This page will house the story of a girl named Hayley just trying to find herself while navigating the murky waters of middle school in Asheville, North Carolina. I hope you enjoy getting to know her as much as I have enjoyed creating her. Hayley is my daughter’s namesake with shades of me mixed in along with some fictional elements. I started working on narrative writing last March and my ultimate goal with this story is to turn it into a Young Adult novel. Until then, I’m practicing the craft in bits and pieces.
Part 1
Speedwalking as if her life depended on it, with the sunrise at her back, Hayley jumped out of her mom’s banged up car and headed straight towards the side door where the library at Asheville Middle Grades Academy was. Earlier in the school year, the librarian with the mouse colored-hair had asked for volunteers to help shelve wayward books before school. Hayley leapt at the chance because that meant long stretches of glossy yet lonely linoleum. She liked it that way after what had happened at her last school. She preferred to keep to herself, blending in as if she were nearly invisible. Most of the time The Hunger Games adjacent obstacle course that was the 7th grade hallway was pure torture.
Hayley, clad in her signature black hoodie despite it being nearly summer, swatted away a yellow and black buzzing nuisance that was hovering around the trash can near the door. Of course it was a bee! There it was trying to enjoy that sweet, sugary syrup seeping out from a crunched-up Dr. Pepper can near the top of the overstuffed trash bin. As if she didn’t have to deal with those enough. Her science teacher was obsessed with them. Lisa Turner, the most popular 7th grader was, too. Hayley hoped her teacher and the queen bee herself Lisa would not be spending the whole class period chitchatting about them. The Science teacher Ms. Buzzy, which was not her actual name but what Hayley referred to her as, was a beekeeper and provided honey to a lot of the parents including Lisa’s mom, a local celebrity chef.
As if hearing about bees at school all the time wasn’t enough, she had to deal with hearing about them from her mom, who she had practically nothing in common with. Everything she said made her cringe inside from secondhand embarrassment. What was most offensive was that her mom went by the name Rainbow when her given name was Megan. “Rainbow” sold this homemade goop to treat bee stings at her store called “The Crunchy Hippie Emporium” in Downtown Asheville along with all kinds of other potions to loyal locals and gullible tourists.
Her mom was a total hippie complete with the tie-dyed shirts a lot of the time, but she was also a pretty shrewd business woman who for sure marked up the prices she quoted visitors from out of town. Hayley had started off the car ride to school complaining about how she wished it was summer because “she was so over this school year.”
Her mom, Rainbow, had heard this song and dance before. This school year had been very challenging for her spirited daughter.
She tried to console her by reminding her there were only a few weeks left of the school year and then she was smooth sailing into a really fun summer. Hayley popped her AirPods in while rolling her eyes at the “smooth sailing” comment, and Rainbow dropped the subject while turning on her favorite bluegrass playlist.
This had been their routine almost the entire school year before and after school. Trying to give pep talks before school or asking about how the day went afterwards was an exercise in futility. It seemed like each day, the eye rolls and dramatic sighs escalated. Summer couldn’t come soon enough, so the two of them could spend some quality time together.
Rainbow knew that Hayley had barely started thinking about the summer project that was a tradition at the school for 7th graders. It had to relate to something students had learned during the school year. There had been one topic this year that had really caught Hayley’s attention, and that was The Civil War. Her dad was big into history and loved to participate in Battle of Gettysburg re-enactments every July. Hayley had tried her best to stay away from history, but learning about it in school, rather than just hearing her dad drone on about whatever nerdy tidbit was the fun fact of the day, was different. She was so much like her dad although she would never admit it.
Hayley knew that most of the girls were trying desperately to be friends with Lisa so they would probably do a project related to science and she was actually considering it, too despite her newfound excitement over American History. They were supposed to get more directions and guidance relating to the project this week and with that she knew would come Lisa’s opinion about the matter. This school year had been rough for Hayley since she really had made no effort to make friends at her new school. She just wanted to survive the school year and make some changes over the summer. She was probably going to begrudgingly go along with a Science project despite being really excited to showcase some photos she and her dad had taken of Civil War battlefields as part of her project. She thought about it as she walked into the library and grew increasingly frustrated.
It was hard enough being the awkward new kid with red hair this year. Imagine being the only girl who had taken an interest in history. That would never work. The only way to stay on Lisa’s good side and start the next school year differently would probably be to do something related to science, probably even about bees.