"You will be attending Daylight Academy. Henry will give you your uniform. You are to wear them when you attend school. This is a prestigious private academy. As you are my granddaughter, I will not have you attend just any school. However, I expect you to not break any school rules. You will behave appropriately while you carry the Ellis family name. Is that understood?"

I intended to get to know my grandmother when I came down to have a meal with her, but instead, she was telling me how I would be enrolled in the academy here.

Well, it wasn't such a bad thing. I still needed to graduate if I ever wanted to go to college. And I certainly wanted to go to college.

Although I was forced to come here and live with my grandmother, I made a promise with my friends before I left. At the very least, we would all apply for the same college so we could reunite. But we weren't applying to just any old college. It was a very respected place in education.

Mecree College was listed as 3rd place in the top 50 college ratings. It wasn't an easy place to get into, but it was a well-respected place that any parent wouldn't say no to. I hoped that by applying to this college, neither my parents nor my grandmother would oppose it.

I planned feverously and hoped before I got on the plane. Otherwise, I would have made empty promises to my friends and eventually, I would be living a sad life, away from them.

I didn't even know if it was possible to make any friends at this new school, considering how late I was being transferred in. More than anything, I wanted to go back home and reunite with the ones I had.

"Redah." My grandmother's strict voice called out.

"Y-Yes. I understand." I stuttered.

"Good. You have a cousin, Samuel Ellis, who also attends the academy. Tomorrow, he shall help introduce you to the new environment. Learn from him. If there is anything you do not understand, you may ask Samuel."

Wow, I have a cousin.

I didn't know I had family other than my mother, father, and grandmother whom everyone kept quiet about.

My mother was an only child and sadly her parents had already passed. As far as I knew, she didn't have any other family. As for my father, he was always nervous and acted strangely when I tried to ask about my grandmother so I stopped.

Since he never spoke about my grandmother or why we were estranged from her, I never asked if I had a grandfather. Things already seemed complicated enough.

I certainly wouldn't ask the person in front of me. She looked too scary. Who knew how she would react if I started asking personal questions?

Throughout the whole meal, my grandmother didn't speak about anything, other than school and the books she would have me read here at home. Any hope about trying to get to know her was non-existent.

I wondered why she wanted me here in the first place.

If I had a cousin, that meant he was her grandchild too, right? So why bother bringing me here? I wasn't anything special. Was there even a real point in me being here?

As far as I could see, she wasn't trying to get to know me. Instead, I could only see an invisible wall between us and there was no seeing past it.

* *