A/N: Trigger Warning- Depressing thoughts, mentions of physical violence

Song: Look Through My Eyes by Phil Collins and recorded by Everlife for Bridge to Terabithia

September 8

This past week was a blur. Everyday was mostly the same as Tuesday, but I tried harder to distance myself from Sarah since that day. It didn't work. She is infuriatingly persistent. Everyday she finds me and sits with me at lunch. Then at the end of the day, she drags me out to the cafe, and we sit and talk a little bit more about ourselves and classes and life in general. Maybe I could try harder, but she made it almost impossible to refuse an invitation to hang out. Not only would she just assume that I would want to, but she is so easy to talk to and so understanding. It's hard for me to say no and close her off. Just one look from her seems to make me feel more relaxed and calm. It's damn near impossible to keep my walls up around her. I've barely been able to side step questions that revealed too much about myself.

Anyway, that leads me to what happened today, and why I've pretty much given up not trying to be friends with her. At lunch time, instead of inviting me to go to the cafe again, she asked me if I wanted to catch a movie with her. The movie theater (if you could call the old, run down building that) was playing reruns tonight. I managed to actually completely decline the offer, but then she sighed and said, "Look, Austin. If you haven't noticed, for some reason, practically the whole school hates you." I snorted at that point because that was obvious, but she continued. "You need a friend who you can talk to and will be there for you. I don't care if you think you don't, but having at least one good friend to be there is important whether you like it or not. You need someone who can respect you and listen to you. Everyone does. I want to be your friend, Lakewood, and if you don't want to be friends with me then fine. But you need to find someone because I don't want to see you get hurt. Also keep in mind that you can't make a friend if you constantly push them away." She stood up and brushed her jeans off. "My offer for the movie still stands. If you want to go, I suggest you tell me by the end of the day." Then she walked off. I had a feeling she was talking about herself as much as she was talking to me about needing someone who understood. It wasn't the first time I wondered what happened to her in Norfolk.

It was after that moment that I had decided to just accept the fact that we were going to be friends. When the bell rang to signal the end of the day, I caught up to Sarah at the door to the classroom and walked with her outside of the building. "So, what movie do you want to see?" I had asked.

She turned her head to look at me and smiled. She was holding her notebook to her chest and had a pencil stuck behind her ear as usual. "I heard they were playing Bridge to Terabithia in an hour. We'll be able to buy some candy at the corner store before we have to find seats."

"How is it that you already know where everything is?" I asked incredulously.

She just shrugged. "I like to take walks."

When we got to the store, Sarah ran to the candy aisle like a little kid and came back with practically half of the candy produced by the biggest candy factory in the world. "Whoa, are you going to be able to eat all of that?" I asked.

"Oh shut up and grab some sodas. I didn't know what kind of candy you liked."

I laughed and grabbed two Pepsi bottles and a few tissue packages. I didn't know about her, but reading the book or watching the movie Bridge to Terabithia always made me cry. After we made it out of the store, we ran inside the theater just in time for the movie to start. Of course, at the opening scene, I tried to open a bag of Skittles, but it burst wide open and flung the candy in every direction. Sarah started giggling, and I elbowed her playfully to try and get her to be quiet.

By the end of the movie, Sarah and I were sobbing quietly and hugging each other. She was able to pull herself together first, so she took one of the packages of tissues and dried her eyes and blew her nose. Then she tried to help me dry my own eyes, but instead she poked me in the eye. I yelped in pain, but it got me to stop crying. Sarah rolled out of her seat because she was laughing so hard. "I'm s-so sorry!" She gasped before she was overcome with laughter.

I pretended to be upset and snatched the tissue out of her hand. "I'll take that now, Missy." She continued to laugh, and I couldn't help but join in as well. I didn't realize how long we stayed in the theater until the next movie was about to play and we were kicked out for being too loud. It took a few minutes after that for us to calm down.

I looked up at the sky and sighed. There were no clouds to be seen for miles, and the stars seemed to have taken advantage of that by twinkling brightly and lighting up the sky almost as if it were day in the upper atmosphere. I felt Sarah walk up next to me and gasp. I looked over at her curiously. She was looking up at the sky in pure amazement. She seemed more captivated by it than I was. "Back in Norfolk, there were too many lights in the city for the stars to shine this brightly. It looks like there are more stars here than there which I know is impossible but..." She let her voice trail off in wonder.

"I guess that's one of the few good things about living in a small town surrounded by country," I said softly, turning my gaze back up toward the heavens.

"Look! There!" Sarah suddenly whispered excitedly. I quickly turned to look at where she was pointing. A shooting star streaked across the sky. "Make a wish!"

It's incredible to me how someone who was so strong willed and seemingly tough could get excited over things like candy and shooting stars. One minute, Sarah could be ready to snap someone's neck for beating up a kid, the next, she could be giggling about something that seemed so simple to me but meant everything to her, then the next one, she could be doing the whole "tough love" thing, and then the next one after that, she could be freely showing her emotions by crying because of a sad ending to a movie. I have never met anyone like her.

After she told me to make a wish, I closed my eyes, and immediately I thought of what I wanted even though I had no idea a second before what I would wish for. I wished that if one day I did come out to her, she would still accept me for who I am because I didn't want to lose her.

I opened my eyes and looked over at her. She still had her eyes closed, but her face was wet with fresh tears. "Sarah? Are you okay?"

She opened her eyes to look at me. "What? Oh." She touched her face as if she didn't realize she was crying. "Yeah, I'm fine."

I pulled her closer to me and hugged her. Her body shaked with renewed silent sobs, and I rubbed her back soothingly. We stood there like that for a long time before she pulled away and wiped her eyes. "Does this have something to do with Norfolk?"

She nodded. "I... I'm sorry, but I don't know if I should tell you..."

"Hey, we're friends right? What was it you said earlier? You need someone to talk to and will be there for you, right?" I said with a soft smirk.

She smiled a little and punched my arm. "Don't use my own words against me." She sat down on the sidewalk, and I sat down next to her. "I won't tell you why it happened because I'm not ready to tell you that yet, but I'll tell you a lot of what happened." I nodded for her to continue. "At my old school, there were a lot of people who hated me because of something I said about me. My friends turned on me, and I would get beat up in the hallways constantly. Then one day it stopped because one of the more popular girls decided she wanted to be my friend. It worked for a while, but then I thought it would be safe to try and say that thing again. I told her what it was, and the next day, she had people pin me to the side of a building on my way to school." She stopped for a second to wipe her eyes. "She said she couldn't believe the rumors were true and that I deserved what happened before and after she told them to stop. Then she pulled out a knife and carved something into my leg. When she finished, she let the people beat me and kick me. When they were finished and walking away, I realized I couldn't just let them do this to me anymore. I limped after them, and they made the mistake of stopping to laugh at me. I... I knocked one of them out and really hurt another one. I took the girl's knife and threatened them with it which made them run. After that, I limped home so that my dad could take a look at it since he is a doctor. He was furious about what happened, but after I told him what I did, he seemed less likely to go out and kill them because I already handled them. He stitched up my leg, but he said it would leave a scar because it was left untreated for a while. That's why I carry a first aid kit in my bag. If I can save someone from having a scar like mine that serves as a painful reminder of the cruelty some people have toward them, then I will do the best I can to do so."

I stared at her in shock. "I'm sorry that happened to you."

She shrugged. "What's done is done. There was a whole investigation and everything, but eventually everything was sorted out. That's why we moved here. My dad thought that in a smaller town, there would be less to no people who would bother me, so I wouldn't end up in a situation like that again."

I gaped at her again. "How do you do it?"

She looked over at me with a slight frown. "How do I do what?"

"How... after all of this happened... how have you stayed so happy and calm and alive and just..." I gestured around at her, unable to find words. "You?"

She snorted in laughter. "Maybe on the outside I'm like that." I continued to stare at her, and she rolled her eyes. "I guess... You can't focus on the past. You can't focus on the pain and hurt. You have to look around you and find joy and peace in the simplest things. Find solace in the things you enjoy. Like the candy. Candy to everyone might just be junk food that's overloaded with sugar, but to me, it's a reminder of the sweetness in life. It may only come in small amounts, but if you know where to look, there is sweetness to life everywhere. And the stars. The stars are a reminder to me that there is still hope that a new day will come. For millions and billions of planets out there, a new day has already started as they whiz around their suns at dizzying speeds. If a new day, a new start to life could come for those planets, it will come for us. The shooting star. It's a hope and a dream that may seem like it's going to fail, but there is still hope that it won't. The meteor burns brightly as it is slowly destroyed by the atmosphere, but it burns brightly because it has passion and a burning hope that cannot be put out that it will make it to the ground without completely burning up. No matter how many trials it faces, it still burns with the same intensity and the same hope and the same passion. And as for my notebook." She pulled out her notebook that she shoved in her bag when we got to the store. "I write down poetry and stories because that's what I love to do. I find solace in it." She looked up at me with a fiery sort of passion in her eyes. "There may be pain and suffering in life, but it's all worth it if you can find hope and believe in the simplest things. There is always something worth living for. Sometimes we just need something to remind ourselves." She turned back to look at the stars again.

When I looked back at the stars, I suddenly seemed to see them more clearly. I saw them like Sarah did. They burned so bright it almost seared my eyes. I could almost see the colors swirling in the breeze. It was so peaceful, yet so strong and substantially there. It was hope.

We went our separate ways soon after that, but I will never forget this night. It was too important, too special for me to forget.

Tonight was hope.

~Austin