Shalene Kirchmeier
4th hr. English Life Can Go Many Different Ways Josh was a young boy when he first discovered that his parents would never be together again. When he was only three years old when his parents first split up. His mom Blythe being only 17 when she had his older brother Scott and 8 years later having his other brother Dylan wasn’t always the best for Josh. He was always put down and was told that he had to be exactly like Scott and Dylan. This made it very difficult for Josh to be happy growing up, he didn't know how to be happy for himself he was always used to be proud of Scott and Dylan, cheering them on at every single one of their events, making sure that they were always happy and excited to play at their next games. This all changed for Josh when his mom had his younger sister Leah. She had amazingly bright blue eyes, and light blonde hair, she was the perfect description of what every teenage boy wanted to talk to his friends about and the girl he went home and told his parents about. Which made his life harder. Now looking from his point of view I would agree, try having two older brothers you always had to live up to, and having a perfect little sister with boys always trying to get in her pretty little head. “You better not talk to him, he’s trouble”, is what he always told Leah… but she never wanted to listen to him. “I’ll do what I want to do Josh. Don’t tell me who I should and should not talk to.” she would say. Soon enough she found out why Josh was telling her this, her boyfriend Alex was being a little too touchy one night and she wasn’t going to have it, “Stop it Alex”, said Leah “but why Leah we’ve been dating for 2 years”,Alex said “because I said stop it now take me home”, Leah screamed. The next day she immediately called Josh, who was trying to sleep because he has college finals the next day. After 6 rings he finally answered, “what do you want”, he said “i'm trying to sleep”, “You were right Josh, he doesn’t even like me, he said he only dated me is because he couldn’t find anybody else.” exclaimed leah. She waited five minutes for Josh to say something…. anything. When he was ready to respond to what Leah had previously said all he could manage to force out his mouth was, “you’ll be fine Leah, do your makeup put a dress on and go shopping with the girls. Don’t waste your time thinking about what could’ve happened with this boy.”Boys, teenage boys to be exact aren’t always the best. They make dumb decisions and go along with what all there friends say to do. Now im not being sexist because teenage girls aren't always the best either, sometimes they demanding, moody and overly obnoxious. Josh who is now pissed off at Alex can not concentrate on his finals for his chemistry class. So instead of calming down Josh decided to call Alex and have a little discussion with him. “You are a piece of shit little boy who doesn’t deserve to be with Leah, grow up!” Josh said, “But we…” is all Alex could say before Josh hung up the phone. After Leah found out that Josh had called Alex she was livid. She wasnt sure how to handle the situation. Should I be mad at him or should I thank him, she thought. And after she decided what she was gonna do she finally called Josh and said “Thank you for calling Alex and supporting me, but I can handle my own problems”, she didn’t even give Josh a second to speak. The next day Josh decided he wasnt going to school and he went to see Leah instead. When he got home she was sitting on the couch with a spoon and some ice cream. All he could manage to say was “I’m sorry Leah”. And that was all she needed because she ran into his arms and started to cry even more. “Why do I always mess everything up” “Why cant I just have a good relationship with someone without messing it up” She said. “Well not everything in life is going to go how you want, not everything is easy. You have to work hard at most things. And you can NOT blame this relationship working on yourself. You weren’t ready and he didn’t understand that. It takes two people in a relationship, and if only one cares its not a real relationship.” he told her. After a few months Leah became more and more positive about herself, she joined the high school varsity soccer team, and the FFA program the school has. These two organizations helped Leah get out of her shell as well she used to be this shy “little” girl who stays to herself. Now she is one of the best soccer players on the team and she is wanting to be a FFA officer. But when it all started to get good again everything went to hell. Around three one Saturday afternoon her older brother Dylan called and informed her that Scott had gotten into a horrible car accident and is not likely to last that much longer.She immediately went to the hospital. By the time she got there her makeup was smeared all over her face and her eyes were red. When she was able to see Scott his legs were all wrapped up in some stuff the doctors put around them because he had extremely bad burns all over them, his right arm was broken and his left shoulder was dislocated. After three hours Josh finally showed up. Although he showed up he looked like complete shit. His hair was all messy, dirt was all over his shirt, and random ass holes in his jeans. “Why the hell do you look like you just got done wrestling a damn pig?” Lean asked. “Well its a long story and I don’t have time for this, where is Scott.” Josh replied. Life has been better for the Mugaliacutty family. They’ve been through hell and back but this is a new kinda bad. They were not used to having someone in their immediate family being on the verge of dying. Or the fact that Josh’s life is turning into hell. Why can’t our lives just be easy and not complicated, they all thought. Life is hard sometimes but you have to roll with the punches and move on. All of the Mugaliacutty members have been through a lot but somehow manage to get through it. Through all the lies and arguments they work together and come as a family to resolve everything. Leahs next couple of days at school were great. Her P.E teacher Rehberg was making fun of her and he let her choose what game they were going to play. So of course she chose soccer. Before they began playing Rehberg chose the teams; Kyle, Austin, Jacob, Mark, Michael, and Brian were on one team and Leah, Shay, Brittney, Donavin, Brenden, and Logan were on the other team. When Rehberg blew the whistle it was time to play. And of course Brian’s team got the ball first, as soon as he kicked the ball to Kyle, Kyle kicked it to the other side of the field and Leah received it and then immediately kicked it. Instead of going the way she wanted it to go it bounced off Brians face and rolled back to her feet. So instead of kicking it right away she made sure Brian was ok and at that moment she realized that she liked him. Brian is this really attractive guy that is a year older that me, Leah thought. “I have to tell Allyssa” she said out loud to herself. When P.E. got over she told Allyssa what she was thinking about this guy and of course Allyssa didn’t know who he was so Leah had to awkwardly find Brian so she could show Allyssa who he was. When Leah found him she showed Allyssa and then went to class. In class Allyssa was like “Damn Leah you were right”, “Yeah I know”, Leah laughed. The rest of the day...scratch that, the rest of the week Brian was all Leah could think about. She wasn’t able to concentrate on school or soccer. Although he was on her mind she knew she wasn’t on his. And of course Leah was upset but she got over the fact that he would never like her and she just needs to move on. But after a trip that some FFA students went on everything changed. While they were at the trip Leah fell more for Brian. Which was unexpected because she thought she was over him… but she wasn’t. On the way back from the trip she had to sit in the back seat between one of her other friends Dakota and Brian which was great but bad. That morning before they left she found out that one of her friends Ashley likes Brian. Leah knew that that was going to happen sooner or later because Brian is VERY attractive. So while she was in the back seat between Dakota and Brian she fell asleep on Dakota’s arm then woke up for a minute then fell asleep on Brian. Leah’s friend Ashley wasn’t happy at all she was pissed. In fact she wouldn’t talk to Leah for a couple of hours because she was so mad. But after Ashley got over the fact that she wasn’t dating Brian she calmed down. This made Leah happy but she didn’t know what to do. She wanted to still be friends with Ashley but she knew that, that wasn’t going to be able to happen if she and Brian started dating. Unfortunately Leah wasn’t able to get over Brian and she still continues to talk to Brian, even though they’re not dating. “Being friends with him is better than nothing at all” Leah told herself. Everyday they snapchat and or text each other almost all day, but nothing is going to happen. He doesn’t want to date her… she found that out one day while they were snapchating when she asked him if he would ever date her. Which was a total let down for Leah. But she’s was able to be mature about it and just get over it… Kinda. She still talks to him everyday and still likes him but at least she knows that nothing was ever going to happen. Their relationship is weird. She likes him but some of her characteristics doesn’t fit his wants. Which is totally fine because Leah shouldn’t need to change for anybody. She just needs to find someone who likes her for her. While Scott was in the hospital everyday the Mugalicutty went to visit him at 5:30 sharp, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. Unfortunately after 3 weeks in the hospital Scott passed away. The family was devastated. But instead of being miserable they decided to move on. They knew that Scott wouldnt want them to mope around. They all started a new chapter in their lives. Leah moved on from Brian and focused on school. Josh finished college. Dylan got married to his girlfriend Amanda. And Blythe is happily single. Within the next few months the family was able to get over the death of Scott and moved on with their lives. “To be honest… I still think of him everyday and sometimes I still think he’s here”, Leah said to Josh after their usual sunday dinner. “I know, I think of sometimes too Leah”, Josh said back to Leah. At the end of the night he’s not here and we can’t change that, they all thought. To be fair the family deserves a break. Through the death of Scott, the kid’s father running off and being a total fucking douche bag, I would give them all a break from everything. I know that people have to move on and they can’t hang on forever, they still deserve a break. Eventhough I said that they deserve a break Leah’s attitude lately is not acceptable. “Everyday she comes home and complains about every little fucking thing”, Blythe told Dani (her best friend). “I mean I love her to death but I just wanna strangle her sometimes.” Now Dani had a hard time trying to to relate to what Blythe was feeling because she doesn’t have and children. So instead of making shit up, Dani just said “It’s just a stage, she’ll grow out of it sooner or later.” “Hopefully your right”, Blythe replied. Leah is just having troubles growing up I suppose. She doesn’t tell people anything, not how her day went or if somethings wrong. Nobody she doesn’t open up, she’s a book full of secrets. One day when she got home the first thing she did was go to her room packed all of her shit and told her mom that she was going to her dads house in Kentucky. She says, “I called his old number the other day just to see if he would answer and he did. So I told him im not happy here and this house pisses me off as well as all the memories in it. So he said I can go live with him”. I can’t tell you no Leah, you’ll be 18 in a couple months and will have to grow up sooner or later. But when you get there and decide you wanna come home because your dad is a piece of shit loser who smokes weed 24 fucking seven, I’ll be here but know when you wanna come home and you're ready to hear it I’m going to tell you “I told you so”. And off Leah was, her suitcases full of clothes, sports bags stuffed with shoes and school bags almost breaking because off all makeup and accessories that were in them. Blythe was DEVASTATED. “How am I supposed to be okay with my daughter going to her dads house. He hasn’t been here at all for 17 damn years, and she’s just gonna up and leave like that. She’s going to go live in a complete strangers house. What the hell is wrong with her?” Blythe cried to her father James. “Well you can’t stop her now, she’s already gone. For one and for two do you really think she was going to listen to you anyways? Exactly she wasn’t. She thinks she a grown adult and can make her own decisions. But what she doesn’t know is that shes going to make bad decisions in life. She can’t always be right, you just have to support her. Maybe not all her decisions but most of them, and make sure you’ll ALWAYS be there for her no matter if your mad at her or think she’s making a dumb mistake. Just promise me you’ll be there for her?” James said. “I promise” Blythe replied. What the hell Blythe thought, no kids are here and I have time to myself. So she happily took herself on a shopping spree, and got her hair and makeup done. She actually went on a blind date Dani set her up with. “His name is Matthew, has two kids but they’re grown up.” Dani told Blythe. Blythe didn’t want to be rude so she went on the date. When they got to Applebee’s the waitress showed them to their table and ordered their drinks. When the other waitress arrived to get the order for their food Blythe ordered what she always ordered when she went to Applebee's bourbon street chicken and shrimp. Matthew ordered sizzling double barrel whisky sirloins. While they were waiting for their food to arrive they talked about a plethora amount of thing. Such as eachothers children, what were their life goals and if they achieved them along with other things. After a 20 minute wait they felt like they’ve known each other for their whole lives. Although they though they’ve known each other they really don’t know what eachothers like. All they talked about was their families and what they wanted to do in life. They did not talk about themselves, well maybe a little but not enough to feel like you’ve known this person for a long time. Around 1 am is when Blythe arrived home the next morning. After they went to Applebee’s Matt took her shopping and to go watch a movie. When the movie got over all Blythe could do is smile. “I feel like a teenager again” she told Matt. “Going to dinner, seeing a movie and going shopping… I’m glad I met you”, she said. “I’m glad I met you as well”, Matt replied. Then off she went to bed. No goodnight kiss or anything, she just left him standing there. But thankfully he got the hint and left instead of being a creep and staying 10 minutes after she left him standing out there. The next morning when Blythe went to go get her morning newspaper she found a bouquet of flowers and card that told said “I will meet you at the Coffee Zone around 7:30” Sincerely Matt. So she went inside and got around. By 7:00 she was ready to leave, but something was stopping her. She kept telling herself that she’s okay, and that she’s not doing anything wrong but she had a feeling in her gut that she shouldn’t go. But she did, she wasn’t 100 percent confident with her decision but she went. When she arrived there the waitress took her to a table, on the table was another bouquet of followers, but this time they were yellow and orange tulips instead of red roses. Along with the tulips she seen another letter. This time is said “This time go to Central Park, something is there waiting for you”, but before she was able to go the waitress brought her a coffee and said it was from “him”. So off she was too Central park. The first thing she seen was two lines with 17 people on each side holding different bouquets of flowers. Not one was holding the same type of flower. When she began to walk between the two line every time she would pass a person they would give her one of their flowers. When she got to the end Matt appeared and handed her a white rose, then said “This is just the beginning. I want to give you everything you ever wanted, so I started with this.” Blythe couldn’t stop smiling. She gave him a huge hug and said “Thank you sooo much, this is the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me!” Then Matt walked with her all over New York, stopping at every store she wanted to go to, not letting her tell him no. At the end of the day she had 35 bags full of stuff. Majority of it was clothes and shoes. She got 16 new outfits, 6 pairs of new shoes. One pair of the shoes were the new black and pink Gucci stilettos, she seen them sitting in a store window with a $700 price tag on them. “That is way too expensive,” She told him. But he didn’t care all he wanted to do was make her happy. Now in my opinion he went way over his head spending more than $2000 on shit she doesn’t even need. That is way too much money to spend on someone you just met, or on someone in one day in general. I don’t understand why someone would want to spend that much money on 20 things that they do not even need, like what the heck. But whatever if Matt want’s to spend 2000 dollars on unimportant shit then let him. Anyways getting back to all the romantic stuff. Everyday after that he would send her a bouquet of flowers, and a coffee. They would arrive at her house around 6:45am, each day. The delivery guy soon was able to remember Blythes name. Although she was extremely appreciative of Matt doing this everyday she soon became very tired of it and got annoyed quickly. “I feel like he’s trying too hard, and the flowers everyday is just too much. I mean at the beginning it was all sweet and stuff but now it just like ugh go away I don’t want you here kinda feeling.” She told Dani at their Sunday afternoon brunch. All Dani could say back is, “He’s been through a lot and he doesn’t want to make you feel like he doesn’t care, so he thinks if he just shows maybe a tad too much of it you won’t feel like he doesn’t care.” But in reality Blythe was just overwhelmed and annoyed. She came to a conclusion that she needs to tell Matt that he needs to stop, but the problem is she doesn’t know how to tell him in a polite way. That night she called him and cancelled their plans and said that they needed to talk. She said “So, umm I’m not trying to be rude and I appreciate everything that you have done for me but the flowers every morning is just a bit much.” she told him. In reply he said, “Well I’m not sure what to say. I’m trying not to mess this one up, but it seems like I am.” is all he could manage to say before he hung up. Well not everybody finds the love of their life when they're looking for it. The best kind of love is unexpected love. I think that everybody in the Mugalicutty family should take that advice not just Blythe. In fact I think that Matt should listen to that advice as well. Not everybody is going to fall in love. And not everybody will want to fall in love, but those who search for it and try to find it are the ones who won’t fall in love the way you're supposed to fall in love. You're not supposed to look for it you're just supposed walk into it kinda. In other words do NOT search for love. Just let it happen on its own. Now getting out of the mushy gushy stuff lets talk about sports. Guys like to talk about sports right? I think so. “I was watching the Giants vs. 49ers game last week, and we got our asses handed to us. What was Manning thinking playing like that? He should’ve stepped it up.” Josh complained to Dylan. “Yea but the 49ers did pretty good. I’m glad they one!” Dylan said back. And then the fight began. Not literally but figuratively. Back and forth back and forth they argues. Josh yelling at Dylan for being a dumbass and liking the San Francisco 49ers. Then theres Dylan yelling back at Josh because the New York Giants suck. At least they do in his mind. So there they were arguing about what team is better at a Sunday family dinner. After 3 long hours of arguing they came to a conclusion that both teams had stuff to work on, San Francisco won and they cant do anything about the result of the game now. Now with that in mind Josh still wasn’t very happy that the Giants lost. After they all finished dinner they watched a an old show together. The Big Bang Theory. You’ve heard of it right? I thought so. It was the episode 8, The Grasshopper Experiment. Blythe, Matt, Leah, Josh and Dylan were almost all in tears by the end of the episode. “That was hilarious”, Leah and Dylan said at the same time.” “It was alright,” said Josh “I’ve seen better episodes.” We all knew that he was still grumpy about the football game. And of course that meant that nobody else could be enjoying their time or having fun… only because Josh wasn’t having fun. “Lets play Monopoly.” Leah suggested. And everyone was all for it. Well almost everyone. But by the end of the game Josh was in an extremely better mood compared to the beginning of the evening. When everyone was getting ready to leave, Leah announced that she was happy to be back home. Now that Leah was home for two weeks she has been way more appreciative of her mom. She tells her she loves her everyday as well as say please and thank you when asking as well as receiving things. Especially since Blythe has been gone a lot lately. Leah treasures the time she has with her mom considering the fact that she’s graduating High School in 2 months. Also because Blythe has been spending an overabundance of time with Matthew lately, now that he has laid off on all the flower stuff. Leah still keeps in touch with her father. He will call every other day just to check on her and see how her day’s are going. Eventhough he calls her every other day she still feels like he’s a stranger in a way. They never really go to meet each other. He was never home and when he was home he was either drunk, too high to know what was going on, sometimes both. Leah soon got annoyed with her dad and left. She left her dad a note before she decided to go. It said “Dad, I’m going back to moms, I can’t handle you being drunk and high all the damn time. So when you decided to grow up, call me. But until then stay the fuck out of my life”. About a week later Zach called, but Leah didn’t pick up. So he just left a voicemail, apologizing. When she got done listening to it for the first time, she decided she was going to listen to it just a few more times to make sure he wasn’t drunk or high. She came to a conclusion that she didn't really care if he was or if he wasn’t because one day of actually wanting to be a parent isn’t enough especially since he hasn't been there all her life. Leah just isn’t ready to forgive her father yet. Although she doesn’t want to care about her dad she does. No matter how much she wants to give up on him and tell him to fuck off she can't. She still has that abandonment stuck in her head, but she isn’t stuck on that she’s stuck on the fact that she still believes that her dad will turn his life around and grow up. She thinks that just because he was a douche for almost 18 years he will actually decide to be a parent even though it won't be for long. She still wants him to be at her graduation, her wedding, the family christmas. She want’s him to be there for all of that because he’s still her dad and she cares. Family issues can be a bitch I know. But I wonder why Leah’s giving her dad so much slack. The next day he called her at 3:15 exactly when she got home from school. All he said was “Leah I am rrreally sorry that I haven't been here for you for 26 years”, right away she knew he was drunk. Then all she heard was “you're a god damn whore get your ass out of my house”. So she decided to hang up. The rest of her day was ruined. She tried to smile every now and then but she couldn't manage to forget about her piece of shit dad. But by the end of the day she decided that she couldn’t do anything about it and that she just needs to move on. Tuesday morning Leah was in the best mood anyone could ever be in. But it didn’t last long, about 20 minutes after she woke up he dad called and wanted to know if she wanted to go to Niagara Falls with him. She gladly told him no. Over the next few months Leahs attitude on things were more positive. She always looked for the good in things. Never did she have a shitty attitude about anything. Leah improved a lot over those months. She decided that she was tired of being a negative nancy and just be happy. Her being positive about everything helped her become less depressed. She no longer was the girl who had to fake a smile and was hiding behind a mask, she was the girl who was always happy and had a REAL smile on her face. At school her friends noticed her positivity and they became more positive about things as well. At school events like baseball games, and soccer games they got the crowd all loud and cheered for their teams. Everybody became more happy. It’s interesting how one person being more happy affected everybody else’s happiness as well as interest. Its not always good that ONE person can affect hundreds of other people but in this case it is. Just because Leah decided she was going to be more happy
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