I was angry at the world. And I had good reason to be. My dad had left a long time ago, when I was a small child—just walked out one day for cigarettes and never came back. He left behind a gaping hole in my soul that would never be filled. My mother, too, suffered from that same void: She filled it with alcohol, or at least tried to, as much as a bottomless pit can be filled. Occasionally she could pull herself together enough, for my sake, to get a low-paying job to support us and keep us fed. Inevitably, though, she would slip back into old habits, and be consumed by the bottle again.

I was the poster child for teenage angst. I wore black nail polish and black lipstick and heavy eyeshadow with mascara. I dyed my dark hair with streaks of color and cut it in crazy, edgy styles. I had ear piercings and a nose piercing and even a badass tattoo of the grim reaper with a skull on my upper thigh that I got with a fake ID (don't tell my mom). As for my clothing, I usually went for a goth or punk aesthetic: lacy black corsets with short skirts and tights, ripped-up skinny jeans, big black boots, messy crop tops with spaghetti straps. Anything black with buckles or spikes was my jam. I liked black because my heart was black.

My behavior mirrored my outer appearance. I played the role of the bad kid pretty well. I always talked back to my teachers and acted up in class. I smoked weed in the girl's bathroom during lunch and cigarettes behind the school. My grades weren't terrible, because I wasn't a complete moron, but I certainly didn't try very hard. I snuck out of the house on weekends late at night to attend wild parties, although I refused to drink alcohol because I didn't want to be like my mother. I made out with bad boys, whom I knew all too well would use me and break my heart and leave me just like my daddy did.

The relationship I had with my mom, admittedly, wasn't the best. She worked odd hours, so she wasn't around much anyways. Sometimes she would bring home men that might stay for a little while, but none of them could replace my dad. She couldn't handle my unruliness and didn't know how to discipline me or give me boundaries. We would get into shouting matches with each other a lot, where we yelled past each other more than listening to each other. I knew all her weaknesses, and would intentionally say hurtful things to make her cry. I told her she was a terrible mother and she was the reason Dad left and nobody would ever love her again. I would regret my words later, but the rage and sadness I felt inside me was hard to control.

Today was the day where the tension finally snapped, and everything came crashing down. I had been having an unusually crummy day, and I was in a bad mood. I flunked my chemistry test—not that I really cared, but it still made me feel stupid. The other girls in my class were teasing me and telling me I was an idiot, and I didn't like that. I was walking through the hallway to my next class when Billy the Bully, as I called him, spotted me and zeroed in on his prey like a bloodhound. I had spurned his advances once, finding him to be a contemptible wretch, and ever since he had made it his mission to belittle and humiliate me as much as possible. Since I had rejected him, he insisted I was an ugly lesbian. I was not in the mood for his bullshit today. He pushed me hard into a locker, laughed, and strolled off.

The coals burning inside me ignited. Billy the Bully was going down. I chased after him and punched him hard in the back of the head, knocking him to the ground, and kicked him in the ribs a couple of times for good measure. That'd teach him to mess with me. Unfortunately for me, I hadn't noticed the principal walking down the hall, who was now gaping at me, appalled. It didn't matter that Billy always harassed me, and that he had initiated the confrontation. The principal had only seen my violence. Despite fights breaking out all the time in the schoolyard, our school had a "zero tolerance" policy on the books for violent actions. Not to mention, I'm sure they were more than happy to find an excuse to get rid of a troublesome rebel like me. I was swiftly expelled.

Needless to say, when my mom came home from work and learned what happened from the school, she blew up at me. As usual, we yelled past each other until we were both out of breath and red in the face. I stormed out of the house and took a walk to cool down, smoking a cigarette as I went. To be honest, even though I felt justified in what I had done, I regretted putting my mom through more stress. She was always failing me, but I figured she still loved me and cared about me. I was disappointing her with my bad behavior. I felt like such a failure.

Reflecting on my actions didn't change the consequences, however. I had been kicked out of school, and now we would need to transfer me to a new school. I wasn't sure how to feel, whether I should be nervous or optimistic. Maybe I needed a fresh start. My old school sucked anyways, and was lousy with bullies and haters. I hated school. Why did I have to go in the first place? I couldn't think of any other high schools that were close by in our area.

When I returned home, my mom was making phone calls, trying to place me in a new school. Her eyes were red and puffy as she massaged her temple with her fingers. I tiptoed past her, slunk over to my room, and threw myself on my bed. I slapped on a pair of old headphones and blasted some death metal into my ears to drown out my thoughts. Somehow, the sound of wild demonic screaming and electric guitars always helped to calm down the boiling hatred inside me. I started to drift off to sleep.

"EREN!" my mom screamed my name, startling me awake over the sound of my music. I took off my headphones, irritated.

"WHAT?!" I shouted back with a disgruntled scowl.

"Pack your things," my mother demanded. "None of the schools nearby are willing to take you in, and I can't deal with you anymore. You're going to boarding school to learn some discipline."

"Boarding school? Are you freaking kidding me right now?" I balked. I was incredulous. Mom was trying to get rid of me. I flipped the script on her and acidly retorted, "Well, fine then! I didn't want to be around you anymore either!" I rolled over in my bed and refused to look at her, facing the wall instead in defiance. She paused for a moment, as if wanting to say something, then sighed and exited the room, closing the door gently behind her.

I huffed and sulked for a while. Boarding school. Unbelievable. Scoffing to myself, I began to gather up my things, tossing clothes, school supplies, and some other miscellaneous articles carelessly into my backpack and a duffel bag. I didn't have a whole lot to bring. We were poor, so it's not like I had a ton of luxury items in my possession to pack. I prepared for bed and flopped down on my mattress, deep in thought. I wondered what boarding school was like. Maybe it would be better to get away from it all, to be far away from everything that was tormenting me. My mom wouldn't be around to hassle me at least. How bad could it be?

The next morning, I dragged myself out of bed and threw on some clean clothes. I hadn't slept well, since I had been haunted by my nagging thoughts most of the night. I ate a bowl of cereal and drank some orange juice for breakfast, then decided I ought to at least make myself look nice if it was going to be my first day at a new school. I hauled myself to the bathroom and washed, did my make-up, brushed my teeth, and styled my hair with some hair gel. Much better.

I grabbed my bags and placed them in the trunk of our beater of a car. Rather than sit in the front seat alongside my mother, I opted to sit in the back instead, sprawling my legs out along the back seat. My mom pursed her lips in disapproval but didn't say anything. She hopped into the front seat, and after a couple of tries the starter kicked in and the old car coughed to life. The car crawled out of the driveway and stumbled off, leaving a nasty brown puff of smog in its wake.

We drove for a while in silence. I played on my phone and occasionally looked out the window at the bland scenery passing by. We lived in a rural area, surrounded by farmland, so there wasn't much to see other than fields of corn and wheat, grain silos and barns, and fenced-off land for cows or horses. It was a serene and pastoral paradise, but I had lived with these things my whole life so I wasn't very impressed. The density of the buildings gradually increased as we entered more populated areas.

After a couple of hours, I started to get restless. "Where are we going? How far away is this place?" I questioned, finally breaking the silence.

"About that..." my mother said. She trailed off and failed to finish her sentence, as if she were afraid to tell me.

"Well?" I asked, a note of irritation in my voice.

She sighed. "I guess it's better if I tell you now, so you don't freak out when we get there. We're almost at the drop-off point anyways."

"Freak out?" I was becoming increasingly baffled. "Why would I freak out? What's going on here?" I raised my voice as I spoke.

"This isn't an ordinary boarding school." She paused dramatically, letting the words sink in. "I needed to find a place we could afford, and a place that could handle your misbehaving and keep you in check. This school is planning to become an integration school, and they're looking for students like you to join, so they offered me a substantial subsidy to sign you up."

"Students... like me?" I was lost. "Why would they want a troublemaker like me? What do you mean by an 'integration school?' What is that?"

Before she could answer, our car was engulfed in shadow. I peered out the window and my jaw dropped to the floor. We were driving toward a massive wall, constructed of great stone bricks of an impossible size. The wall must have been hundreds of feet tall, and blocked out the sun as we approached. The surrounding buildings and trees looked like little models and toys by comparison. We pulled up to the wall and parked in a vacant lot. My mom, rather than explaining what was going on, got out of the car and removed my bags from the trunk. I stayed in my seat, refusing to budge. I was very confused, and even a little intimidated.

My mother opened the passenger door and looked at me expectantly. "Come on. Get out." I just stared back at her. Nothing had been explained. I didn't want to go. I was getting an uneasy, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

She crossed her arms and tapped her foot impatiently. Realizing I wasn't going to win this fight, I begrudgingly got out of the car and followed her to a normal-sized door that was embedded in the enormous wall. She opened the door and we walked into a short, gloomy passageway that tunneled through the thick wall to the other side. As we walked through the darkness, I cleared my throat and tried one last time to finesse some information out of her.

"Mom... please. Tell me what this is," I pleaded. I couldn't stop my voice from cracking slightly. Genuine fear was starting to trickle into my chest. The whole situation was very strange and surreal.

We reached the door at the end of the tunnel. Sunlight bled through the cracks around the door, framing it with bright light in the musty darkness. My mom placed her hand on the door handle and exhaled slowly. She gazed over at me sadly. Her face was pinched up, as if she were trying to hold back strong emotions.

"On the other side of this huge wall... is the giant side of town. You're going to a boarding school for giants."