Different

David

Sometimes I get discouraged. School is stressing me out, bullies are stressing me out. Why can't life be easy? Why can't I be normal? It feels like guys will never like me. I'm called ugly and treated badly by the popular girls, don't get me wrong, I love myself and I think I'm beautiful but when you become the target of Dynesha you become like garbage and no amount of confidence is going to change that. Well, at least I only have one more year of high school then I can get out of this hole of discouragement and never look back. These are my thoughts as I walk up to the school.

Lord give me the strength I know you are stronger than Dynesha and her gang, I know we don't fight against flesh and blood. I walk up the steps and into the building. Lord give me strength, remove my fear. Then I walk down the hallway to class and there she is waiting for me. I hold my head up high. Lord strengthen me.

"Hey it's Kumo," Dynesha says and starts to walk towards me.

I try to walk past her but she steps in my way and her gang follows.

"Do you think you're better than us, so rude you can't even say hello?"

I always wondered why she targeted me. There is nothing special about me and maybe that's why.

"Hello," I say as I try to step past her. She doesn't move.

"That’s not very friendly Koo Koo"

I smile and say "Hello" and try to walk past her but again she steps in my way. "We're going to be late," I say

" When have I ever cared about school Koo Koo?" She says as she grabs my glasses "You're such a nerd you look like an owl with these on." Then she throws them far behind her and laughs. " Now you look a little better." She says while laughing. Dynesha and her gang walk off and I go off looking for my glasses. I hope they aren't broken.

Lord, why can't everyone love you? Why won't people let you change them? I think as I look for my glasses. I pray that she and her posse finds salvation. I find them and they aren't broken, Thank you, Jesus.

Then I rush to class right in time for the bell !

I like this class because this teacher is funny and he makes calculus easy. But that doesn't mean it comes easy to me. I look around and remember that I'm an outcast.

"Ok let's team up everyone picks a partner." Mr.W says

I team up with some girl named Kyle but I'm distracted the whole time because of the altercation that happened in the hall.

Mr. W my homeroom teacher gives me a questioning look as he scans the room and walks up to me.

"Kumo is everything ok?"

"Yeah, I'm ok," I say shaking myself out of my daydream.

"Are you sure?" He says with concern in his voice.

"Yeah."

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I make it through the day without running into Dynesha and I eat my lunch in my special spot in the garden. I don't really have any friends so I sit here alone and eat. I'm kind of different so it's hard for me to make them.

Dynesha used to bother me a lot at lunch so I decided I would avoid her and found this garden outside of the cafeteria. This is my quiet place of peace where I could breathe when I've had a long day and pray or praise in peace.

"Lord please help me to be more like you," I say as I'm looking at the sky and eating.

The school day ends and I head home. I pop in my earphones and listen to Kirk Franklin "Jesus". I start singing and dancing down the street,

"Can you hand me down a dream

With those hand-me-down jeans?

Thought I'd never make, but I made it y'all, 'cause I had...

Jesus

When I had nothing, had to struggle, and was up to no good

Jesus"

but sadly I got too into the song and suddenly I tripped over a stick and fell off the sidewalk down a grassy hill and rolled into a car. "OW!!"

"What are you doing?" I hear from the car.

A very attractive guy looks out of the car. I look up at him and I'm so embarrassed.

I sit up and try to dust off the grass and leaves that got caught in my big unmanageable hair and my clothes. " I'm sorry I got a little too into a song and fell," I say

" Oh I didn't realize you fell are you ok?"

Man, I'm on the ground up against your car what else would I be doing? Do girls actually do that to him 😅.

He gets out of his car to help me up by grabbing my arm and pulling me up. A random cute guy is touching me 😳. When I'm standing up he lets go.

" Are you sure you're ok?" He says again with concern looking into my eyes.

I stare into his eyes longer than I need to "Y-yes I'm fine" I say looking away from him." I just thank The Lord that I didn't break my head open, or injure a bone."

He pauses for a minute and stares. Then he laughs, "Yeah that's good."

"What were you listening to that made you fall down a hill and hit my parked car?" he grabs my phone before I can stop him and looks at the song and then pauses again. Hmmm ok weird.

"Alrighty, I gotta go. May God bless you for saving me. Bye." I say as I snatch my phone from him and speed walk away from that awkward situation.

I walk quickly home, when I walk through the door my mom is the first one I see.

"Hey, mom," I say to my mom as I go over to the fridge and get a snack out.

"How was school?" She says as she looks up from her book.

"The same as always," I say popping a chip in my mouth and sitting on the couch. I turn on the T.V and watch the little house on the prairie.

I don't tell my mom about the cute guy I bumped, well rolled into because she's told me countless times not to get jiggy while walking home.

Then Dad walks in. "Why are you always watching that show Kumo, how about you get started on your homework." He says taking the remote and turning the T.V to football.

I roll my eyes," You just want to watch the game."

"I will not confirm or deny that," he says sitting on the couch.

I start laughing and go get my homework. I sit next to my dad while I work on it. I like to see his reaction to that pointless game called football. He screams and gets all in his feelings. It's hilarious.

"NOOOOOOO!!!!" dad screams.

I start laughing. Dad is hilarious.

My mom smiles at us and continues reading her book. When it gets late we have prayer together then go to sleep.

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The next morning I read my Bible, get rejuvenized, pray for an awesome day without being bullied, then I take my shower. I throw on some comfy joggers and a nice t-shirt and get a workout when I try to style my ruthless hair, then I go to school.

I went to school expecting my enemy to be watching for me as she always does in the morning. I wonder why she bullies me. I'm not anything special, but that's probably why.

Oh, I forgot to mention I'm black and I'm nowhere close to Asain. My mom just loves the name Kumo because she loves the beauty of clouds and says they edified The Lord's glory, and Kumo means cloud in Japanese. I wonder if my name is the reason for me being bullied because it did seem to stem from that.

On my first day of school, I remember the teacher telling us to stand up and say our names and hobbies. When he got to me Dynesha just had to open her trap. I just moved from Minnesota and was adjusting to this new school and she just had to say something dumb on my first day. "Kumo? Are you Asain" Dynesha said

"No, I'm black."

"Are you mixed?"

"No, I'm just black."

"Man, that's a weird name, Kumo, ¿Cómo estás? Muy bien, Konnichiwa."

Then she started to laugh along with the rest of the class as the teacher tried to quiet them down. I was so embarrassed. Since that day I've been her target.

I have long black curly hair that goes down my back and it's a fight to manage. I have big nerdy glasses 🤓 that get on my nerves and I don't dress girly I like bigger clothes I guess you can call me a tomboy. I wonder if my appearance is another reason she bullies me. These are some more of my ignorant thoughts as I walked to school.

Surprisingly Dynesha isn't there, God sure works fast. I walk through the front door and look through the classroom door and I see Dynesha not even worried about me. Now, this is getting mysterious. I walk in and I follow Dynesha's eyes and it seems all the girl's eyes to some guy sitting in the front.

They're really weird if I can't see his face they sure can't, but they're still looking at the back of his head. So I get something to throw in the trash so I can see who he is and I almost choke on the air when I realize it's the guy who I literally bumped into last night. I hurry and throw whatever I have away and rush to my seat. I wonder if he'll remember me.

The bell rings and Mr. W walks up to the front of the class and says,

"Well everyone before I stress you out with math equations I want to introduce you to a new student we have. Can you come up and tell us your name and a little about yourself."

He walks up to the front all the girl's eyes are glued to him, they're staring at him like he's a snack. Gross 🤢.

When he finally gets to the front of the class he looks around and then his eyes land on me. He looks surprised and then he smiles which gets me a few sideways looks and mean mugs.

Dang, is he going to cause me trouble? He turns his attention back to the class and says,

"Hello my name is David and I just came from California." He says waving.

"Ok thank you David for introducing yourself I hope you have an awesome year and enjoy this math class. I can throw down with some numbers and I can help you do that too."

Our teacher is so lame.

"Ok," he says laughing. Then in unison, all the girls sigh.

"Alright, you can sit down and let us get back to Our regularly scheduled program." Mr. W said smiling.

I looked at David and wondered if this guy would be anything to me? Would he be a friend or a foe? Would he benefit me or make my life harder? Or will he be like everyone else and not know I exist? These were my dumb thoughts as I stared at David like everyone else was. Hey, but at least I didn't look at him like he was a piece of meat.

Math class was finally over and I decided just to act like this David guy was just a regular student and move on with my life. I'm used to being alone anyway. But has God made me to be this lonely? Who do I have to talk to? Does God want me to live like this? Even if I wanted friends and could get them, would they care about Jesus? Would I always be different?

Maybe it's a blessing to be alone then I don't have to worry about peer pressure because hey I don't have any peers. These were another series of ignorant thoughts as I headed to English.

"Yo, haven't I seen you before," a voice said behind me which of course freaked me out. I turned to see David. The smile on his face indicated that he knew exactly who I was.

Whoa ok, I just stare at him like a weirdo.

Hello, he says and waved his hand in my face.

" O-oh yeah yes" I stutter "cool bye," I say as I speed walk away. I'm such a weirdo lord please help me to be bold.

I walk away from him into Mrs. Taylor's room. Well, now I can drown out my embarrassment with English. Lord, please give me strength.

I look up and Dynesha is heading towards me. Man.

She sits next to me and whispers "Why was David talking to you?"

"He just said I look like someone he knows nothing big."

" Oh, that's why he was looking at you in math class huh. Koo Koo. Never think that a guy that fine would EVA like you Koo Koo you're too nerdy to turn anyone's head." She said with an evil smile.

Well, that ruined my self-esteem. I do dress in clothes that aren't girly and my glasses do add to my nerdiness, but I think mines look cute. Whatever I'm not trying to turn a head I'm trying to get out of high school into college, focus Kumo this is your last year. I ignore her as she moves from me to her gang in the front of the class.

Then like clockwork David walks in and everything Dynesha said to me started attacking my mind. I'm fearfully and wonderfully made I say to myself as I close my eyes. I'm made In the likeliness of a King. I'm beautiful. Ok thank you, Lord, I'm fine now I open my eyes to see David sitting next to me. He looks over at me and smiles.

Dang. I quickly look away and then class starts. Surprisingly he doesn't say anything to me during English and I can just relax and lose myself in writing my essay. We have to write an analysis of the book Othello, the most irritating book ever next to Romeo and Juliet, so I enjoyed writing about my frustrations.

Even though I was doing a good job at ignoring David, I could feel Dynesha's questioning stare on me. I was trying to erase the anxiety I was going to feel when she asked me about my newfound burden David. I should be bold the Bible tells us not to fear because God is with us. Father give me direction and the words to say.

Class ended and I hurried out before David could even formulate the thought of talking to me. But as fast as I left Dynesha still caught up to me. She grabbed my arm and asked,

"Why did David sit by you?" I know I'm a girl but I'll never be this crazy for a guy because of his appearance. The majority of girls at this school are soooo weird or maybe I'm weird.

" I don't know, there were other people around him who weren't me. Maybe it was a coincidence? He didn't talk to me all class anyway remember?"

" David is mines stay away from him." Then she laughs, " Sorry Koo Koo he wouldn't be into a nerd like you anyway. You're nowhere close to beautiful."

Ow " Yeah, whatever." I said as I walked away to my next class. Lord, please bless her to accept you as her King and soften her heart towards me, Father Amen.

As I'm walking I just feel like someone is following me so I look back and see David. Oh no. I run down the hall to my class. How can I face him, every time I see him I make a fool of myself. So I continue to avoid him, hes only causing me trouble anyway. Its better to be alone, isn’t it lord? These are my dumb thoughts as I run and try and forget about David.