Concealed

Chapter 1

Ever since she could process her first thought Dominique knew she was different. The other kids would play in the sandpit or make fun of each other while she was silently watching the world around her. Her thoughts and speech almost resembled that of an adult and the teacher suspected she was one of those exceptional minds.

When she was about four years of age, she could hold a deep and meaningful conversation with any adult. Her parents had her IQ tested, and the results were outstanding.

Dominique’s parents were thrilled that their only daughter was one of the brightest people in the world and boasted about it to family and co-workers. They thrived off of the high society and would do anything to keep living a lavish life.

Since she tested so high they moved her to primary school. Not being able to have a normal childhood was upsetting. She was a freak of nature and to other kids it was scary. Children lash out at something they don’t understand. She stayed in the shadows doing as everybody told her to. She was ashamed of being different so there was no reason to not comply with the adults.

But staying hidden didn’t stop the bullying that was thrown her way. In fact, it made her an even bigger target. The group of boys always found her in the library or caught her observing people. They would call her book worm or freak. 

They would steal her lunch and push the books from her hands, and took great pleasure humiliating her in front of her peers. She cried the first few times they picked on her but realised that the more reaction she gave them the more they would come back.

The next time they tried messing with her she kept her reaction to a minimum. As they went to grab the hard cover book from her hands she lashed out at them, hitting them on their heads. The bullies ran crying and never troubled her again.

Of course she got in trouble with the teachers and she had done detention, but it was the end of the bullying. The altercation had made her realise the second off thing about herself. She could handle and process emotion and situations much better than the other six-year-old classmates, and she was only four. 

When she turned five her parents decided that she was spending too much time with her head stuck in books. They bought her a swing set to play with and to distract her from the books, but she wasn’t interested in the set and told them what she wished to do. Kick boxing was out of the norm for a girl her age but she wasn't a normal five-year-old girl. She had watched the karate kid earlier in the week and found it interesting. Although they did kung fu, she tried something else first.

Hesitantly they signed her up. In the end it did the job and had the added benefit that it was keeping her fit. The kick boxing came just as easily as learning for her. The instructor noticed her quick learning but refused to let her move up. After all, she was only five. Instead, he taught her other fighting styles

Closer to her seventh birthday she noticed the strangest thing of all. Her senses was a lot better than others. As a kid she was strong and thought it was normal but just before her seventh birthday she overheard conversations that were in different rooms.

She could smell when the chubby kid farted who sat in the front of the class and almost ripped her bathroom door off when she couldn’t get it open. It would come and go at the weirdest of moments. At first she didn’t think much of it. It wasn’t as if it happened all the time!

That same year was also the year she understood the word no. That is when her rebellious streak showed. She had said no to small things like not wanting to clean up or do her chores but as the years went on; she said no to bigger things.

Students didn’t want to have anything to do with her, afraid she might get them in trouble. Teachers hated her. Her parents had no clue what to do with her, and they didn’t really care about what she got up to. They were too busy falling prey to the world’s ugly pleasures to notice.