Arsenicia's Story (As Yet Untitled) Clip One Draft Two

I'm one of those students whose names teachers dread seeing on his or her role. Not because I'm a trouble-maker, or anything. In fact, I'm at the top of my class, though I have been accused of possessing a wee bit of an attitude problem. But that's not the issue. No, teachers don't like to have my name on their roles because they can't pronounce it correctly to save their lives.

'So?' you must be thinking. 'Lots of kids have names that are difficult to pronounce. It's no big deal. Just use a nick-name.' But that's the thing. All possible nicknames are worse than the actual name. It's Arsenicia Malwrenataie Kilburn.

I tried to get people to call me Ann for awhile, but it just didn't stick. Instead, I get called Arsenic, Arson if peeps are feeling particularly lazy. When I asked one of my adopted brothers why Ann hadn't taken, I was told it was because my personality is toxic, and Ann sounded too sweet.

Joy, huh?

My parents must have hated me.

I'll never know for sure, though. They rather died when I was young, think infant. No one knows who they were, where they were from.... Really, no one knows anything about them, except that they were in a car, going somewhere, with me in a bassinet in the back-seat with a birth certificate with only my name and date of birth filled out, when they swerved suddenly and hit a light pole. They died, and I was put up for adoption, after some wonder at the convenience and mystery of my birth certificate.

The irony is that I was adopted by completely normal people with completely normal names. Seriously. The parents' names are John and Susan. Their two sons are popular, athletic, and go by James and Michael, respectively. Their daughter is a cheerleader; pretty, perfect, and well-liked. Her name is Hannah.

Bland, bland, bland. You might as well bottle it and call it 'American.'

I don't stick out like a stripper's hips, nuh-uh.

And it's not just my name, either. I mean, I'm WEIRD. My peers constantly point it out to each other. (You'd think that after this long, it could just go unsaid, but no.) Where the people I live with are annoyingly bubbly and effusive, I'm stony and reserved. I have all the personality of... well, arsenic. The family is the most influential in Great Hills and the contrast only ups my odd quotient.

When it's written out, it doesn't seem like I'm so strange. But, you'll see. I can't explain everything. Some information you'll have to pick up on yourself, and how truly out of place I am is one of them.

God, I can ramble. I believe that process has supplied enough background for you. I'll write down the actual story now. Or, at least, the narrative of it.

NOTE: This portion of the story may ultimately end up being excluded entirely. I would like feedback to help me make the call.