I was emitting happiness specially when I saw my parents faces glow with pride. We were meant to go visit London as a present for getting such good grades and I was just oozing happiness, after all I wold get to see my cousins again of course I was happy. But as stories and legends go nothing lasts forever and my happiness didn't last long either, when I got out the long plane ride I was glad but when I touched London with my feet I ..cant even describe how I felt. We were taking a cab from the airport to our old house, and like a maniac I was pointing at the familiar things I would see and tell my parents of the silly things I used to do with the cousins. My parents didn't say anything only smiled at my antics. When we reached our old house, I did everything I could to hide my tears and it worked my parents like me were occupied as well looking at our first house.

Minutes, which felt like hours to me, later, dad opened the old door, and I ran literally ran inside and up the stairs to my old room and jumped on my old bed. Burring my face into my old pillow, closing my eyes I inhaled the musky smell of the old familiar house, while memories assaulted my mind, and that's how my parents found me half hour later deep asleep with a content smile on my face.

I remember being shook awake in the morning because the suns bright rays were hitting my eyes, it seemed that someone had opened the dark drapes in my room. Opening my eyes the first thing I saw was my moms bright chocolate happy brown eyes staring at me.

"Come on honey, get up its time to wake up its nine o'clock , I think you've had enough sleep." she said in her soft soothing voice. Giving her a big bright smile I kissed her cheek and told her I would get up if someone wasn't holding me back.

She laughed and got up of the bed and with one last smile left the room. I got up, took a shower, got ready and went down stairs only to be greeted with the site of my four cousins happy smiles. I was ecstatic at the site and ran which to me felt like I flew down the stairs, not ran and pounced on them giving them all one big hug. I was happy and smiling non stop like a mad child and for once since my first day of school I felt like the wild child. I guess I was thinking hard without even knowing cause I was brought out of my reverie by my fathers warm but deep laughter.

"Now, now, kids be carful we don't want any of you getting hurt now do we?" he said with a humble voice and a teasing look on his on dad, you know we wont get hurt that badly, the worst that could happen is we could kill ourselves but I don't think a little wrestling between cousins will go down that road..." I told him, he only smiled and ruffled my hair and went to the kitchen, that's when it hit me, there was no laughter or any kind fo sound coming from my cousins I turned to them and looked questionably at them for a second before I asked.

"Is something the matter?" I was scared to tell the truth. Jake my oldest cousin was the one who spoke up after a moment of uncomfortable silence had been hanging in the room.

"You've lost your accent..." was all he said. I was confused for a sec at his statement, then it downed on me what he meant my British accent. I smile and turned a nice shade of red.

"Yeah, I know its kind of weird to hear you guys talk that way for me too.." I said, after all I was gone for a year and no one in the USA spoke with a British accent so it was about time I lost it. It wasn't like I didn't like my accent, I loved it was part of me but the kids at school would tease me about it and I really didn't want to give them another reason to do so, I had practiced all night and day during thanksgiving weekend to loose it and I had succeed. I was happy but at the same time a big hole had settled into my heart a hole that through out the year I tried to fill but never could.

My cousins just looked at me for a moment and then went back to acting like nothing happened, but after a whole year of hiding my feelings and acting I could tell that they didn't like it and I also could feel their rejecting feelings but I pretended that they weren't there. That day I found out that I had changed a whole lot and that my cousins weren't the same people I left a year ago and for the first time in my life I cried out of saddens and into my dear James pages.

My cousins didn't drop by at all that week and I was sad but at the same time happy, I don't think I could of taken the feelings of rejection from them for too long without breaking down. I went sight seeing that week only accompanied by my favorite book and James. After my sight seeing I would go to the park and read then write a poem or two inside James.

During that week I would pass this particular store. It caught my eye very fast it was an old looking building with odd engravings and old English writings plus it was a piano store. And everyday I would walk pass it I would stop at the window, to look at the pianos and I would admire them, I never went inside, now that I think about it I never knew why. That was until the store clerk came out. Never saw him or heard him come out I was to engulfed into the my little world and admiration for the pianos to notice him.

"Is there something I could help you with?" he asked me. I was startled to say the least I jumped and turned around to face him. He gave me a calculating look, and I looked him directly in the eye. Finding my resolve I finally spoke.

"No thank you, I was just admiring the pianos, I am very sorry if I have inconveniently disturbed you in anyway."

He just looked at me and my resolve was starting to fade, then he smiled.

"No, you didn't disturb me, I was just wondering, I have seen you pass my store every morning and afternoon and you always seem to stop and look then leave, so I was just wondering if there was something you wanted," he spoke in his British accent and soothing voice. He was an old man, well to me he looked old he was about fifty years old from what I could see.

I blushed scarlet at his comment.

"I am sorry, its just I think your store is very beautiful and the pianos just bring out the beauty of it even more, so its only natural that I would stop to observe it," I said my voice firm.

He gave me an incredulous look, and I began to feel nervus in the pit of my stomach, then he gave me a small smile which had caught me off guard. My face must of shown it because his smile widened and then he spoke.

"How old are you Miss?" he asked with what I could tell was intrigue in his voice. I raised an eyebrow.

"Six, why?" I answered with a question.

Now he was surprised, his face showed it from his widen eyes to his mouth that was shaped in an o.

"To be honest I was surprised at your answer, specially since you didn't seem that old, but the answer was rather mature so I was only wondering how old you were." he answered.

I gave him one of my big smiles.

"My name is Dartania, what's yours?" I asked him, he was rather very nice and I wanted to make friends or at least acquittances with him if I was ever to be allowed to come and observe the old store of his.

"Jeremy Thatch ," he said and smiled at me and I was happy. There was this bench just outside the store, he and I sat down and started to talk and talk we did, until it started to get dark outside. I had made a friend and I was happy. That night I wrote to James about him and how nice he was. Of how Mr, Thatch, was living with his wife and how he never had any children let alone grandchildren. After that afternoon I went to his store every day to greet and talk with him. We would talk about anything really form the weather to sports and from sports to the books I read and everything that involved everyday life. About a week after I met him, he had told his wife about me and she dropped by one midday and she was just as Mr, Thatch had described her, nice all smiles and a worry wort. I had told mom and dad about them, and they were all smiles when they found out that I was having fun. It seems that they had noticed the lack of happiness after the day that my cousins had been over and were very worried about me but know they had a reason not to be. They had asked to meet with them and one day they joined me on my brisk morning walk down to the store. My parents and the Thatch's got along great, the minute they met they hit it of perfectly. I was very happy.

After that my mom would always pack me a small lunch so that I could take it down to the store and another week had passed and Mr, Thatch and Mrs, Thatch had become like the grandparents I never had. And James was quickly becoming full. Then one day while I was reading one of my as, Mrs, Thatch putts it, 'abnormally thick books,' she asked me if I wanted to learn to play the piano. Lets just say surprise is not what I call falling of the chair at the sheer happiness. Once I calmed down I answered with a calm yes. But there was this small little problem.

"Who is going to teach me?"

"I will, I have been known to play quiet well back in my day," she said with her sweet voice.

"Wait a sec..you know how to play the piano? How come I never heard about this little secret?" I remember asking Mr, Thatch.

"You never asked," he had answered me with a teasing smile.

"Enough with the chitchat, time to learn how to play the piano!" Mrs, Thatch had exclaimed. The Thatch's were a very weird couple, they were very energetic and acted odd most of the time.

She started me off on holding an apple all day long and made sure I wold not eat it. She said it was to teach my hand how to keep the fingers curved. I obliged with her but it was far too before my resolve would break and then it happened, I couldn't stop, I tried but I just couldn't, and I took a bite out of the apple. I got caught of course and got one long lecture while Mr, Thatch was laughing up a storm.

During the end of the month I started to actually touch the keys of the piano, and to my surprise my hand curved exactly out of its own accord so that only my fingers were touching the keys and my palms were no where near touching em. I started easy learning the keys and what sound which key made, at first I had to write the whole A, B, B, C, D, letters on some duck tape and tape it on the keys, but after a week my hands and brain had memorized where everything was and before long I didn't need the tape on the keys.

My first time ever playing for anybody was for my parents. I played them one easy piece that had picked out for me and after I was done, my parents, they were in tears. I was glad they liked it. Summer vacation was coming to an end soon and I only had about two weeks before we left London once more for the great U. A.

I spent as much time as I could at my adoptive grandparents while James expanded to three journals. Only on the last day of my vacation, I really didn't want to leave but I had no choice in the matter school stared in a week and I really didn't want to miss out like last time.

And after a teary and definitely sad goodbye with one last longing look at my home, I stepped on to the plane, with a resolved and strong mind I made up my mind to face my problems head on with out a doubt.

Now I just wish someone would of told me that with one problem solved a harder one takes its place.