What is your fondest memory? The teacher writes the question on the white board in a fading green marker, making it almost illegible.

"This is your writing topic for today," he says, standing away from his writing so the students can see it, though, majority of the class doesn't care. "You must write at least 250 words." The teacher finishes, trying to sound enthusiastic about the assignment. This seems like so few words to write such an interesting topic, but he has lowered his standards through out the year on how much we can get down on a Microsoft Word document.

I think back to the writing topic. What is my fondest memory? Some may take a second, fumbling through the few memories that remained important enough for their brain to hold. It may take them a minute or two to come up with a solid answer, and some may even say they don't have a favourite memory 'cause their life has either sucked or had too many good times just to choose one. And then the people in the last category of teenage essay writers may lie and make up some cute story of how they went to the zoo and saw an adorable baby tiger and that made them change their perspective on life forms, or something corny and fake like that.

But for me, it's different. On the spot, I can definately say my 7th birthday. Though it was nine years ago, I can still recall every minute of that day. That day was very special. It was the 7th day of the 7th month of the 7th year of the 21st century. Some people may assume that I had a great party, with a petting zoo and a bounce house, and every kid in the grade came. No. I've never had enough friends or cared enough to throw a party like that. No. That birthday was special because I recieved the gift that determined how I would live my life for the rest of my days. On that day, I became a telepath.

Since I was only 7 when this happened, I had no clue what telepathy was since I had had no reason to know previously and assumed it was a normal form of communication among people. I remember trying to say hello to people telepathically, but they wouldn't respond. Instead, I could hear them questioning why a little girl was looking up and smiling at them. 'How rude,' I would think.

Eventually, I realized that my gift was not normal after many frustrating attempts of trying to make conversation with my classmates telepathically as the teacher had story time, leading me to think that no one liked me. I consulted the internet, which told me that my gift was telepathy, a 'made up' power that is considered to be a shared bond between twins sometimes, but never confirmed. I knew that I had no twin, and that the internet was wrong. Realizing that I was special, I kept my gift to myself, not willing to reveal it out of my own safety, keeping in mind that in most movies, people who are special don't do well when their specialness is revealed to the public. To this day, I am the only person who knows of my gift.

As the years went on, I would never do anything extremely wrong with my power that would deem a person to be bad, and somewhat evil, such as invading very personal thoughts that I knew weren't for me. Instead, I would often eavesdrop on peoples harmless, idiotic thoughts durring class when I was bored, or while people were having a conversation. Yet, with all the secrets I collected I never revealed any of them.

My power was very useful though during tests and quizzes. Some may say I abuse my powers in those situations. I would go into the thoughts of the smarter kids if I was ever stuck on a question, or, if everyone in the class was stuck, then to the teacher and see if they'd reveal anything. As a result of that, I became a straight A student.

Though I never really had any close friends, I had learned enough about everyone so it felt like I was everyone's best friend, like they had shared all of their secrets with me. But I knew that wasn't the situation. So instead, I was friendly to everyone and kept light conversations about how they spent their weekends, never to speak of the things I knew about them to their face or anyone else's.

Now, I could write all of this down for the teacher, explaining my fondest memory and how it has affected my life forever, but I can't. I wouldn't. He would never believe me, and even if he did it would be too risky. So instead, I will write about my 7th birthday, and the extravagent bounce house and adorable animals that delighted 7 year-old me, and how every kid in the grade came. And I will be that third category of teenagers who write essays.

As I quickly type this out on my laptop, I confirm it's over 250 words (which is considerably easy, and I end with 934 words) and print it out to hand to the teacher with a fake grin that sits on my face. As I pack up my things to get ready for the next class, I know that, as always, my secret is still safe, and though that paper is a lie, I'm gonna get a great grade, yet again.