Hi everyone So I noticed that Shaylin didn't have any FanFiction! At all! She's my favourite character, so I decided to write one…it's before she ever came to the House of Night, before Eric Marked her.
Thanks! Please, please, please, review! I love reading those! Thanks!
Also, I don't know the exact age that Shaylin was when she was Marked, so I just guessed…SHE'S 17. There we go. That could be way too old, but, oh well…
Disclaimer: I do not own the HON series…I'm not that genius.
Ugly.
That's the one word Shaylin would use to describe them. Holding her Mother's hand, they're walking through the market. The colours around the place are sparkling. There's so much choice, so much wonder, Shaylin can't stay still.
She loves colour.
Her Mother scolds her, trying to keep her calm, but then Shaylin breaks away, trying to see the colours. Vibrant, dark, beautiful, bright, calm. All shades, all types, all kinds. It's magic. It's her world. It's what she's always wanted.
Then she sees them.
A man is pushing a cart quickly through the market, trying to get by everyone. Shaylin moves aside quickly, staring at what he's got. They look like fish, like the kinds she's seen on the television, but they don't look like regular fish.
They don't swim like they should. Their eyes don't hold pretty colours – instead, they look…dead. Shaylin doesn't really know what that word means, but when she'd asked her Mother, she'd said it "was a bad thing." Those colours looked bad. Were they dead?
The fish pass her and she can't see their eyes anymore. She doesn't mind. But she does know she'll never forget those colours.
It was the first time she saw a colour that she didn't like.
She's six now.
Months pass and she doesn't forget the eyes. She pushes them away, out of her thoughts, but she didn't forget, just like she knew she wouldn't.
The kids at school tease her constantly. They tell her she's different. They push her and they shove her around. They tell her mean things. She doesn't understand why she's bullied like this, only that nobody likes her.
Nobody likes her but the colours. Colours are her only friend. She tries to imagine what life would be like without them and she finds she can't. Life may be simpler without the colours, but not as exciting.
So she doesn't mind the bullying. She doesn't mind her abusive mother. She also doesn't know what "abusive" means, but her Mother said she was one. Shaylin gets hit a lot. She's never known anything else. Doesn't everyone's Mother do that?
She has no friends to tell her otherwise.
She's seven now.
The bullying has only grown worse. She understands what they're saying. She understands that the scars and bruises she has on her body shouldn't be coming from her Mother. She knows the breaks and tears in her mind shouldn't be coming from seven-year-olds. She knows this and she can't stop it.
She buries herself in the colours around her, trying to hide herself from the harsh world that seems to leap at her, trying to destroy her. She still doesn't know why she's the one who gets tormented like this. What did she do wrong?
She reads a lot now, too. The characters in her stories are a lot more enjoyable than the ones in real life. She can connect to those people. She can relate to them. She can visualize the colours in her head.
She doesn't realize it herself, but her teachers see the most gifted student they've ever taught when she's there. She's destined for greatness…that is, if she can survive through her life. She's intelligent, kind, and beneath the walls she's put up there's a very brave soul.
They try to talk to her, try to get her to take enrichment, try to encourage her to try harder, but she knows if she says yes, the kids will pick on her more. She doesn't want that. She doesn't know if she can stand it. So she says no, every time, to the point where her teachers just stop trying.
They completely ignore her. She has no peers to turn to.
A little while later she gets glasses. Her eyesight began to grow fuzzy, and though she doesn't understand what square things on her face can do to help, they do help. She can read again. The glasses just set on a whole new sore point of teasing. They let the colours through, but not enough to help.
It gets so bad she wants to tear the glasses right off her face. She wants to crush them, but then her Mother will hit her again, and she can't have that. She doesn't want to show up to school with a black eye. The kids will tease her about that.
She builds more barriers around her mind. She never goes out, at all, except for school. She never wants to go there. Nobody has heard her speak in a long time. She secludes herself, trying to hide from the world. She cries out in pain but nobody hears. She's only seven. Can't anybody understand?
Nobody does.
So instead, she builds her walls up higher, letting only the colours through.
She's eight now.
The bullying gets worse. She hides herself. Nobody knows her name. She doesn't know herself, what she's capable of. Great things can come of her, but she doesn't realize it yet.
She goes to bed one morning, savouring the colours as she always does before she goes to sleep. When she takes her glasses off, the horrible things they are, her eyesight is so bad she can't see the colours anymore. They blend together, reminding her of the dead fish eyes.
She hasn't forgotten. She feels dead sometimes.
As she tenderly rubs her split lip her Mother gave her, sleep takes her and she says goodbye to the colours.
The colours said goodbye too.
For, when she woke that morning, she couldn't see anything.
It's just dark. There are no colours. No vibrant greens, no sparkling blues, no calm violets, no striking reds. It's all black, like night descended on her eyes and stayed there.
She wails when she realizes the truth. She's blind.
She'll never read again. She'll never see again. What did she do wrong? Was she being punished? For what? Existing?
She tells her Mother and she gets hit for it, like it's her fault. It's not Shaylin's fault. Is it? Did she do something wrong? She can't help but think that she is.
When she finally goes back to school, they give her special equipment to help her learning. Afterwards, they forget she's even there. The kids laugh at her. It's a new game to sneak up on Shaylin and scare her or push her.
One day a boy pushes her down a hill. She falls hard, twisting her ankle when she lands. The teachers tell her to watch her balance.
She cries herself to sleep everynight. She can't make up the loss of the colours the one thing keeping her grounded. And so, she doesn't stay grounded.
She floats away, trying not to break apart, but inside, she's already broken.
The day she breaks her glasses opens a whole new world. She doesn't need them anymore, obviously, yet they still sit on her nightstand. She accidentally brushes them one night, before she's about to go to sleep, yet she always feels as if she's asleep now.
They fall on the ground and hit her foot. In that moment, she feels all the pain that's been inflicted on her come back. All the anger she's kept hidden. Everything. And she steps on the glasses, smashing them to bits.
She feels the glass cut her foot again and again, the frame crumple beneath her. It hurts, but the pain is good. It's a good pain. It's the kind of pain that helps you, that lets you feel when you don't think you can anymore.
MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOP!
She falls to the floor, sobbing.
She's thirteen now.
She's cut herself more and more. She can't count how much blood she's lost from those cuts. Several times she's passed out but it still feels good.
And everytime she cuts she knows she shouldn't, but she can't stop. In school, they always tell you how addictive drugs can be, and stay away from them. They don't tell you how addicting self-harm can be.
She's so, so alone.
She just wants a friend. She just wants somebody she can relate to. She needs somebody to relate to.
Or else she fear she'll give up. This time, for real.
The walls she built so long ago are closing in on her, suffocating her, choking her.
She can't tear them down anymore.
She's seventeen now.
She's forgotten the colours.
But she hasn't forgotten the fish eyes.
Her Mother still abuses her. She's still bullied. She's stopped cutting, simple because she can't see the cuts. Her waist is probably a mess. She's probably cut on top of old cuts.
She's a mess, though she's better at hiding it now. Nine years of blindness and she's finally used to it.
She's walking down the street, trying to take a walk to clear her thoughts. Nobody's around, and that's how she likes it. She understands these things now, but she doesn't believe in miracles.
She needs a miracle.
Shouldn't one have happened by now?
She hears somebody running and she stops briefly as the footsteps stop in front of her. He seems to stammer, not sure of what he's saying, but he's talking to her.
He's probably making fun of her. They all do. They don't even know her.
He touches her forehead and white hot pain races through her skull. Before she knows anything, she's on the ground, shielding her eyes from the violent onslaught of colour and shine.
Shielding her eyes?
She can see. She can see! She can see!
A boy's looking down at her, about her age. He's incredibly handsome, and by the tattoo on his forehead, he's a Tracker.
She's been Marked.
She can see.
A very cute boy was standing over her.
Hope comes back to her now, hope that maybe everything won't be so bad anymore.
She's found her miracle.
Thanks for reading…I hope you guys liked it! Thanks for reading! 3's! Please review!