• Crimson lifted her head from the pillows. Her back covered by her shirt, her legs and feet under the blankets. Though cold to the touch her feet were warm. Crimsons arms were snug under the pillows; her nearly bare back was cold. Her deep blue eyes glowed in the dark and were set ablaze. Crimson pushed herself up from the bed and glanced at the alarm clock.
    "5:50 AM. Great." Crimson sighed. She had always awakened some time before her alarm was set to go off.
    Beep. Beep. Beep.
    Crimson's alarm was going off; she hadn't known she had fallen asleep. She got up and turned her alarm off. She was half naked; the only thing that covered her was a baggy T-shirt and a pair of black underwear. Her hair covered her eyes, it was short kind of like a boys, but girly in a way. It came to her shoulders in the back but got shorter as it came forward. She wasn't very slim, she was chubby, but she didn't mind she was more proud than ashamed. But of course she was trying to lose weight. At first it didn't seem like it was working, but as soon as she started high school it started to show in the first two weeks she had already lost 17 pounds to her it was like a miracle.
    Crimson shuffled her way into the bathroom to get ready for school; she put on the dirty clothes from the floor, put in her contacts, and put on heavy black eyeliner all around her eyes. She walked back into her room and grabbed her backpack and west coast choppers hooded sweatshirt.
    Walking out the door Crimson noticed it was snowing. She stopped. Looked up at the sky, smiled, and closed her eyes. For a moment she felt revived like god gave her new life with every touch of snow that fell upon her face. Crimson opened her eyes and walked away.
    Crimson knocked on the door of the house. Inside, she heard dogs barking, loudly, too loudly it seemed. Crimson had sensitive ears. She also had a sensitive nose, and her eyes were sensitive to light.
    Crimson heard a woman yell from inside, what exactly, she was unsure, for she had her hands over her ears.
    The door opened slowly, Crimson threw down her arms the dogs were still barking. was the one who had opened the door, she was holding one of the dogs by the collar. Crimson stepped inside.
    Crimson covered her nose, but quickly threw down her arms not wanting to insult Gina. It smelt awful in Gina’s house, it smelled like dog s**t and piss, especially to Crimson’s sensitive nose.
    “Did you bring the check for gas money?” Gina questioned.
    “No my mom didn’t write it up.” Crimson explained quietly.
    “Make sure she does, got it?”
    “Yes Gina.”
    Crimson stepped over the safety gate that led from the porch to the kitchen, then wandered into the living room. The smell was worse in there then anywhere else in the house. Crimson heard a door open from behind her, she turned around quickly and saw Nikki walk out of her room stomping her feet loudly.
    “Good morning Nikki.” Crimson said quietly. Nikki glanced at Crimson but said nothing, this happened every time Crimson came over. Nikki was Gina’s daughter and one of Crimson’s classmates. Crimson didn’t like Nikki and it was clear Nikki didn’t like her either. Crimson growled under her breath.
    It took Nikki and Gina about 30 minutes to get ready, and it made Crimson mad. The reason it made her mad was cause it only took Crimson about 5 minutes for Crimson to get ready and get to their house. The other reason was because it always made Crimson late for school.
    Gina, Nikki, and Crimson got in Gina’s car to go pick up Kenzie. Kenzie was another one of Crimson’s classmates.
    The Car pulled up to Kenzie’s house. Her house was a beat up double trailer. It had a car port out in front, a tall fence around the door, with a small hole in it for the dogs to go out into a bigger fenced area. In the fence was a small, yet tall wooden gate. Kenzie stepped out the door with a lot of stuff in her arms, she could barely close the door let alone get out the gate. But somehow she did it, and pretty quickly. She got in the car saying hi to Gina and Nikki, then Crimson after getting situated and everything out of her arms. She handed Gina a CD to put in the player.
    Crimson waved and said “Hi Kenzie.”
    “How are you?” Kenzie replied.
    “I’m ok, and you?”
    “Eh, alright, could be better.” Kenzie explained with a bit of a sigh.
    The car pulled away from the house. The school was in the next town over about 15 miles away, Gina, Kenzie, and Nikki talked the whole way there. Crimson had earphones in her ears listening to music. She never liked to listen to people talk unless they were talking to her, or if they were talking about something interesting.
    There were kids lined along the right side of the street across from the school. They were all smoking cigarettes. Gina pulled the car in front of the schools office, saying bye to the girls as they got out of the car, then pulled away. Kenzie and Nikki went to their community and Crimson went to hers.
    They went to an alternative school, called Southwest Open School or for short SWOS. Community was the first class in the morning; it was sort of like a home room but not quite. Crimson walked into the Small building that was called the Yurt. It was the art room, there was a bunch of unfinished art work hanging about the room, the tables had designs and pictures painted on them, the floor had its own designs painted on it.
    “Hi miss Crimson” Crimson’s advisor said as she walked in the door.
    “Hi Janis, how are you?” Crimson replied happily.
    “Oh, I’m good. How are you?”
    “Eh, I’m actually pretty tired.”
    “Ah, didn’t sleep well?”
    “No not really.” Crimson finished, walking further into the room. She sat next to Morrighan. Morrighan was another one of Crimson’s friends