It’s not the same around here without my brother Glen. They just came and took him away. No warnings or anything.  The worst part was, our parents did nothing but stand there and watch them rip him from our home and of our lives forever. He was everything to me. He protected me from the others. He was my best friend and now he’s gone, and I don’t know where.

Wiping the tears from my eyes, I realize it’s time to get up.  No sleep again last night. I haven’t been able to sleep for weeks, because every time I close my eyes, I go back to that day. I hate it, and I wish it wasn’t true. 

“SPENCER!”

Time to get up.  Looking out the window, I notice the sun hasn’t even risen yet.

My closet is so not what a normal teenage girl’s closet should look like. There should be jeans, t-shirts, sneakers, flip flops, and short skirts. All I have are homemade dresses that come to my ankles, and if I’m feeling adventuress I have a couple that come to my calves. Sighing, I get dressed in my normal attire for the day.   My long blonde hair braided down my back.

One last glance in the mirror before heading down stairs, reveals my blue eyes that have lost there luster.

Down stairs my mother is in the kitchen kneading bread. While her sister wives attend to other chores and the smaller children.   My family. I have five mothers and twenty-one well twenty brothers and sisters.  Glen was the oldest. Now I am which means it’s almost my time. I will be placed with a husband not of my choosing.  This is the only life I have ever known and with these new laws being passed I will not even have school as an escape pretty soon. 

“Spencer, I need you to run to the market. We are out of milk and eggs.”  Mary hands me some money. She is my father’s second wife and very far from my favorite. She reminds me more of an iceberg  then a human.

“yes ma’am”

Hurrying out the door and down the road, I begin my short journey.   The dirt road showing the way. My surroundings always the same. The wall of the compound  blocking access to the outside world. A world of movies and music that I have never heard or seen. My favorite daydream is that I’m just a normal girl with normal parents, and I’m allowed to date who I want