Author's Note:

Hi. Thank you for clicking my story. A Beautiful Disaster is a story about a girl who is in love with a ghost, while in the other hand, she still has another option. This story will goes in diary format, with an intervention of the ghost's point of view with every three chapters or so.

And yes, the story will start slow in the first. And no, this is not inspired by Twilight. The idea has been going inside my head for roughly three years, long before I knew Twilight, and this is just the time I actually get around writing it.

December

21

12:33

Of all things that my parents could do to make my Christmas better, they chose to keep their suckity intact and bought another house (of course, after they tramped the poor old one) in a totally different continent.

It was, in my opinion, the worst parental gesture that they had ever done to make my teenage years irrevocably and indisputably disastrous. Unlike my brother (and my parents), I am what you call unsociable beyond belief. Don't get me wrong. I'm pretty good at meeting people, and quite decent at making friends. It's just inexplicably hard for me to like like them. And get them to like like me.

According to my school therapist, I am "a semi-antisocial person with little tolerance for new things, and a tendency to push people away."

Oh, and the look that she threw to me when she realized I was able to peek through her notepad totally said, "with a mean streak, capital M"

To sum it all, I am what you call a Universal Misfit, (again, with capital M).

And the most dreadful thing that every Universal Misfit fears is moving to yet another new environment before s/he could have one friend that has a penchant to NOT leave him/her alone.

Well, alright, I admit I was kind of exaggerating there. Actually, the people have always been nice to me. I've always been lucky to not get stuck in your typical Holliwood-esque, clique-induced, backstabbers and sycophants and snollygosters filled schools. Mine had always been normal. Like, normal. Normal girls, normal boys, normal lessons, normal sex-life without the likes of sexual predators and not-so-repressed nymphomaniacs.

It’s just, while I could hover around their circle, I couldn’t really get into the circle. The real thing, I just kept missing it. And I don’t have a freaking idea how to get into it without crushing my pride.

Or lack thereof.

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21

19:40

It only took a whopping seven trips before all of our goods were inside the house. A few hours before it was in their respectable places (according to my Mom’s vague knowledge about feng-shui), another three before we decided our rooms and cleaned it on our own. It was a miracle. It was the best record that we have ever have. Usually it’d take a full three days before everything could be set and we could sleep in beds.

But that’s probably because usually we brought along our furniture. Modern house had always shaped like the usual cubicle with nothing but concrete walls and a few lamps, and if you’re lucky, a fridge.

But this house. This house has everything we need. And it’s like ‘quote agent’ a GREAT bonus ‘unqote agent’.

It came to our benefits because most furniture that was left in this house was relatively great. I meant relatively, because, while it’s subsequently clear that the sofa was at least had been puked 50 times and the carpet needed serious vacuum work in it, they looked pretty damn expensive. What the furniture here lacked in sanitary, they made it up in beauty. And being a neurotic, art-smartass, Mrs. I-do-think-I-come-from-royal-heritage my mother was, she immediately agreed to buy this house the moment she saw what’s inside it.

I, on the other hand, wasn’t nearly as gullible as she. The price really was shockingly low for a house this big and this grandiose and this packed, and those realizations got me to do what I was born for: thinking negative thoughts.

“The house must be sucky”, I said to my mother before we got into the car. Though it really wasn’t the full argument. You see, I have a tendency to say only the inaccurately summarized version of what I’m really thinking. It often gets to my nerves, but I know that nothing in my power can make it stop. It’s just a trait I need to make peace with.

The ritual would always go to something like this: I think. I talk different. Mom doesn’t listen, or consider me retarded.

Every family has to have its own niche, and I have found mine. Why should I change anything about it?

“Miriam”, was how my mother replied to my dissuasive statement, “you know it’s not. You’ve seen it yourself, right?”

Right. And that’s my cue to shut up and stay in my dark corner, like I usually do.

Actually, it’s rather inappropriate to call my corner ‘dark’. While I’m not a happy person like what sixteen years old girls supposed to be, I’m also not ‘emo’, as often society put it. Especially not compared to my sister, Tracy.

Aka, Selene.

If not seen playing with her dull knives, you could always spot TracyslashSelene scribbling some poems, predictably dark, to her black notebook with black bookmark that had My Chemical Romance picture printed on it.

I have always wanted to tell her that the picture wasn’t accumulating her emo points, but in fact, doing otherwise. But she seems so proud of Gerard and his EMOmale-only-makeup that I don’t have the heart to tell her so.

So, yeah. That’s my sister for you. She’s thirteen, she’s changed her name, she’s tried knives and fake-pills, and black eyeliner and she’s also written bizillion dark poems about death.

Fascinating, huh?

Not compared to my brother.

Gregory, or as he likes to refer himself Greg, is a self-proclaimed dreg.

“Oh, don’t say that, Sweetie..” I remember my mother said that to him when he came up to our parents and proceeded to proclaim that. “Your father and I know that you’re far from that.”

“Believe me, Mom. It’s the best word to define me,” Greg the Dreg said, a smile over his lips.

“Why?” I couldn’t help asking.

“Because it rhymes!” he said with his usual ‘I’m-So-Happy-People-Think-I’m-Nutty!’ tone.

“Oh, Gregory!!” Dad slapped a head on his forehead, clearly thinking that it’s just another joke from his lovely, manly, intelligent, funny, athletic, perfect son. “That was a good one!”

Greg smiled. “And because I just found out that I’m, in fact, a full-blown queer.”

Now, whatever colors my mom and dad were, they’re all drained out from their face, leaving only pasty white to fill their cheeks.

I was only around eight or ten that time; I wasn’t in the caliber where I’m supposed to know what ‘queer’ meant. Gay, I might know about it, but Greg was smart and chose a vague word to avoid tainting his younger sisters. Me, with my Disney-stimulated mind, thought that Greg was only having miscommunication, and what he really meant was he’s a queen.

So I started clapping vigorously, because it sounded so cool and so cool and so cool in a 8-10 year old girl mind.

“Queer!” I remember chanting that like I would sing the ode of America. “You a great queer, Greg!”

That song gave some colors back to my parent’s faces, only the color that came back was purple.

And having two purple faces, combined with hyperventilation and wide-eyed, nearly popping out eyes in front of you, had never meant good. Ever. And ever. And forever.

Ever.

“OUT!” my father directed his finger to the door. “NOW!”

Now this proved my theory.

Still smiling, Greg nodded and went upstairs. Before my father could yell at him for going to the wrong direction, he’d reappeared again, only this time with two bags that had already neatly packed. Greg had predicted him getting kicked out, and he even had packed his clothes in case it really happened.

So, when I was 8 or 10, or probably 9, I witnessed the dark side that my parents had. It’s supposed to happen at least four years later. At 8, or 9, or 10, I should be happy and naïve and exposed to only happy and naïve things.

And since it’s easier to blame someone else to my ever-present depression, I blame my parents for getting freaked out in front of a mini-me. It was actually irrelevant, because I remember dancing when I saw Greg walked away from the door. I thought he’s out buying me some princess dress. You know, him being the Queen… Besides, he came back roughly two or three years later, and he did buy me a beautiful, knock-out, princessy dress.

Too bad, at around that time, my formerly blonde hair somehow turned dark, and came along my personality. I refused to wear it and inherited it to Tracy, instead, who around that time still used her own name and hadn’t familiarize herself with black eyeliner and men who wear make-up.

Oh, the happy times.

Anyway, since my mother was in love with Greg so much, especially after he had scored 1500 in his SAT and got accepted to various Ivy League, she begged him to stay with us again, and he did.

Only, he didn’t do exactly what my parents wanted him to do. And since it could be so long had I write it, I’ll just make a list.

1. Daddy wanted Greggy to go to Ivy. Greggy refused and decided to flip burgers in Mc. Donald’s because there he could meet up with his new boyfriend every Friday.

Reaction:

Me – Good God, Greg.

Tracy – OMG GREG! YOU GOT A BOYFRIEND I WANT ONE TOO!! THAT’S SO SWEET, BTW! (shit, I seriously miss those noisy days)

Mom – Oh, god, GREG!!

Dad – God, Greg!!!

Conclusion: my father and my mother’s gens run inside of me and Tracy. Our vocabulary to express our feelings is exceptionally limited, and we even use the same words to express different kind of feelings. Great, no?

And yeah, I also found out that, despite our atheism, we’re so devoted to the One up there.

2. Mommy wanted Greggy to try going to a shrink, finding out that the gay part of him is just a fleeting phase. Greggy did go to the shrink, but then he found himself another boyfriend there: the shrink himself.

Reaction:

Me – Is this your fifth or your sixth? (it’s the seventeenth)

Tracy – Greg, he’s so cute!!!! I want him, too!!

Mom – ??????? (I honestly don’t know. She fainted)

Dad - …… (Though his blanched fist indicated that he’s holding the urge to direct his finger to the door again)

Conclusion: our family is incapable to produce a sweet, supporting shelter that a gay man should have.

3. Mommy and Daddy wanted Greggy to stay away from trouble. Greggy vowed so, but then he’s caught having anal sex with our neighbor, who had already had a wife and three kids, and who thought he’s straight.

Reaction:

Me – You score another one, Greg.

Tracy – I want to die (aka, she doesn’t care)

Mom - ?????? (she faints a lot lately)

Dad – That’s enough. We’re moving out!

Conclusion: Avoidance. Prevarication. Evasion. That’s how we deal with our problems.

These kind of scandalous acts involving our starry-eyed big brother and the various neighbors who had had wife and kids happened at least four times before we’re finally stuck in this huge mansion.

And tell you what, my father even had done a quick-check first to make sure that there’s no thirty something men with wife and kids around.

There is none. The closest neighbor we have is about a quarter mile away, and it’s filled with teenage kids and a thirty something woman, not man. I guess that means Greg will be stuck masturbating furiously for at least a few months.

If this is my dad’s attempt to punish Greg, then he’s sure as hell did it well. Because not only it affected Greg, but the misery was also distributed to me.

So, I know I should blame Greg for what happened to me, because indirectly, he made me turn dark and stay dark. But as much as I wanted to do that, I couldn’t. I was selfish and mean and it’s easier for me to blame my parents for all the irreversible flaws I have.

Besides, Greg is the closest thing that I consider normal in this dysfunctional family. Bless him.

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21

23:10

Or I might have written the time wrong, I honestly don’t know. My cellphone has died twenty minutes ago and my mom is still freaking out to the fact that our new house doesn’t provide any hairdryer (she sold her old one), not the fact that it also lacks any working clock. The big grandpa clock downstairs is too big and to scary, and it’s also the only clock in this house. Unfortunately, it’s stuck forever in 24:00/12:00.

I can’t sleep. I’ve tried and failed. I went to bed at nine o’clock, exactly what a good nerdy girl without social life would do. But even though I’ve tried over fifty sleep position, I still find myself completely awake..

Sleeping hasn’t been a problem for me before. usually, the moment I lie on the bed and close my eyes, I’m already in a stage three sleep. What teenagers my age always struggle all night, I got through it all with ease. Even Greg commented on this peculiar condition of mine.

“I can’t believe you’re sixteen,” he said while applying cheery-colored lipbalm. “I thought everyone over the age of fourteen should at least develop an early stage of insomnia.”

So, according to Greg, my current inability to sleep means my mind is finally budding to teenagedom. I should be proud. I should savor all these moments and use it to my own advantage. I should leave behind my power-puff girls chapstick and go for either The Body Shop or skull nose-ring, depending what kind of stereotypes I want to be labeled.

But I digress…

I guess it’s not because something that I no control over. I can’t doze off to sleep, but I find myself not minding this state. I think it’s a good opportunity to ponder things I’ve never considered before.

Like, about dinner. I’ve never noticed this before, but each of my family member has a different attitude to deal with dinner.

Greg is always happy to welcome food. Fast-food, vegans, Chinese, Western, even leftovers, he will eat it all. I think it’s not just because the overwhelming mass of his muscles, but him being gay has also something to do with it. He seems to have a obsessive-compulsive behavior to engage in sexual action with other guys, and since I’ve researched the internet and witnessed the real thing myself, I know that gay sex requires a LOT of energy. No wonder Greg always have nearly three times than my usual meal.

TracyslashSelene is different from him. Like a true emo she is, she needs to maintain a nearly-dead look, and one of the best and easiest and cheapest way it to keep her weight way below the healthy BMI. Currently, she weighs about 87 pounds, and is so proud of it. So, yeah. She’ll sit on the chair, but her plate will be filled not with food, but with condiments.

My mom and dad are normal. Or so I thought. Mom can’t cook for the sake of her life, so Dad experiences all the culinary adventures. He’s a decent cook, but he has a habit of messing up spices. His quote masculine unquote eyes seems to always confuse salt with sugar, pepper with sugar, and any kind of sauces with sugar.

Or, in other words, my dad, despite his nonstop roaring about homophobic speeches and great mass of muscles and the title ‘Most Athletic’ from his highschool yearbook, loves sweet to death.

And since we’re not that loaded to hire a cook, the family has accustomed themselves to tasting sweet fried rice and ultra sweet fried-chicken. It’s almost like our papillae can taste only sweet things.

The rest, my and my mother that is, are really really really really normal. Except for our modified tongues.

Anyway, our first dinner in our fifth house was fine. It went the way it always did. Greg got twice as much meal as mine, then he also got to eat TracyslashSelene’s portion. Dad went on blabbering about how homos aren’t going to have a happy life, taking hypothetical examples that very much resembles Greg’s life and dubbing it as someone’s quote poor and misled unquote life. He knew that none of us were listening, but he kept going on because dinner was the only time when he could show off his extensive vocabulary.

In the middle of Dad’s story, I saw him.

I even couldn’t grope for the right words to describe the boy. He’s just standing there in the hallway, watching us eating with his big, sunken eyes. Aside from that, nothing in his face was extraordinary. He looks around my age. His hair was ordinarily brown, and chopped like how Leonardo di Caprio cut it at Titanic. The classic kind that will never get old. His skin is a little bit too pale, though, but that’s understandable because he looks like he’s your ordinary ‘stay-on-home’ type of boy. So yeah, he’s just an ordinary boy watching us eating dinner.

I know I should get suspicious about this. A stranger in our house! HELP! MAYDAY! But that would be stupid. Since the price of this house is maddeningly low, and it’s placed in a remote place, we still have a lot of cash under our box. Mom used this rare opportunity to have something that we have never had before: a maid.

Our maid came to our house right at six o’clock. Li Fang is a small, old lady with more wrinkles than hair. She’s a one-way conservationist. She knows English, but can’t speak it, so she only kept her mouth shut as Mom detailed about what to do and not to do. She looked so frail and weak I almost pitied her. But turns out that she has more strength than Dad and Greg combined. Just imagine this, a 4’’10 lady was able to push a 130 pounds table with just one shove so that Mom doesn’t trip on it.

So, she’s short, she’s skinny, she’s Asian, she’s old, and she knows tae-kwon-do. Suddenly, in my eyes, Li Fang became the female version of Captain America. And the best part is, she’s to live with us!!

With her living with us, I think it’s just normal for her to bring a child. Maybe this boy is the product of her ovaries, I don’t know. They certainly don’t look alike. But the boy carries an identical aura as her.

Besides, my other family members don’t bother to go ballistic over his presence. And believe me; they are loco most of the time. So that means the boy’s fine.

So, there he went watching us. His eyes were half-shut and his pale mouth parted slightly, as if he longed to join here. I’m not the type of person who greet people, so I looked around to see if any of my family took pity to him and considered calling him over.

None did. They even acted like they didn’t see him.

I was about to approach him when I realized that he’d gone. Gone, like, gone. Without any trace about where he’s going to go. I didn’t even realize that he’s not there anymore, and I’m usually quite an observer.

Hmmm…

End Note

Thank you for reading. If you'd like, please review.

-DemonicBlackCat