Skylar Marie Johnson is a mere 17-year-old girl who loves everything to do with music and writing. Unable to keep up with the demands of her long, wavy hair, she decided it’d be best to just...cut it off; much to the dismay of her parents.
Well, they weren’t part of her life anymore, anyway.
Skylar was pretty tall for her age, standing proudly at 5’6”. A lover of all things sports, it’s no wonder she was the captain of multiple teams at school: flag football, football, American football, rugby and swimming. It was a lot to take on top of her school work, but she managed.
Amelia Ann Rose, too, is 17. Once in a band with five of her other sisters, she never understood what having a ‘normal’ life meant. Or perhaps, this was her definition of ‘normal’. Always on the road with her family, either for a gig or a simple road trip, Amelia saw a lot of the outside world; but not the kind she wanted to see. Being born into fame and coming from a family of a whopping 11 kids, the poor girl was homeschooled. She never got to experience what it was like growing up with other children around her, lest for her siblings. She yearned to talk to someone that just wasn’t related to her, even if it was just for one time and nothing more.
•••
It was 7am here in Yorkshire, Northern England. Skylar was the only one awake. Typical. She’d texted her friends just moments before, but she wasn’t expecting a response anytime soon.
Seeing as she had nothing better to do, she ripped a piece of paper off her notebook and picked up a pen. Her lecturer had gone on and on about the importance of letters and pen pals, as if the 21st century hadn’t already caught up to them.
Well, it was graded...so why not, right? How hard could it be to score an A for something so simple?
Skylar opened her laptop, wondering how she’d be able to find someone to write to.
Okay, maybe not too simple.
Nevertheless, she decided to try anyway. Coincidentally, the Rose girls had just posted a new video about fan mail.
“They're never going to see it anyways, but why not give it a shot? I've got nothing to lose,” she mumbled under her breath.
Unable to figure out what to write, the brunette wrote a few variations of...well, pretty much the same paragraph.
“Dear Rosy Illusions,
Thank you for being who you are.
Skylar”
No, if she wrote something so short, they wouldn’t think she was serious. Right?
So, she tried again.
“Dear Rosy Illusions,
I love you. Thank you so much for being who you are. You saved me from myself. Whenever I'm feeling down, I listen to your music and laugh with you guys in the bloopers. It always makes me feel better. People always look down on me, but I ignore them, because I know you guys wouldn't want me to give in. You're what's keeping me alive.
Skylar”
No, that's too long. They’d think she was a psycho if they read this.
And that was when Skylar realised she’d been going about this all wrong. Her lecturer had mentioned a pen pal, not a group of them.
“Okay,” she heaved a sigh. “What if I just write to Amelia?”
The American was the closest to her in terms of age, anyway.
“Dear Amelia,
Thank you for everything.
Skylar”
There, that would have to do. Just something simple, nothing too wordy. Forget what was said about it being too short.
Skylar sealed the letter in an envelope, wrote the girls' PO box address on it and mailed it.
Now all she had to do was pray and hope that the addressee would see it.
Only for the grade, of course.
