“My secrets are burning a hole through my heart and my bones catch a fever. When it cuts you up this deep, it’s hard to find a way to breathe! Your eyes are swallowing me, help me find a way to breathe, time stood still, the way it did before, IT’S LIKE I’M SLEEPWALKING! T -“

“Lana? You in here?” My aunt knocks on the door just as she enters. “What?” I snap, then soften my voice. I shouldn’t be so rude, especially when she could have made me stay elsewhere. I yank my earbuds out of my ears and sit up straight, my arm guarding my laptop, which is basically my life. “I brought you something.” She hands a package wrapped in butcher paper to me and sits on my bed without permission. “You know, your mother used to stay here. In this room, I mean. She’d sleep here and stare at the stars until she fell asleep.” She’s referring to the glow in the dark stars super glued onto my ceiling that I tried to scrape off with a butter knife. I nod a few times, and then pretend to check something on my laptop and then turn back to her. She clears her throat. “Well, I’ll leave you alone then.” She pats my leg and walks straight out of my room, closing the door behind her. I lean my head back on the wall, mentally cursing myself. So much for subtle. I open my MacBook and write a couple chapters of my book that I’m working on.

I run my own blog (LanaStarr.com) and I write pretty much anything that crosses my mind. Right now (ha, WRITE now) I’m writing a book about a futuristic Alice In Wonderland. It’s about a girl named Alice who was walking in the woods one night and tripped down a rabbit hole, and when she wakes, she finds herself in a kingdom and gets thrown in prison for a murder she didn’t commit. I don’t think anyone has even read my story. I don’t blame them. If there was some random 17-year-old girl that wrote stories on a blog, I don’t think I’d read her blog either. Writing is amazing. I’ve always loved how you can weave words together and they can change the world, change someone’s life. I write until I forget my name, I write until I forget my past, and I write until I forget who I am.

“Lana! Dinner!” My uncle yells up the stairs at me. I suspect that it’s not the first time he’s called for me. I thread my earbuds under my shirt and secure them in my ears. I’ve got to survive dinner somehow, I suppose. I close my laptop and stow it under my mattress (snooping cousins) and double check that my earbuds aren’t visible through my hair. When I’m sure I won’t get caught, I walk down the stairs where they’re all waiting for me. “There you are!” My aunt rises from her spot at the head of the table and dishes out casserole onto my plate while my cousins fight. Amelia (7) starts screaming because Jules (7) snapped her arm with a rubber band. Mike (18) makes choking motions at me from across the table. I bury my laugh in Potato-N-Tuna casserole, which is actually really good. Samantha (12) yells that Lindsey (14) owes 25 cents to the Swear Jar, and then my uncle yells at the top of his lungs for us to all be quiet. Silence cuts through us all like a winter breeze until everyone, save me, starts laughing.

“So…Lana…What did you do today?” I nearly choke on a piece of tuna and have to cough several times to dislodge it from my throat. “Umm…Mostly I just took a nap and worked on my project.” Since it’s summertime, my aunt and uncle like to keep us all out of their hair so they make us take up projects to do. I told them mine was working on decorating my room wherein reality I’m writing on my blog. The rest of my cousins talk about their projects. The only cool project is Mike’s. He’s started a band called When She Rebels which the name was actually something that I randomly came up with. Amelia has started a lemonade stand with Jules, Samantha makes Rainbow Loom bracelets and sells them for an extravagant price at Amelia and Jules’s lemonade stand.

After dinner, Mike comes up to my room. “What are you really working on, Lena?” I sigh, and hand him my MacBook. While he reads I stand on my bed and try to scrape more of those wretched stars off of my ceiling. After scraping off twenty stars he’s done reading. “Lana, you have to do something with that blog of yours. I never even knew you could write like that. Just….Wow.” I snatch my computer back. “No. I’m writing for myself. Not for anyone else. That makes me a writer, not a fake.” Mike shakes his head. “Lana, it’s not that. It’s…I don’t know…Art. No wonder you lock yourself in your room every day to write.” “MIKE! COME DOWNSTAIRS NOW!” My aunt’s angry voice rings with authority up the stairs and into my bedroom. Mike gives me a sheepish grin and slides down the railway of the stairs. I keep writing until all of the other kids are asleep and then I shut my laptop down for the night.

“I worry about her. She stays locked in her room the whole time everyday…” “Jessica, I’m sure she’s okay. She’s working on her project, remember? We gave her a project to finish? I’m sure she’s okay.” “I know, but since Natalie and Carl…” I start down the stairs and they silence themselves when they hear me coming. “Lana, are you okay?” I open the fridge and take out the orange juice. I raise my eyebrow and take a swig straight from the carton (Why dirty a glass for one drink?). “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” I take several Reese’s from the candy bowl on top of the fridge and stuff them in my pocket, unwrapping one. “See, Jessica? She’s fine. Nothing to worry about” I hear my uncle whisper. He’s not being as quiet as he thought. I put my earbuds in my ears, signalling that I’m done with this conversation, and walk back up to my room. I lay down with my favorite book and read until I fall asleep.