✔ Aspen | Sherman Yang

[b e f o r e]

"Caroline darling, this is your new home." A nervous middle-aged couple spoke in Mandarin Chinese to a small girl with short black hair and adorable little bangs. Her almond-shaped eyes darted around the small apartment in wonder, and rushed to the window, attempting to pull back the screen door.

Her parents laughed and pulled it open for her easily, and she ran with her tiny little legs to the balcony, gazing down on the streets of New York City. Compared to the rest of the small apartments in New York, it was a piece of junk, but it was modern, clean, and was quite amazing to Caroline, for her old apartment in China was everything it wasn't.

But she was too young to understand, that the reason they moved was because of the Tiananmen Square Massacre, a protest rally formed of young students and were shot down by the military and tanks. It was hard to explain to Caroline why her teenage cousins were gone and her aunt who was a doctor, came rushing in crying, with blood-soaked on her clothes.

No one really wanted to know anyways, 10,000 people died.

Her parents watched their three-year-old daughter gaze down on the bustling streets of Manhatten, hoping that they could afford this life, one they put all their money into and escape the language barrier that was threatening to tear them apart.

༻*༺

Caroline was four now, and her parents decided to send her into daycare as they became part-time students, studying English while making a reasonable sum of money.

She was scared of all the other kids, they didn't have black hair, brown almond eyes, and they didn't like her. She spoke a different language, and they teased her by calling her "alien girl". Caroline wasn't stupid enough to know that alien girl wasn't her real name but an insult they used. Just because their family gave her a name in English, didn't mean they would accept her.

New York wasn't so nice after all.

༻*༺

She was in second grade now, speaking a reasonable amount of Chinese, but English was her first language. Often picked on by the bullies of her elementary school, she sometimes came home with a bruised arm and her hair a mess. It wasn't easy for her parents, they had a hard time with English, and they knew from experience since they didn't have a good childhood themselves. Teachers didn't do anything in their time. After gathering up all the money they could and talking with some new friends, they put her into a martial arts class.

At first, she was skeptical, but Caroline proved to be amazing at it, and she realized that the bullies were backing off. And from then on, no one messed with her, and some of the girls even became her friends. Little by little, her life was turning around.

But little by little, her future was being determined.

༻*༺

There was a white signup sheet for the volleyball team. She was in ninth grade, and she had been waiting for this moment since she started eighth grade. Caroline and her friends scribbled their names into the sheet and giggled with each other. They had been practising volleyball during their recesses, using all they knew about it and putting their efforts into it.

The tryouts were merely a practice, the coaches were extremely impressed by the girls, she had never seen this skill in an eighth-grader. Easily, Caroline and her friends made the team.

"We made it Car, we made it." One of her friends squealed.

"Well after all this time it would be kind of sad if we didn't." She told them with a huge smile on her face.