The Ripmender

Chapter 1

I stroked Nathan Jake's cheek with the tip of my finger. His roguishly handsome brown eyes smiled into mine, as I raised my hand to touch the dark curls that tumbled over his forehead.

Then I sighed and closed my sketch book. Drawing him was the closest I would ever get to him. He was an American rock star, and I was a plain girl with long dull blonde hair from a tiny town in South Africa.

For years, I had hoarded every picture I could find of him. Stored up every scrap of information about him that magazines, and the internet could give me. I knew more about him than I knew about my own brothers and sisters.

But as the months turned into years, I was forced to accept that our worlds would never merge; that our lives would never be on the same level. That he would never, ever be mine.

And then the miracle happened; I learned that he was he was running music workshops for College students in between world tours... And not in New York or London, or anywhere you would normally expect a celebrity to go, but in the city of Durban, which was only three and a half hours from where I lived.

I had just finished Matric, and with a lot of persuading, pleading and tears, my parents eventually agreed that I could do an art degree. The closest College was fortunately the same one that Nathan was at, so I left home with high hopes of finally having a chance to get to know him.

But I had only ever seen him once, from a distance. He was surrounded by screaming fans, who were being kept at bay by his intimidating bodyguard, and a substantial number of College security staff.

After that, the College had issued a stern warning that anyone harassing him would face expulsion, so the chances of me meeting him shrank to almost microscopic levels.

And even if we did meet, Nathan Jake would pass me by, and never give me a second glance. Why would he, when there were millions of girls in the world who were more attractive.

With my long, drab hair, plain face and brown tasselled clothing, I looked more suited to sitting around a campfire singing Kum-ba-ya during the Flower Child era, than being the girlfriend of one of the most famous young people in the world.

He might as well be back in America; he was still out of my league, and out of my reach.

The gaudy cover of the sketch book disappeared in a haze, as my eyes clouded over with the tears that had been threatening to escape all week. If anyone wanted to paint a picture of misery, they could just use me as the model.

It was a pathetic tale, my life. Not very interesting at all.

I had grown up among siblings who were convinced that I had been swapped at birth, and that their real sister had been lost to them in some horrible mix-up at the hospital. My parents of course knew the truth about why I was so different. They just didn't know that I knew.

My best friend of fourteen years had moved with her family to Brazil, and had promptly decided that I didn't exist anymore. The boy who had recently asked me out had ended up being a douchebag, who had wanted nothing but a roll in the hay.

Literally; his father was a cattle farmer.

Nathan hadn't been the only reason why I had wanted to study here. I had to get away from home; from the indifference of my siblings, the anxious looks of my parents, and the stifling smallness of a town where everyone knew everyone's business.

I was going to start a new life, with a group of like-minded students who understood my need to paint and sketch and create.

*I'll do my best to get the next chapter up soon*

Cover photo attribution: http://www.flickr.com/photos/justinwkern/5731499465/