Birthday

Sarah was sitting at home, the night before her birthday. This year she was going to turn 15. Fifteen was her big number, even though 16 should really be the biggest birthday of her life. Sarah was not a normal girl. She of course had hair, light brown, eyes green, and a nice family but she thought of herself as different. Not in a bad way though. She thought of herself as a person God only sent down to earth once in lifetime. Sarah sat on the couch, all alone in her Victorian style house. As Sarah sat watching T.V. on her couch she thought to herself out loud “It is my birthday tomorrow and no one is home to wish me an almost, so close to a happy 15 happy birthday. What to do what to do?” What Sarah didn’t know was that someone was coming to give her a present that she would wish she could take back.

The next morning Sarah woke up only to find her parents gone for work and a happy birthday pancake sitting on the table, cold as her parent’s heart. She ate her cold pancake unhappily in the kitchen. Why didn’t her parents love her? , she wondered. But what Sarah didn’t know was that her parents loved her more than she thought.

After school, when Sarah got home she was expecting a big surprise party her parents had thrown for her birthday. All she found though was an empty house with the same old furniture, and the same old remembering of what had happened this morning. Though Sarah thought she was the special girl of the earth, she was not the kind to be patient, she waited. She waited till 5:00 pm, waited until 9:30 pm, and then she got the phone call. Sarah’s parents were loving and kind. Sarah’s parents met on a cruise ship and fell in love at first sight. Her parent’s names were Cathy and Jim. When Sarah got the phone call all she heard was that Cathy and Jim… car crash…. never found. The police women told her in quote “You must come to the station right away; your parents may have been killed in a fatal car crash. They could be dead; we will come and pick you up right away.” Sarah never cried that night, she didn’t cry when the funeral was the next week, she didn’t cry when the officer said none of her relatives would take her and the foster home was the only place to go. But what only her parents could see from heaven was that the old Sarah that only came around once in a life time was fading away into nothing.

THE NEXT YEAR

Sarah woke up to the warm smell of pancakes. It was her 16 birthday. Sarah took out her journal and wrote “Sixteen: happy, sad, crying, laughing, dreaming, pretending, alone, family, friends, sister, brother, new home, missing, hoping, believing in life.” As Sarah then ran down the stairs her new foster family surprised her with cake and a whole plate of pancakes. Her sister and brother ran up to her and gave her pancakes. There names were Julie and Josh. Then her new foster parents came and gave her the birthday cake, filled with chocolate. Her new parents hugged her. Their names were Cathy and Jim and she loved them very much though she never forgot the thing that happened on her 15 birthday. “ I know this year will be better.” ( Sarah raised her new family 10 years later and met her parents in heaven 3 days after her 60th birthday)