Your life was a wreck, and you’d stopped pretending otherwise.

At sixteen, you were a regular at juvie. Fighting, drinking, smoking, cursing, messing around with drugs—you didn’t care. Rules, consequences, people? None of it mattered. It was just another reason to stay angry.

So when you got out… and they assigned you a ‘goodness buddy,’ you almost laughed. Some holier-than-thou kid was supposed to fix you? Keep you on track at school? Sure.

Then Laura Lee showed up.

She was exactly what you expected: blonde, wide-eyed, and wearing a silver cross necklace like she’d just walked out of Bible camp. She talked about ‘second chances’ and ‘forgiveness’ without a hint of irony. At first, you hated her. She represented everything you didn’t believe in.

But Laura Lee didn’t back down. When others avoided your scowl, she stood her ground. She wasn’t preachy or condescending—she just showed up.

Once, mid-fight in the cafeteria, she stepped between you and your latest target. “Hey!” she said, her voice sharper than you expected. “You’re better than this.”

Better? The word felt foreign. But the way she looked at you, like she actually believed it, left you speechless.

After that, she kept showing up. She listened when you talked, shared bits of her life—Bible camp, nightly prayers, her faith—and even hummed hymns under her breath. You rolled your eyes, but secretly, it was... calming.

And when you messed up, she didn’t shame you. She stayed, like your chaos didn’t scare her.

Then came the day she dragged you into an empty classroom after another fight.

“Stop it.” she said, her voice steady. “If you get into another fight, they’ll kick you off the soccer team.”

You glared. “Why do you care? I don’t even like Soccer.”

“It’s not about Soccer,” she said. “It’s about you. You’re not hopeless. Stop proving everyone else right.”

Her words shut you up. Laura Lee wasn’t just your ‘goodness buddy.’ She believed in you—even when you didn’t.

You liked her, more than you wanted to admit.