My name’s Amber Whal and I hate life.

Not that anything’s particularly wrong with my life; I think I’m just an angst-y teenager. A long, long time ago, there was something wrong with my life, when I was really little and still lived with my dad.

I know you’re not really supposed to remember anything before the age of five, but some things just stay with you I guess.

Like the first time I met my sister, well, technically my half-sister and more of an adoptive mother than anything. They locked my dad up for child abuse, drug traffic and a whole bunch of other things that I’m certainly not proud of, that’s why I live with her.

I also remember the night he beat my mother to death, I didn’t see him do it, but I heard her screams and when mommy wasn’t there the next morning...

I was put up for foster-care and as soon as my sister and her boyfriend turned husband got settled, they adopted me.

By what I said before about hating life; don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful, if I had lived with my father forever, who knows what would have happened.

I love my sister more than anything in the world. Nia’s sweet and caring but not over-protective in the least which is a pretty huge accomplishment from what I hear her teenage years were like.

I really love Cody too, he’s the most amazing guy and I can totally see why my sister married him. If he was my age and not madly in love with my sister; I’d have fallen for him too. What makes him even more special is the fact that he’s a shrink, but doesn’t try to get inside my head when I do stupid things. He also never treats me like a kid, much less like his kid, which I really feel like sometimes.

Nia and Cody are pretty much ideal parents in my eyes, and I’ve always wondered why they never had a kid of their own, but I’ve found myself pulling away from them and I find myself making more and more stupid decisions. I don’t want to go running to Cody and Nia though; I want to show them that I’m responsible, that I’m growing up. I don’t feel like I’m growing up though, I still feel kind of like a kid inside, even if I’m sixteen.

Back to my initial statement; I hate life.

What do I hate about life?

I hate school, I hate work, I hate a lot of people, I hate poverty, I hate pollution, I hate war, I hate hatred.

But mostly, I hate school. It’s not that I’m bad in school, and I have a few friends that I hang around, but apart from that, I just don’t understand the point of sitting in a classroom all day, listening to middle-aged women, for the most part, drone on about subjects that will bring little help in the future.

It also doesn’t help for that, for the most part I’m in detention, or being given a lecture about some work I haven’t done, about how hats are not to be worn indoors, skateboarding is strictly prohibited on school property and any other “disciplinary bi-law”, as I call them, I’m in the middle of breaking.

I don’t go out of my way to cause trouble, I just act normally and it gets me in trouble. Cody and Nia don’t mind though, they say so long as I’m not doing drugs, beating people up or flunking my classes they don’t really care. It’s not that they’re irresponsible parents, it’s just that from what I hear; Nia was never much of a rules girl when she was my age, she hung out with some pretty whack guys...

The only part of school I don’t hate is art class. Like my sister, I’m an arts girl. I put all my frustration and anger into my art, seeing how I’m not really sure how to put it out any other way. When I get angry, I’m not the type to scream and yell, when I’m angry, I don’t trust myself to open my mouth, which isn’t such a big deal, because I don’t usually do much talking anyways; I’m more of a listener and a thinker.

Because I put everything into my paintings, sometimes people get the wrong message. Such as now, I’m in the principle’s office, with my sister. The principle thinks she should be informed of how I’m “exhibiting my talents”.

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AN: here's the first chapter of "Embers of Amber", the sequal to "One Jump Away". Now that I've finished "One Jump Away",I decidedI should post the first chapter to this story I've been... uh... advertising?
-Annie O. x0x