Mount Reform: a military school for the "troubled." That's where Keeley Harris has been for the past five years since her bad and brooding mafia boss father sent her away. After getting kicked out, Keeley returns home to a situation and a family sh...
"Welcome to Washington!" the sign read as I sped by in my blacked-out Hummer with Gus beside me.
"You ready, Gus?" I asked my best boy as we continue to drive through the winding forest road. I got a bark in response, which I took as a good thing. I've had Gus for about a year now, ever since it happened. It's not every day that kids at Mount Reform were given things, much less pets.
Mount Reform is the military academy I'd been attending for five years. After my mother died, I got too much for my big and bad, Mafia leader father to handle. So naturally, I was shipped off to Virginia where I was hopefully going to learn some discipline. I did for sure, but everything comes with a price. I lost the girl I used to be: cheery, giggly, a normal girl who just had family issues. Now though, now I'm a trained soldier with a mafia background who has no sense of what normality is that also has family issues. Good to know some things never change.
I kept on driving to where my father and brothers had moved since I've been away: Bayside, Washington. I was told it's a little town about an hour from the coast that's plopped in the middle of nowhere.
It's sad, though, to know that because I've missed out on five years of my teenage life, I really have nothing to come home to after Mount Reform. All I owned was packed up in my car: my paintings and paints, my clothes, weapons, military trunk, and Gus. Plus I haven't talked to anybody besides one of my brothers, Cal, since I've been away. Not even on Family Weekend did anyone come to visit.
But oh well, here's to new beginnings and a hopefully "normal" life.
***5 hours later***
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I eventually started seeing some small neighborhoods and buildings the closer I got to the house. As I drove through the small town, I saw a couple of schools, some local boutiques and shops, and a few restaurants. Before I knew it, I had already driven through the main strip and had gone into farmland. I was pretty sure I had missed the house when my GPS suddenly told me my destination was on the right. I turned onto the gravel driveway and drove for what seemed like a while till I pulled up to the house that had to be larger than the one I lived in when I was twelve.
Their house, well mine now too, was beautiful. White with walls of stone and a black roof, an enormous circle driveway that was paved even under a portion of the house, pointed roofs and large windows, it was like something out of a fairytale.
I pulled up and parked in front of the grand, front door to the house. I hopped out handmade my way around the car to open the car for Gus. The two of us stared up at the house which was now our home. It was a lot different than we were used to.
As we stood there staring, I saw the brother I was closest to, Callan, walk out of the house and towards us, shouting my name with a smile on his face. He made his way to me in no time, considering he was just shy of being a giant, and went to engulf me in his tattooed arms. I awkwardly sidestepped him at the last minute, still not yet comfortable with affection or how they all treated me before I left. I promised myself to move on, but it still hurts.
