Find Me Part 1 (Volume I)

I washed my hands on the sink to remove the soil residue from the garden. I washed my face afterward too. I was trying my best to be a hero by saving a ball from the mud pile, but the kid cried anyway after looking at me. Waking up every morning and expecting the day to end badly is normal to me. Having this kind of dilemma every day is a typical situation. I got used to all the bad luck that came my way since I was young. I'll be laughing at first and in a second I'll be the saddest person in the world. I breathed deeply and closed the faucet. I took my black band from my wrist and tied my hair in a ponytail with it.

I placed both hands on each side of the sink and stared at the reflection in front of me. "It's okay, Sapphire," I told myself.

I heard footsteps from the hallway outside the dressing room. I could hear Jo, my best friend, coming and worried that I'm already late. She's murmuring something about me being ridiculously late all the time.

Aside from a bad luck magnet I also have a strange—what do I call this—'curse' might be the right term because it makes me restless especially at night, I have this curse which makes me hear even the faintest sound from the other room really loud and clear as if it happened in front of me. This curse stretches from where I stand to the sound that is meters away from me. One day, I tried figuring out how far I could hear. The farthest I got is hearing other people talking to the building that was blocks away from me that time. I didn't go further than that as it gave me an unbearable headache after trying. The footsteps got closer and it stopped in front of my dressing room's door. The door creaks open and closes as someone enters the dressing room.

"Sapphire?" Jo called.

"I'm here," I shouted from the bathroom.

"People have been looking for you." Jo made her way inside the bathroom. "Are you not ready yet?" her voice full of worry.

"Unfortunately," I murmured.

"What is that?" she sniffed in the air, "Is that you?" her eyes sprung into my clothes down to my unpleasant-looking white shoes that turned brown from the dirt. "Sapphire!" she shouted. I'm pretty sure it wasn't a shout but it does to me. "Take a bath now! What on earth did you just do?" she dragged her platinum mermaid cut dress as she pushed me towards the shower and opened it.

"Stop acting like a mom. It was already embarrassing when I was trying to pass the people from the hallway and avoiding their troubled faces," cold water sprinkled to me as if trying to pierce through my skin. "That's so cold," I said.

Unlike me, Jo is actually a proper lady; her long platinum blonde hair falls perfectly on her back, naturally plump lips, long eyelashes complimented by her dark gray eyes. Perfect look for a real lady.

She removed my hair from its place and dumped the free shampoo from the hotel on my head. "You better do this yourself. I'm going to ruin my makeup if I continue." She stepped back and went out of the bathroom. "Where is her dress?" I heard her asking herself.

I removed my dirty clothes and threw them on the side together with my shoes, I'll have to clean them later. I continued taking a bath and dried myself with a towel and then wore a bathrobe. I see Jo flattening my dress on the sofa as I get out of the bathroom.

"There you are, damsel. Come here, we need to fix you." She guided me towards the vanity with lights blinding my eyes. She then turned on the blower to blow dry my hair and my goodness it sounds like I'm standing beside an airplane's engine ready to explode anytime.

"You could just put my hair in a pony again," I said.

"No can do, this is a musical opera not some stadium for ballistics," she combs my hair while drying it and it hurts like shit. My pain tolerance is at its low point. A single cut could hurt all day. Which is bullshit.

"When do I perform?" I asked as I put moisturizer on my face.

"Hopefully, not yet, or else it will be too embarrassing to make your parents wait." Her eyes grew huge as she says 'parents'.

"Ah. They're going to attend. I forgot."

She pulled my already so painful hair harder, "You forgot? You?" Her eyes are wider and voice louder. "I can't believe that you're my friend."

"Jo, you came into my life and stayed. I didn't ask you to do any of it." Blaming her for all the bad luck that came to her because of me. Sticking with me means catching some of my treasures.

She took my hair tie and pulled my hair into a pony. I thought she would stop there until she took some pins and curled my hair into a bun. "What very long hair you have." She murmured. She doesn't know that I have some sensitive hearing which makes me hear everything that she says and luckily, she's not the type to badmouth anyone.

I took the foundation and blended it on my face. I heard someone walking towards this room and probably it's one of the organizers. A knock pierced towards the door and it opened. Jo removed her eyes from me and gazed at the person standing in front of the door. He's wearing a black shirt and black pants matched with black sneakers which I'm guessing is the uniform for the event. His sweaty face suggests that he needs some rest. He looks like he's been running all over the place.

"Miss Valoria, I'm just going to remind you of your schedule. After this performance from Mister Yu, you're up next." Jo's eyes widened once more as he announced. "That's all." He then closed the door before him. "You're next!" this time, it's definitely a shout. I took the eye shadow palette and took some neutral colors to my eyes, skipping other make-up bullshits. "Put some gold in your eye. It looks good on hazel brown eyes." Following the best makeup guru I know, I took the shimmering palette and placed it on my eyelid. "Don't fail this one, Sapphire. I'm rooting for you to the next level. I'm next after you by the way."

"What if I didn't make it? Knowing my luck, it's probably going to happen." Knowing my parents, they're going to be more disappointed in me than they already are.

"Then support me. If I don't, I'll support you. If neither of us, let's eat it out, and if we both make it…let's eat it out too." She smiled.

I smiled back. I took a pinkish tone of lip cream and put some on my lips. My long dark brown hair is perfectly put in a bun by Jo.

"There. Are you not going to put on some mascara and eyeliner?"

"Skip the cara put some liner on me." I closed my eyes and felt Jo putting the wet black liquid lines on my eyes.

I heard Jo's stiletto heels walk towards the sofa and took my tan-colored dress which is quite similar to hers minus the too many sparkling gems. "Here." She unzipped the zipper on the bag. I fished through my dress and inserted my feet on the six-inched heels she gave me last September for my birthday. It's a sparkly maroon and really expensive. "There you go, you look like a lady," she smiled widely. But I don't want to look like one. Being a lady means that I need to make my parents proud and making them proud means that I have to give up everything I love.