Being McKenzie Prince ✔

Dear Diary

Everything at school started to fall apart when I was caught in a lie. I was a part of that fake world until my boyfriend cheated on me with my best friend and left me for her.

The lie I am referring to is the fact that I am not in fact rich and that I do not live in some sick mansion which has way too many rooms in any way. I happen to live in the worst part of town; a type of trailer park. I know that a lot of people have different ideas or opinions of what it must be like to live in the local trailer park; well let me help you with that, it sucks.

I got labelled as an emo and a liar afterwards. I cut my natural long blonde hair. My wardrobe changed with the hair. I used to wear brand name outfits outside of school, which I borrowed without permission, now I wear a bunch of layers made up of different colors. Some people would say that this was my attempt to re-invent myself, that I am now more "fake" than I was before. Maybe they are right, or maybe I am now being myself. Maybe that dumb blonde who was head-over-heals in love with Brian Montgomery and best friends with Ashley Castles and Christina Brown was the fake "me".

My mom currently has three jobs. The first job is from six o clock in the morning until two o clock in the afternoon by the local Diner. The second job is at the local meat market, where she sells meat for this really rude guy called Pedro, from two thirty pm till about six thirty pm. I think that he is Greek or something like that. At least that is what he keeps telling everyone who will listen. I think he is lying through his teeth though, he was born somewhere on a farm in Namaqualand. The third job is at a club in town called the Raging Bull where she works as a bar lady. In other words, my mother is never home. Even when she is physically home, she is still not home. I don't know how else to explain it. Like a Zombie.

My dad died when Skylar and I were five years old. Whenever I tell people this they say how sorry they are. The truth is that I hardly knew him. All I remember is that he yelled allot and drank allot. He ended up drinking himself to death, literally, by walking in front of a train while he was drunk. Too bad he had to do it in front of my brother. It really messed him up.

My mom's boyfriend who happens to live with us at the moment is this guy called Goliath. The one boyfriend is worse than the other. Goliath works from home, or at least that is what he says. In truth I think he just likes to sit around and do nothing. That makes the fact that he often calls me a "loser" kind of ironic.

Do not misunderstand me; there are a bunch of really nice and civilized families living in the neighborhood, but my family just happens to be the rotten egg in the whole equation. I would avoid my own family if I could. I do not blame the others in the neighborhood for walking circles around us. The sad truth is that you cannot choose your family.

Skylar is my older brother by a total of five minutes. It is probably common sense that with a name like Skylar that he has been bullied a lot. We are more than brother and sister. We are best friends. We do everything together and we always stand up for each other, no matter what. Even if the whole school hates me and my so-called parents think I am useless, I still have Skye. Mac and Skye against the world and that is the way it is always going to be. Like Thelma and Louise or Bonnie and Clyde except for the fact that we do not really steal, that much, and we have no current plans to go driving into the sunset off of a cliff or to get shot to death by cops.

My life is actually pretty boring except for the fact that every day of my life is like a war and that my house is full of active landmines that can explode any second. I always thought that things could have been worse. If one of my mother's boyfriends would get angry and physically assault Skye or me; I would tell myself that things could be worse; at least he did not break a leg or an arm. The night one of them broke my brother's arm, I told myself that it could have been worse; at least they did not break his leg as well. The list became longer and longer over the years and I have always looked for excuses to make my life more bearable, more normal.

I have spent my whole life looking for the light at the end of the tunnel, or the rainbow at the end of a storm, because the second that I admit what my life is really like, that there is nothing better, that things are only going to get worse from now on, I will lose all hope.