My name is Hannah Sokalski, I live near Houston,Texas in place called Pasadena it’s a small town, but I have always loved living here. This is My story, a story of me trying to figure out life, trying to survive through high school. Today the worst yet hopefully it will be a good day. Today is the first day of high school, thankfully I have my best friend since like I was four, Emma Waterfall she has always been there for me, especially when my parents died nine years ago in car accident it was a hard for me, but she was there for me even though I couldn't fully understand what happened. “Hannah, it's time to go, you're going to be late for school” my foster mom (Emily Kowalski) said, “ okay I will, be down in a sec, mom” as I walked down the loud oak steps into the smell of bacon, eggs, hash browns in the kitchen. “Hey sport, you ready for your first day of high school?” asked Noah Sokalski, (he is my foster dad) “Yeah I guess so, I mean I am kinda scared.” “ what do you mean you guess?” “Well, I am kinda scared, what if the classes are hard?” “ I am sure that you will do amazing and besides you have Emma to help you.” We ate all breakfast together for once. I had little bit of time to go upstairs and put a ponytail in my long dirty blonde hair walk up to the third floor of the house “Come on we are going to be late and we have to pick up Emma,” mom said. I grab my backpack and headed out, the big oak door with a big window in the middle, and had different designs etched in to the door it's probably the most favorite thing in the whole house besides the Kitchen, but that's only because there is food in there. We pulled into Emma drive and waited for her, she walked up to our red truck wearing, her beautiful dark brown hair in a high pony and a blue flannel and denim shorts. “ Hey Hannah and Mrs.Sokalski, are you excited for the first day of high school?” Emma said. “ Yes,I can't wait to meet my teachers!” I said “ me too and they have an even bigger library at the high school,” Emma said. The rest of the car ride to school we talked about how much school work they might give us and what we think the teachers will be like. “ We are here girls, I hope you both have an amazing day at school!” my mom said, we both looked at each other with a nervous yet a hint of excitement, “here we are High School.” Emma said, “ we survived middle school, there's hope we can survive high school.” We both walked into the very large entryway with different coloured flyers about different clubs and our school logo saying “ GO BADGERS.” in big yellow and gray letters “Wow this is amazing, it's better than Middle school” I said, we made our way to our classes I had math first and Emma had Honors Biology. I made my way to math, I passed a couple of my friends from middle school I heard a couple complaining about being back at school. I walked into Mr. Davidsons room, somewhat ready to start my day. The bell rang, and Mrs. Davidson came and said “Good morning class today, we will not be doing much math today, we will mostly going over the schedule for the year, checking out textbooks and well be getting different sheets for the year, and if we have time we will go over some of the textbook. I will call names in alphabetical order for textbooks” The first name she said was Abby Anderson, and a couple other people to check out textbooks. Mrs. Davidson finished checking out the books. After she started to talk about the schedule for the year and what she expected from us, and the kind of classroom atmosphere she wanted. The bell rang a couple minutes after she was finished talking. As I began to walk out of the classroom, Mrs Davidson stopped me when I was half-way out of her room and asked if she could talk to me, either before or after school. “yeah that's fine, I can come in tomorrow morning” I said “ OK sounds good” I met up with Emma and told her about Mrs. Davidson, and she that it was really weird, we walked together into civics and at first I thought I walked into the wrong classroom, because there was paintings on every single wall and on the windows. We continued walking in and we sat together at a table with Jenna and Thomas, and started talking about how there first hour was, and me and Jenna have the same first hour with Mrs. Davidson. And how weird it was that she told me to come in before school, then the bell rang and Mr. Larson came in and introduced himself and started talking about some of the different things we would be talking during the year, and the definition civics and how it affects us. After he finished talking he told to go gets books, we all sat back down and he started calling names in alphabetical order “Jenna Anderson, Charlie Andress please come to my desk” Mr. Larson said. He finished checking the books out and then we had five minutes to do whatever we wanted to do. We all started to talk about what are next class were and me and Jenna both had Wind Ensemble, Jenna played the Alto saxophone and I played Clarinet. The bell rang me and Jenna started walking to the first floor and said bye to Thomas and Emma, we walked into the band pod and sat down with our groups and Mr. Hammin walked into the band room and said “ Good morning, class today we will not be playing but assigning band folders, cubbies and assigning seats. I have a seating chart up on the stand then on the the seating chart it will have two numbers that has your folder number and cubby number.” We all got up and I was the fifth person to look at the chart and I had cubby number eighteen and folder number eight, after like five minutes everyone was sitting in there appropriate seats and Mr. Hammin started talking some of different songs we might be doing, and he said that we might be able to do Don’t Stop Believing in our May concert, then talked about the way lesson would work and how we should sign up early for lesson, so we aren’t doing it last minute. We had three minutes before the bell would ring. I walked over to Jenna and we started talking about how excited we were about possibly playing Don’t Stop Believing and how it was are favourite song. The bell rang and I started making my way up to Honors Biology and Mr. Harrison had already made a seating chart and I was sitting next to Thomas Erickson who was also my crush since like 7th grade. The rest of the day passed so quickly once the bell rang for the last class I went down to the commons to waited for my mom to pick me and Emma up, we started talking about some the classes we are excited for and aren’t excited for then Thomas walked up to the table and said “ Hey, mind if I join you guys my mom going to be awhile before she can pick me up from school” “Yeah definitely, if you want my mom can drop you off you only five houses down from us?” I said “Yeah that would be awesome, my mom has to work late and my step-dad is gone on a business trip for work” I quick texted my mom asking if we could bring Thomas and she that was fine. After like 10 minutes my mom texted that she was here, so we all walked out and got into our truck. I sat in the front seat then Emma and Thomas sat in back, for the most of the car ride we all talked about how our first day of high school went, then we dropped Emma off then Thomas then once we got to our house I told my mom about my short talk with Mrs. Davidson, and she said “ Maybe she wants to talk about your math skills, because she saw your grades from middle school and probably got worried, because you suck at math” “I know I suck at math, but they way she said it, it sound like it was about something else” “ I guess you will find out tomorrow” We walked into the house and my brother was playing on the XBox like usual my little brother was upstairs playing with his Spiderman and Captain America action figures that I got him for his birthday last year, he looked up for a second smiled then went back to playing with his toys. I went the second set of stairs to get to my room. My room was on the third floor of our house, my room was the only room on the third floor which is fine because I get my own bathroom and shower. I threw my backpack on to a chair and pick up a really old picture of my parents and stared at for really long time, my real father was a Doctor and my mother was a Lawyer. It’s a sad way that they died I was five when it happened they were driving home after picking me at daycare it was pouring rain outside and my dad lost control and the car rolled over four times, after it rolled my parents didn’t even think to try to save themselves, they started looking around for me to see if I was ok. I was hit in the head pretty hard and I cracked three ribs, had an concussion and broke my leg, maybe my parents would still be around if they hadn’t worried about me they could still be alive. I have always wondered what my life would be like if my parents didn’t die that night, I love my foster parents they kinda like my parents from what I can remember my foster dad is a big time Lawyer and his was a tall broad shoulders and my foster mom is a Nurse and she was kinda short and had long dirty blonde hair like mine. “ Hannah Dinner ready then we leave to go visit your parents” my dad said “ I’ll be down in a sec” I put the picture back on my nightstand and started to head down to the dining room and sat down at a large hickory table and ate spaghetti and brussel sprouts. After dinner I helped my mom with the dishes, then my dad pulled out the shiny baby blue volvo polestar and we drove down to the sematary to replace the flowers and just say hi to my parents, after 10 minutes my parents went back to the car and left me alone with my parents. I started talking to them how my first day of high school went and how I missed them so much. I replaced the old flowers with the new passion flower’s, then I went back to the car and I hadn’t realized that I had started to cry, we drove back to the house and my parents asked “How you doing Hannah, I know today can be a hard day for you” “ I am doing ok I just miss them so much, do think next weekend I could visit my grandma, grandpa, aunt, and uncle?” “ Yeah, of course I will call them tonight to see if that’s ok.” “Thanks mom, I love you both so much, and thank you for everything” “ We love you too, and we try our best to make sure you feel happy” my mom said. I got really confused when my parents missed the turn to our street so I kinda sat in the back quite for a bit, then I piped up “ where are we going?” “ It’s a surprise, and really hope you like it, it may be a bit overwhelming but it should be good” my dad said. After about half an hour drive, the car stopped and my parents got out of the car and I kinda sheepishly followed them to this house we were at. They knocked the door and this boy who looked kinda like me when I was younger he looked about 9 years old, this younger couple invited us in and I was still confused we all sat down in there living room. “You must be Hannah, I am Lauren Phipps and this is, my husband Samuel Phipps and this is Ryhan Phipps.” “ I am not trying to be rude at all but why are we here?” “You're probably really confused about all of this, but just listen and don’t talk” my dad said. “ So you know how nine years ago your parents died today but what we all kinda didn’t know that your mother was pregnant and that on that night after she picked you up that she went into labor, you have a brother and after searching, long nights of looking through lots of folders, but we finally find our brother Ryan Phipps. So this is your brother he is 9 years old and he is probably going with you to see your grandma, grandpa, and a grandpa.” I sat in silence trying to take all of this information in, “ so your my brother” “ yeah I am, unm so do you know what are parents were like?” “ Yeah I only knew for a little bit, but what I do remember is that mom made the best homemade chocolate cookies, and her sweet potato fries and chips were amazing, mom was the best cook in all of Pasadena and dad was one of the best barbecuers around, he also was an amazing doctor, dad also loved working on old cars. I remember one time he was working on an old 2r5 Studebaker in the garage once and he let help me once.” All of the meriores started to make me cry again and Ryan came over and hugged me, which didn’t help to stop crying. We left after an hour or so and we planned for me to come down again next weekend so I can get to know my new brother better, most of the car ride home was pretty quiet, I was still trying to take all of this in, but I was more bursting with joy that I had a biological brother and that I wasn’t the only one left in my family. When we got home i started to head up the stairs to my room and thinking to myself what if my new brother didn’t like me, what if I didn’t like him and would he want to see me every weekend, and more what if’s popped into my head, I calmed myself down by saying that they were all just what if’s. I got to my room and changed into comfy PJ’s and brushed my teeth, I got into bed and started reading Harry Potter And Prisoner Of Azkaban. After an hour I went to bed amd my alarm woke me up earlier than I wanted to wake up, but I grudgingly got up and took a shower and started getting ready for school and put on a My alarm clock went off earlier then I wanted to wake up, I took a shower and threw on some denim short and a University Of Houston t-shirt, blowed dried my hair, braided my hair then looked into a mirror in my room, then I head down to the Kitchen to make a lunch for me and my little brother. When I got down to the Kitchen all of lunches were already made and my dad was in the kitchen making breakfast, “You can cook dad?” “ Yeah I can cook, you sound surprised, I figured I would make breakfast, and your mom is tied up a work too.” “Alright, but you are overcooking the eggs and the pan should be on if your going to actually cook the sausage.” “ Ohh yeah I probably should do that” my dad sounded very tired and eazacted, “ Are you ok dad you seem very out of it today?” “Yeah I am just a bit stressed out from work, but I have you, your brother and your mother to come to.” I talked to my dad for a couple more minutes then went upstairs to wake up my little brother Adam, I went into his room and he was already sitting on his bed trying to put on a shirt but he kept on putting it on backwards I tried to help him but he wanted to try by himself after he tried again he finally got it on the right way. “Hannah why do we have to school, I don’t like it very much?” I sat think on how to answer his question, part of me wanted to answer with it “Only gets worse” or “Trust me if I can survive you can too”. I decided to answer with “ Yes it may suck at times but sometimes it can good too.” We sat in silence I got up after a couple minutes and Adam followed me, down the stairs to the Kitchen where dad was grabbing some OJ from the fridge. I grabbed some plates from the cupboard, and yelled up the stairs to my brother William that breakfast was ready, as we all sat down for breakfast. I heard a loud screeching sound coming from the garage “mommy’s home mommy’s home!” adam said with joyfulness in his voice, he probably hopping mom won’t make us eat the burnt eggs and the bacon that looked raw still, “Good morning everyone. Why does it smell like burnt eggs?” I tried to explain to mom that dad tried cooking “your father can cook?” “ Yeah I questioned it to but somehow he still burnt the eggs, and the bacon still looks raw. And he seems a bit stressed” I tried to saw without laughing “ I will go talk to him and see how's he doing.” I grabbed some cereal from the cupboard, quickly ate it then ran up the stairs to grab my backpack. I ran down the stairs and my dad was pulling out the car, Will was on his phone like always, adam was trying to put his shoes on the wrong feet I let a small chuckle. I grabbed my backpack yelled one last time to my brother that is was time to go, then I hugged my mom goodbye. The car ride to school was quite besides a few side comments here and there. The car stopped so smoothly it was very different from how the truck stopped, the truck stopped like a tank, we had to stop a mile away before the actual stop. I first stopped at my locker before I went to talk to Mrs. Davidson, my locker was on the third floor in the B pod, Thomas was over by my locker “ Hey what are you doing here so early?” Thomas asked “Well I have to go talk to Mrs. Davidson then I have to go talk to Emma about something that happened last night.” “Ohh gossip what happened last night, did you do something crazy, or something wierd, what happened?” “Well last night as you know was the anniversary of my parents death, and last night after I visited their grave my parents brought me to this random house and when we got inside there was a couple and their nine year old son, who turned out to be my biological brother.” “ Wow a lot has happened in one night for you Hannah” “yeah, anyway anything new with you?” “ Not much my dad came home last night from his business trip, and he got me mini statue of liberty.” “ Cool, what does your dad do even?” “To be honest I have no clue I think it is something having do with some sort of science.” “ Interesting, anyway I have to go talk to Mrs. Davidson now, bye” “See ya in Civics” Thomas said. I walked down to the second floor to the A pod wondering what Mrs. Davidson would ever want to talk to me about. I took a deep breath then walked into her room, “Good morning, Mrs. Davidson!” I said feeling I said it too happy for how early it was. “Good morning Miss. Sokalski, please have a seat. The reason I asked you to come in this because I wanted to talk to you about your biological parents.” I sat in silence not knowing what I should say or what to do. “I wanted to tell you that before your parents died they entrusted me to be your godmother and Earl Sanches to be your godfather, and that in the case that your parents die that when you where to reach high school to give you this letter, and for you to follow close to the instruction given, now I have no clue to what is inside this letter, but here you go.” I thought myself a letter from my parents why would they me a letter, is there something I didn’t know about, what could possible in this letter? I took the letter from Mrs. Davidson, I carefully opened it and in the letter was a short paragraph saying “ Hi Hannah we hope that you never have to read this letter, but if you're reading this there something we want to tell you that the car crash was a fake, the people who were driving the car wasn’t us, it was people we hired to be us. The reason we did this was because, there is a secret we kept from that we weren’t really Lawyers or Doctors, that was just a cover for what we were really doing. We work for the FBI, and we were doing a mission we were deep undercover, when Simon Trese who was the bosses son of a big Russian mob Garret Trese, he started to look too deep into us and were almost made when, the FBI suggested that we fake our deaths, and have someone to take care of you and your brother, so we wrote this for when you turned old enough to hopefully understand. Your father love you so much, and we want to remember the trip we took to Minnesota to visit your father's parents, and the house we stayed at. Love mom and dad. “Are you ok Hannah?” Mrs. Davidson asked “Yeah… Where does my godfather live?” “ Last I heard he lived in Alabama with his son Wade Sanches he is about your age, why do you ask?” “No reason, I have to go.” I walked out Mrs. Davidson confused because we stopped in Alabama on our trip to Minnesota, my parents are still alive did my foster parents know. I feel like now my whole has been flipped upside down and shaken vigorously. I walked down to the second floor to the library, “ Hey Hannah, are you ok you look stressed?” “Yeah just tired I had a long night.” Should I tell someone, I wasn’t told I couldn’t tell anyone, but yet I had this feeling that I should keep it to myself. The bell rang I walked up to the third floor for math, math was boring like always, all we did was a review from past years then Mrs. Davidson said we could start looking through examples one through five. I finished everything in whole amount of class time, I waited for Emma then we walked to the civics and sat next to Jenna and Thomas. “ How was Mrs. Davidson, what did she tell you?”
Thomas asked “Well she is my godmother and she has a couple of things that my parents had, and she said I could look through it” I had lied I didn’t know if she had any of my parents, most of there things were left to me in their Will. “Good morning class, today we will be taking about what civics means, and how it affects us.” Civics just dragged on and on about how civics affects us. I really didn’t give a crap about any of this, so for the most part I zoned out, I started to think about my parents and how they were still alive, I really didn’t know if I should be mad or happy. MAybe I could go to Alabama and go find my godfather, maybe I could find another letter tell me where my parents are now. What about my foster parents, should I tell them or not I have no clue what I should do? What about my brother does Mrs. Davidson know about my brother, “Hey the bell rang, you coming?” Jenna asked “Yeah I just zoned out for bit I gessus.” “ Are you doing ok you seem off today?” Emma asked “ To be honest I don’t” “Do wanna talk about it?” Thomas asked, I thought for second I probably should tell them right “Yeah, just hold on a sec.” I grabbed the letter from my backpack, my hand was shaking as I handed them the letter.They looked at me with confusion, they all read the letter. They look up to me they said in a somewhat of unisins “Hannah” “Yeah, I have no clue what to do, also Mrs. Davidson is my godmother and my godfather lives somewhere in alabama, he also has a son who is our age.” “Ohh Hannah is there anyway we can help?” Emma asked, “Hey now don’t bring me into this, I am just here.” Thomas had said Jenna punched him the arm “Shut up Thomas!” “Umm sorry to barge in, but the second bell rang and you all are not in your classes?” Mr. Larson said “Ohh sorry Mr. Larson could you write us a pass for our next class?” Jenna asked “ Yeah let me go write them quick.” “Thank you Mr. Larson.” We all went to our classes, before we went to our classes “Let’s all meet after school” Emma said. We all agreed to meet in the commons, me and Jenna walked into the band room, we grabbed our instruments and folders gave Mr. Hammin our passes then sat down, we got some different music like Celtic Voyage, Egier, and Heart Beat Five. We tried playing Heart Beat Five, it went surprisingly good for the first time playing it. “Alright we will resume where we left off tomorrow, class dismissed.” I started to walk over to Jenna then Mr. Hammin stopped me “Hannah can I talk to for a minute in my office, please?” “Yeah” I walked into his office, “ Hannah I wanted to talk you about being a first clarinet, I was wondering when we play Celtic Voyage if you could play the clarinet solo? You have a little time to think about it, but I really think you should do the solo.” “ Thank you I will think about it” I left his office “What did Mr. Hammin want?” Jenna asked “ He wants me to play a solo for Celtic Voyage!” “ OMG that is so cool what did you say?” “I said that I would think about it.” The bell rang I said bye to Jenna, I started to walk to the second floor, when Liam Morris walked up right next “ Hey Hannah I haven’t seen you at my races in awhile, where have you been?” “ You probably forgot but last time we talked we were fighting.” “I know I remember but I want to say I am sorry, I miss you. Will you please forgive me?” “ Yeah I forgive you, when your next race I will try to come.” “Good it’s tonight at 7 O'clock” “Alright will try to make it.” I smiled I walked into honors biology right as the bell rang I sat down, Thomas had whispered over to me “ I was kidding early I hope you know I do care you have been my best friend forever.” “Thanks Thomas, it means alot for you to say that.” “No more talking!” Mr. Lopez said sternly to the class, but mostly looking at me and Thomas. Mr. Lopez blabber on about a bunch of random stuff after awhile it got really boring. The bell rang I head up the stairs Jenna said hi to me as I walked into the spanish classroom, during spanish, we got to choose our spanish names. I chose Mia Mrs. Hernandez spoke in spanish for most of the class time, everyone had this look of confusion. After the confusion ended I went to A lunch, I found Emma, Jenna, Thomas, and a couple other people sitting at a table near the conner of the commons. The rest of the day was a blur to me I zoned out for the rest of the day. After school I met up with Thomas Emma and Jenna, “Hey, so what are you planning in telling your parents” Jenna asked? “Well I am not sure yet, what do you think I should tell them?” Jenna was about to say something, but closed her mouth instead there was a couple minutes of silence, “You could show them the letter than ask if they knew, then maybe see if you could go visit your godfather in Alabama.” Thomas said. “That might work, but I don’t think they will let me go visit some random guy who is my godfather.” I said, but then I had realized something that I my godfather has no idea who I am probably, I don’t even know if he does live in Alabama anymore, or what his name is. Jenna had piped up and said “Hannah I see your moms truck coming what are you going to do?” “I don’t, I will talk to you all tomorrow.” I picked up my backpack and shoved the letter into my back pocket, walked out of the high school into my moms truck, still not knowing what to do. I was quite for the car ride home, mom was asking the normal questions like how was your day, do have homework, I told about my talk with Liam, also asking if I could go to his race later tonight, “I forget what does Liam play again?” my mom asked “He does cross country in the fall alpine skiing in the winter and tennis in the spring.” “ I don’t care if you go, but ask your father first.” I decided while on the way home that I would tell my parents tomorrow, because my brothers wouldn’t be home, I figured that would be a good time to tell them. I wanted to tell my parents so bad, but I had to wait I didn’t want my brothers to know, not yet. I went upstairs to think about how I would say that I have parents somewhere and godmother and godfather, ugh I have no clue what to do. Knock Knock “Sissy are you in there?” “Yeah Logan, I am in here what do you need?” “ Are you ok, you don’t seem like yourself?” “What do you mean? Did mom send you up here to talk to me?” “Yeah, she did, but don’t tell I told you cause then I don’t get the ice cream after super.” “your secret is safe with me.” Logan started to walk out of my room when he stopped and looked at my parents letter they wrote to me, shoot I thought to myself then I remembered he couldn’t read to well still.” Sissy what's this letter about I can only read half of it?” “Ohh it's nothing really it not important.” “I think it's really important, imma gonna show mommy!” “Noooo! It’s not that important.” I almost tripped trying to catch him, sadly he got to my mom before I could stop him. LIfe is all going down hill now, “ Mommy what does this letter say? I found it in sissy room.” “Let me see it.” She took the letter from Logan and she started to read it, I was just standing in the corner. Trying to think about her reaction would be and if I would be in trouble or something I have no clue. It felt like ages before my mom said something, “ Honey what is this? Who gave you this letter?” “ Well mom Mrs. Davidson gave me this letter… actually I should start from the beginning. When I went to go see Mrs. Davidson this morning she told me that she was godmother, and she had a some of my parents and she found this letter a couple years ago and is said on the letter to give this to me once I get to high school and she gave it to me. I was going to tomorrow at super when it was just you and dad, but Logan I guess bet me to it.” “Ohh do think that it’s your parents or a fake letter of some kind.” I thought for a sec I never thought about if it was a fake or not, but I had this feeling that it was my biological parents. “I really think its them in the letter it talk about our trip to Minnesota and how we stopped off in Alabama which I almost forgot about it’s them I know it.” “Alright I trust you, honey so what do you think we should do?”
YOU ARE READING
Changing Times
Teen FictionHannah is just a normal teenage girl when her world starts to flip upside down
