i wish I knew then [faith's writing contest!] what I know now -- closed

Some of the greatest people I have met, I haven't met physically, but virtually. We may not know each other by looks, but we know each other by heart. We have shared memories of all kinds, from behind our computer screens.

Nothing can change the way I feel for them. And you may be saying, one day, we will lose contact, and forget about each other. That is not true. No matter what happens, they will always be in my heart, and we will all be forever connected.

None of our moments will go unforgotten, we will always be friends, no- we will always be family, not matter what happens. Now here is my story, of how it all began......

Ashanti's pov

6th grade. A place of uncontrolled hormones, new people, bullying, teachers, tests, and more. Its scary once you first get there. You have 7th graders who feel proud for surving 6th grade, then you have the 8th grades, who think their superior.

The 6th graders are a mess, well some of them anyway. I'm one of the okay 6th grades. No one really hates me, and No one really picks with me like in the before grades, everything seems good. That was until a week into 6th grade.

It all started with the name calling, and it hurt me so bad. Then it got physical, and I started getting, punched, kicked, and slapped, you name it. It all was unbearable really. That was until I met my friend Kayla.

Here is how it went down.

*********************

I walked towards my 5th hour class. Hopefully I wouldn't be late, because after three tardies, you got a detention. And I'm not a big fan on detentions. It would be my first time taking this class. Its called Technology literacy.

It wasn't my type of class, but school is school I guess. I turned off my phone, and listened to the teacher blabber on and on about what to do in his class, and what not to do. We were about to start sending emails to one another, and that's when Kayla came in.

"Hey, I'm Ashanti nice to meet you! Your really, nice I like your hair, take a seat, right here." I smiled sweetly. She smiled, and set her stuff down.

I hoped I didn't scare away, cause me being me, I was a little annoying. "Kayla your here, now pay attention." The teacher instructed. He was a pretty cool dude.

Once we started sending the emails, the girl and me started talking more and more, until she kind of got mad. "Okay I get it!" She said, raising her voice at me. Was I really that annoying to her? After that, I didn't utter a word.

We soon had free time, and Kayla was on this thing called Warriorcatsrpg. I loved warrior cats, and I dared asking her what it was. "Hey Kayla what are you on, cause I love warrior cats." She seemed mad at first, but then smiled.

"Its called Warrior cats rpg, you can roleplay on here with other people, but as a cat. You can make your own clans, clubs, pretty much anything you want!" She said.

"Show me please!"

"Sure, just look. Here is how you make an account." Kayla explained everything to me, all the rules, and that's when it started. At first when I got on it, it seemed stupid. Little did I know, how much this all would change my life forever.

Lemme' just link you to a thread I did on my subbie...
http://warriorcatsrpg.com/inde…4.msg75400803#msg75400803

Consciousness came to Caspian very quickly. The sunlight is very bright and it causes him to squint. His bleared vision spins and his head throbs painfully. Sleep is the best option, he decides in his muddled mind, and he hunches tighter into the small ball he was sleeping in. Confusion floods his system as an empty loneliness surrounds him. The only breathing he can hear is his and there are no warm bodies crowding into his space. He suddenly feels very, very cold and he shivers as his muzzle searches out the warm bodies of his family and finds nothing. He forces his eyes to open despite the throb it creates in his skull. He unfolds himself onto shaky legs and leans against the wall of the den for a moment before he wanders out like a newborn deer toddling on fresh legs. They quake underneath him and he almost falls a few times. He makes it, though, and stands outside in the fall morning with his chin tucked to his chest.

He opens his mouth and a name falls from his lips. “Sophie?” His voice sounds rough and weak, as though he hadn’t used it in quite a while. There is a long silence before he calls again. “Sophie?” His voice echoes in the empty forest, bouncing off the shedding trees. Suddenly, like an unexpected blow to the chest, the memory of Sophie’s death comes bounding back. There is a fierce, crippling pain in his chest that sends him to his knees as a low keen comes from his mouth. The grief washes over him like a tidal wave and he trembles under the weight of it. An onslaught of memories flood back as the grief threatens to crush him, his head throbbing harder with each one. He sees, as though from different eyes, as the pups race towards him as he carries Sophie’s body towards the den. Eriel stopping by a day later to find him curled next to the body, the pups scared and hungry in the den. Eriel coming by every day to feed the pups and taking them with her for hours on end while he grieved. Pandora coming by to say goodbye.

The tears flow like a river down his face as he mourns the loss of his true love and he feels very alone. He mourns her as he lays there, his heart thrashing in his chest like some kind of wounded creature. Around noon, when he’s out of tears and the ache in his chest has become numb, he comes out of the grief he was drowning in. His chest heaves as he breathes in low gasps and his throat is raw. He stumbles to his feet again, emotionally wrung out and completely shattered. He doesn’t pay any mind to where he’s going, just let’s his paws move. He’s hyperaware of the things around him. Sees the reds and oranges and vibrant colors for the first time in a long, long time. The crunch of dead leaves under his feet seem to ring in his ears as though they were amplified. He shivers every time a damp leaf brushes his coat and more than once does he freeze when something rattles or drags somewhere around him. Anxiety crawls up his throat and he has to stop again and again to get a grip on himself.

He reaches the border and he stares at it, confused. Then with a flash of white hot anger, he realizes what’s got him confused by it. The scent of Cold Summers was faded almost to the point of being completely gone. All of the claw marks were old and it made a hot poker of self-loathing branded him. It’s fueled by the sight of that border and it makes him ashamed to have neglected the pack for so long and so selfishly. He thinks of Axel for the first time in a long time and the poker stabs him again and again and again. His father would be so furious with him. He was being weak, he could imagine his father spitting at him. His father would tell him that he wasn’t acting like an alpha at all. He lunges forward angrily, rearing onto his back legs. His claws tear violently at the wood until the ugly gouges are enough for him. He darts forward, rearing again on his back legs. The thin tree bends a bit and then snaps as he smashed his claws against it. He feels a few splinters in his pads and can’t bring himself to care.

From then, he starts walking the border. He moves fast, remarking the entire border. He’s so determined that he doesn’t even feel the ache in his claws as he drags his paws dozens and dozens of times against dozens of trees. Once he’s down and the sun’s beginning to set, he stumbles upon his father’s clearing. The ground is cold and smooth under his aching paws and there aren’t any scents that suggest someone spent any time there. He stares around the empty clearing, remembering the couple who held meeting here. He remembers being a pup and watching his mother and father, so peaceful and loving towards each other. He remembers his mother, practically rearing them by herself while Axel stayed away from them.

He gets very angry with Axel and Pandora very fast. He doesn’t understand why his childhood had to be ripped away from him. He wants to know why he had to grow up so fast. He wants to know what his family had done to deserve the punishment they had gotten. A feeling of abandonment fills him to his core, not only by his mother and father but by Sophie and his pups and Odessa too. The feeling boils up and up and up until it explodes out of him in a loud howl that surprises even him. He howls for a long minute and then shuts his maw with a click. He feels impatience troubling at his frayed nerves and it makes him very jittery. He forces himself to sit and he freezes himself with his head high and his face as impassive as he can make it. A rustling of bushes draw his attention and another kalak steps out. Katia’s eyes lock on his and the docile she-wolf stands very still. Caspian takes her in, shocked by her age. He can’t remember her growing up to be so old. Not that she’s fully grown, no. But she’s on the brink of being a teenager, the point of life where she should be wanting to leave. Her coat is reddish grey and there isn’t any black on her, her shadows are grey. Her eyes, one green and one brown, hide her fear of rejection behind a mask of shock.

They lock eyes for a long, uncomfortable moment. She mumbles a soft ‘hi’ that makes his ears strain and his voice doesn’t want to come out, so all he does is nod silently. There is no one else here yet to break the frigid tension between them, so neither of them speaks. Finally, he beckons her with a tilt of his head. “Sit by me,” he says and feels a tug at his chest by how delighted and surprised she looks. She comes to him quickly, moving so that she sits behind and to the left of him. They fall back into the awkward silence as they wait for the pack and Caspian forces himself not to fidget. His mind is a series of plans, each one specifically designed to restore the pack. He stiffens his backbone as he sits and his emerald eyes slowly harden as he forces himself to forget about Sophie and her death and the past few months. He can’t live in the past anymore, and he won’t allow that to happen again.