You plan to meet up with your best friend. Nothing is different. You are going to meet at the local coffee shop like every other Tuesday afternoon. Five o’ clock on the dot. Routine. But when you show up, she’s not there. You wait. And you wait. And you wait some more. She never shows. The next day you see her at school. She’s not wearing the same smile she normally wears. She seems to be timidly trying to avoid you. What could have possibly gone wrong? You don’t remember doing anything to deserve this kind of treatment, but you’ll get to talk to her in first period.

First period comes and she doesn’t want to talk to you. She keeps looking down on her desk. You don’t know what’s wrong with her until you hear a deep voice say, “Jasmine.” It was your teacher, Mr. B. She replies, “Seven” and he seems satisfied, but she happens to look up and you see it: a black eye. No one seems to notice it but you. When you let out a hushed gasp, Jasmine turns away. You need to talk to her and she knows it, but when? Where can you possibly talk about this? You decide you are going to stop by her house this afternoon.

Ding dong. You ring her doorbell and you hear a dog bark. Ding dong. Ding dong. You want to make sure someone hears you. Jasmine’s mother opens the door. She seems to be upset. You ask for Jasmine, who you can see peeking at you from behind her bedroom door. She calls you to her room, but won’t open the door much more than a crack. When you get inside her room you notice a little girl’s room. Dolls, pink fabric, and ballet shoes decorate the room. She’s seventeen. This doesn’t make any sense to you. You finally get the courage to ask, “Jasmine, what happened to you?” She doesn’t make a sound. Instead she goes to her door and peeks outside. She doesn’t want anyone to hear her.

“My step-dad. He’s my problem. He hits me when I…” You can barely understand anything else. She begins to sob profusely. You hug her and try to reassure her that things will get better if she tells you what has been going on. She begins again, “He gets really angry at me when I do anything wrong. My mom won’t stop him. She says he’ll hit her again if she tries. He promised he would be better to us, so we took him back into our home. How are we supposed to live like this?” She broke down again and you did nothing more that day, but try to comfort her.

People don’t always deserve second chances. I learned this the day I saw my best friend with such pain in her beautiful green eyes. No one deserves to go through this. The second chance her step-dad received from both her and her mother was unjust. Second chances should not be given to people who will abuse them. That’s plain and simple. If someone hurt you once, physically or mentally, they will do it again if given the chance. Without the opportunity, they can’t do a thing to you. Jasmine should have been strong for herself and for her mother. She should have never allowed her step-dad to be welcomed back with open arms by her mother, but her mother is loving and forgiving. Jasmine can’t blame her.

Now if I could get a second chance to stop this before it all began, I definitely would, without a doubt in my mind. My best friend needed help and I was oblivious to it all. I wish I could have the opportunity to go back and help her and her mother out of this terrible situation. I don’t know if a seventeen-year-old, one hundred pound girl could help against an abusive step-father, but I would step up to the plate and give all I have for Jasmine and her mom. I never want to see anyone, friend or enemy, have to go through this. A second chance wasn’t deserved by her step-father and I can’t say I deserve one  either, but I hope she knows that, given the chance, I would throw myself off a bridge to keep her from going through  the hardships she had to face at such a young, fragile age.

*Names were changed to protect the innocent.