I have been working on this story for a while. I only work on it when I feel a little down. This isn't as happy and cheery and my other stories, but I hope you'll enjoy it anyway.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, which makes me sadder.

~*~ 7:23 a.m. September 8 ~*~

First Day of School. First Day of Freedom.

Today is the first day of school. It was a long summer for me, I thought that I wouldn't make this year. But I did and I'm somewhat proud. I'm starting ninth grade this year. I can't wait, at school I don't have to worry about Dan hurting me. He walks down the stairs, eyes bloodshot from his little happy hour last night. To relieve some of the pain that came from his headache he barged into my room and beat me with his bare fist until he got tired and I got blood all over my shirt.

I'm not sure what he is stumbling downstairs to do, maybe it's to remind me to come back home, maybe it's to help me remember who is the boss of me. "I want your pathetic ass home at one time. Not a minute before, not a minute after. Do you understand?" His breath still smelled of alcohol. I nod my head in response. "Good now get the hell out of here." He said sternly.

I grab my bag and rush out the door before he has a chance to hit me. I felt safe out here. Anywhere outside of that house is safe to me. I have to walk to school which is nothing new I always used to walk to school. A car rolls by me and the owner of it honks there horn. The people inside point and laugh at me. I see the owner of the car is my ex-best friend Ino and her new friends.

Me and Ino stopped being friends when eighth grade ended. She said that she couldn't be seen with me anymore. I took it pretty hard, but not as hard as the beating I received from Dan for being two minutes late coming home that day. She was my only best friend. She always stood up for me when other people teased me. But now I'm all alone.

Every time I arrive at school I notice that everyone has a place here. Everyone has someone except me. I see a field of cherry blossom trees. I may not have anybody, but at least I have a place. I sit underneath one of them and automatically feel a lot safer. Ino and her new friends strut by me. She glances at me and makes some comment about how I'm alone. Her clones laugh. Does Kami hate me? I think so. It's bad enough I have to live with Dan, I lost my only friend, and now I have to deal with her rude comments for the rest of my high school life.

I can't let that get to me. Any abuse I face here will always be better the abuse I face at home. Plus I love school, I always have. I love to learn, which Ino never understood why. The more I learn, the better the chance I have of leaving Dan. The bell rings and I have to go to class. I always dreaded being a freshman. The school is so big and I can easily get lost. Plus I might wander off to where the upperclassmen were. That would be a nightmare.

Everyone looks at me like I'm a ghost or something. I can hear them whisper about how weird I look, girls laughing about how pathetic my outfit is. I think it's pretty pathetic too, but it's all I got. I always wear long sleeve shirts to cover the bruises on my arms. I have a whole bunch of them, the one I'm wearing now is black and I have black cargo shorts on.

Dan won't give me enough money to dress as glamorous as the other girls do. And I can't have a job because Dan won't let me have one. And I don't even try to argue the benefits of me having a job. One would be I can get away from him faster, and he doesn't have to waste a thirty dollars a year to take care of me.

I head to the nearest girls bathroom and go in. Starring at the mirror, I noticed that I do look sort of weird. There aren't many people in this world with pink hair and green eyes. Strike that, there aren't any people besides me with pink eyes and green hair. I slowly drag myself to my assigned homeroom class.

~*~ 8:56 a.m. September 21 ~*~

Class has already started. I walk in not being noticed by anyone except the teacher, but even she doesn't care that I'm like fifty minutes late. I really took my time getting here, there's no reason for me being on time or early. Everyone was sitting with their best friends. I sit in the back with just me, myself, and I. There is no window in here so I just daydream about how my life would be if Dan wasn't my dad.

My dream dad would spoil me, he would tell me he loves me every single day. He wouldn't ever try to hurt me and he would always be there for me. Of course, I know this is nothing more than my imagination at it's somewhat best. One day I actually got so caught up in my dream one time that I came home believing my dream dad would be there waiting for me.

Reality hurts, reality sucks, reality is too real. The bell rings and everyone gets up and rush out the door like someone is giving away free I-pods. I linger for a bit longer. I hate crowds, people bump into me and knock me over as I'm not even there. But when I got out the class people knew I was there. A path was cleared for me to walk. It was like a fashion show, all eyes were on me. Except I wasn't being admired, I was being ridiculed.

I walked passed all of them, looking at the ground as I walked. I saw several people stick their feet out to trip me, but since I was starring at the ground I saw all of them and walked over their foots. Most of the people groaned when they saw I wasn't going to fall. "Come on freak, trip already!" Someone yelled, but I still didn't fall. I sigh, this can't go on forever. Soon there will be someone else to make fun of, I hope.

~*~ 9:18 a.m. October 29 ~*~

Students are discussing Halloween plans, I'm in the back trying to redo my geometry. I got blood on my first paper. Last night me and Dan got to play this fun game called 'it's all your fault'. He got to say everything that went wrong in his life, and after every event that went wrong he would punch me. The last thing he said was, "It's your fault your mother is gone." And then he punched me in the nose so hard I blacked out. It's not my fault, it's his and he knows it. But I would never say that to him.

Kids here talk so loud I can't help but to hear their conversations. "I know what I'm going to be for Halloween." A kid said. "I'm going to the boogeyman!"

Ino was one of the many people talking about their plans. She glanced at me and smiled. "I'm going as Sakura." Everyone laughed. Yeah that was hilarious.

"You'll have the scariest costume ever!" I walk out of room and go to the bathroom. I remove my long sleeve shirt to reveal my undershirt. I can see all the bruises and cuts clearly. My skin isn't normal, it's purple, black, blue, and red. I'm one big rainbow mess. A take a few wads of paper towels, wet them, and place them on my purple bruises. The cool water feels good against my sore skin. I wish I had some bandages to cover up some of the bruises. Or maybe some concealer, that works well too.

I see Ami and Ino walk in the bathroom, look at me and leave quickly. I saw the fear in their eyes. I am scary, I should walk around the place like this. People will fear me and for Halloween I won't have to buy a costume, I could just go as myself. I decide against that, I wouldn't want anyone to have a heart attack, and put my shirt on and go back to class.

Ino and Ami were looking at me half worried half wanting to make some comment on what they had just saw. They continue looking at me, I figured that if they aren't going to say anything I can return back to my unfinished geometry homework and tune out the rest of the world.

11:25 p.m.

I was listening to the sounds of people running around knocking on doors asking for candy. Several people came knocking on our door. I could hear Dan screaming at them that we didn't have any candy. He came stomping upstairs and into my room. "Get up." He demanded. I reluctantly do as I was told, he dragged me by the hair out into the hallway.

He takes my head and bangs it against the stair railing. Tears fall out of my eyes, and blood flows out my forehead. I try to crawl away, but he dragged me back and introduced my face to his fist over and over again.

I finally woke up hours later and realized I was late to school. I cover my face completely with my hair to hide my new bruises. He was waiting for me when I got downstairs, he looked drunk. I decided to make a run for it, but I'm still a little woozy from last night so I ran into the unopened door. I shook off the pain, opened it, and ran out of there as fast as I could.

Everyone called me the grudge. But I doubt they would be able to come up with a clever enough name if I showed them my face. Karin saw me and snickered. A lot of girls saw me and snickered, but the one girl who didn't do anything was Ino. That surprised me, maybe she finally can see my pain. Maybe she'll stick up for me like she used to. Maybe, hopefully, I don't know.

~*~ 5:25 p.m. November 6 ~*~

I still am hopeful that one day someone will rescue me from this hellhole. I had always been hopefully that it would some day happen. I would often dream that someone, like a really cute guy would bust through the door, kill Dan, and take me away to his castle, or really nice house it doesn't matter.

For all I care it could be a farmhouse in the middle of no where. Oh and Ino and I will become best friends. We'll forget the past and only look toward the future. I'll become a world renowned doctor and have a beautiful family.

I love to dream, it's a lot better than reality. Starring into the mirror I realized that I wasn't the prettiest thing around. I'm not even cute or decent or okay enough to be some drunk guy's one night stand. The longer I stare, the longer I see why no guy would be just dying to be with me.

I see Dan's reflection in my mirror. Is it me dreaming? No, it's him alright. I can tell from all the way over here that he is slightly buzzed. He chuckles. "Look at you. You worthless piece of shit. I've seen hyenas that look better than you." Wow I'm really that ugly? Now that I think about it, for Halloween I should have bought myself a Jason hockey mask, or maybe a Micheal Myers mask. Then maybe I'll look slightly better by comparison.

~*~ 11:02 p.m. December 15 ~*~

I hate winter, it is the worst time of year for me. The only good thing about it was that I have an actual good reason to wear long sleeve shirts. It's snowing outside and the cherry blossom trees' leaves are gone. I stare at their bare branches during class. My English teacher calls me up to her desk.

As I was walking to the teacher's desk to get my book somebody, Karin, stuck their foot out and tripped me. I was close enough to the teacher's desk that when I fell I hit my head on the desk. I could feel a little trail of blood fall down my forehead.

"Have a nice trip, see ya next fall!" Karin shouted which made only some people in the room laugh. The rest of the students sat silently waiting for me to get up. I sat there, head resting on desk, trying to get my thoughts straight. Slowly I stood up and revealed my bloody forehead to the class. At that point, no one laughed except for Karin. But after she noticed that no one found nothing funny about seeing someone's blood drip down the face, she grew quiet as well.

"Ms. Haruno are you okay?" The teacher asked very concerned. She removed my hand from my forehead and looked at the blood. "Stay here I'll call the nurse." Call the nurse? What for? It's such a minor wound. I've had worse. I slowly walk back to my seat, taking a handful of napkins with me. I learned how to take care of my own wounds back in seventh grade. It really was just practice for when I become a doctor.

Students glanced back at me to see if I was okay. I'm fine, perfectly fine. I tried to avoid all of their gazes. I know deep down inside most of them just want to point and laugh. But that would be inappropriate, they have to wait until I'm out the room. The nurse showed up and escorted me out of the classroom. I have good hearing, and I still heard nothing from the class not even Karin.

12:05 p.m.

She seemed very nice. She instructed me to lay down and remove the bloody napkins from my head. Examining the damage carefully she came to the conclusion that I need stitches. "What's your name sweetheart?"

"Um...Sakura. Haruno." I said quietly. She picked up the phone and dialed a number that I was all too familiar with. "What are you doing?" I sat up and asked frantically.

"I have to call your father." She said. Oh no. She was calling Dan. I wanted to jump up and smack the phone out of her hand but it was too late. He had already picked up the phone. I'm surprised that he isn't wasted right now.

"Hello?" I could hear his voice, it was calm.

"Hello, Mr. Haruno. I'm the school nurse for Konoha High school. And I'm calling because your daughter has been injured and she needs to get stitches." She informed him. I hope he says that he can't come down and pick me up.

"Oh really?" He sounded concerned but I knew he wasn't. He's one good actor. "I'm on my way to get her right now." My heart stopped beating. He's coming. He's coming here to get me.

"Okay thank you." She hung up.

"You didn't have to call him. I'm fine." I try not to sound scared. But it's hard, I know he's probably going to do more damage which will cause me to need more than just stitches.

"Sakura, your head is practically split open. You need stitches." No I don't. No I don't! I decide to keep my mouth close before I start crying and have a fit. I don't want to tell our little secret, the justice system is crocked and the only people I distrust more than the kids here at school, are cops. He probably won't get a year for abusing me, and whose going to testify for me? Certainly no one here.

He came as promised looking like the world's most perfect dad. No one knows his deep dark secret and if I were to tell anyone then they wouldn't believe me. "Sakura are you okay dear?" He sounded so convincing.

"Y-yeah." I managed to get out.

"Don't worry. She'll be fine." The nurse reassures. He picks up my bag and smiles at me, then the nurse and then back at me but it was a more sinister smile. I walk ahead of him to the car. He forcefully grabs my arm and drags me to his side.

12:45 p.m.

"Why the fuck can't you be more careful? Now I gotta take time out of my precious schedule to come get you." We walk outside. I'm so happy that it's lunch and there are a lot of people outside. I wanted him to hit me so that people can see that he is nothing but a phony. He glares at Ino and her new clique as they walked past us. I could hear them whisper something about how evil he looked.

I looked up and they were right. He couldn't wait to get me home and beat the living daylights out of me. By now he was almost literally dragging me to the car. He opened the door like a gentleman and then shoved me in the car like I was nothing. I waited and waited for him to get in the car. Those were some of the most agonizing seconds of my life. He started it and drove off. The first light we go to he turned around and slapped me with the back of his hand. My cheeked stung and it stung even worse when tears rolled down it.

"Shut up you stupid bitch. I ain't even started yet." It was a fairly short drive home. I was wondering if I could make a run for it. Nope too late, he dragged me out the car and shoved me onto the hard pavement. I try to crawl away but he just curb stomps me in the gut. I cough up blood and cry more. He pulls me up by the hair and drags me into the house.

Here is where the real fun begins. He uses me as his punching bag. I am the reason his life is so miserable he says. I am the reason my mother is no longer here he says. I am to blame for everything. I try to dodge some of his punches but I'm not quick enough. When he's finally done, he leaves me bloody and bruised.

I can barely stand up but I know I have to leave before he decides to go another round. I feel like one of my ribs are broken, but who am I going to go to get it fixed? We don't have health insurance and the walk in clinic is all the way across town. I'll lay in my bed and hope that I'll recover.

Tell me what you think and I will update sooner if you guys like it.