The Anonymous Check

The Anonymous Check(Nick) Computers- machines that seem so complicated on how they work to many people, yet to the young teenager Mark Smith they are simple and give him the power to do absolutely anything! Mark Smith is a 16 year old teenage boy currently a junior in high school. Like most other students, Mark doesn't care for school so much, but Mark’s dislike for school is much greater. At every school there are different groups or types of people. There are the popular ones, geeks, jocks, etc. Mark doesn’t fall into any of the groups in his school because he has maybe 2 friends who he would talk to once a week at most. He doesn't participate in sports or any other activity and sits in class focused on his computer. Every class he is in he is always kicked out at least once for failure to participate in class due to the deep focus on his computer work. Yet Mark still manages to hold a perfect 4.0 for every year he has been at school. He was constantly bullied and made fun of for being a geek or nerd, having no friends, and being weird. Mark never fought back though; he just kept doing what he was doing and took it in. Not even a tear or facial change would happen when he was bullied.

Marks family life is not much better either. He is the son of Mary and Tom Smith and is a brother to John. John is also in high school and is in the same grade as well, yet they go to different schools. Mark and John never got along when they were young. They would always be in fights and always be found hurting each other in some way whether it is at home or at school. To try and fix their situation or at least stop them from fighting their parents sent them to two different high schools. Mark was sent to a public school of decent ranking for education whereas John was sent to a top end private school to get the best education possible. His parents spent nearly triple the amount for Mark on John. It wasn’t just at school that Mark was treated poorly by it parents, but at his own home as well. The only place he had to escape the terrors he endured every day at school turned out to be even worse. Every day he woke up to get ready for school his brother would get first dibs on everything. John would get the shower first and even all the warm water by the time he was done. Even the delicious breakfast his mother made would be gone due to John and his father devouring it all. To make mornings worse, Mark had to take the bus his entire life at high school as the one car his parents got for them was only Johns. Mark rode his bike 10 miles to the DMV just to get his license, and he can’t even use it. After going through a day of torture at school, Mark comes home to a house empty as John doesn't get out for another hour and his parents work till the same time. Mark does all the chores because he is afraid of being punished for not doing them. He brings the mail in, vacuums, sweeps, does the dishes, and anything else he can find or is listed on the list his mother leaves for him each day. John and his parents arrive home at the same time. John head up to his room and is gone till dinner and his mother begins cooking. Mark sits at the counter and works on homework or other things on his computer with his headphones in. Every day his father finds something to yell at him about, hence the headphones. Yet what they don’t know is that Mark isn’t playing any music to the headphones so he can hear everything they are saying. Mark overhears everyday his father talking to his mother about what a waste he is and how pointless it is to spend any more money or resources on him. When everyone goes to bed and he can finally have silence, Mark sits on his computer until well into the morning working on projects, hoping that the night won't end or that tomorrow will be better.

One day, Mark was a senior at the same high school, he didn’t come home. When his brother and parents got home, they couldn’t find him. They waited a few hours to see if he would show up but he didn’t. His mother called the school while his father called Marks cell phone only to find his cell phone in his bed. The school said that he was at school all day and left the same time as everyone else. John found the two friends that Mark had and asked if either of them had seen or heard from him. The two responded by saying that they haven't talked to him in over a month. Weeks turned to months and before they could blink it had been a year since Mark was ever seen. Eventually the family accepted the fact that Mark was gone and went on in their life.

Five years after Mark's disappearance the family gets into hard time. His father loses his job and they are forced to give that car to the bank to keep the house. John ends up dropping out of college because he can’t afford it and made some bad decisions during his attendance. They are then facing having to downsize in housing when one day an anonymous check comes. The check has enough money to pay their loans, debts, and other bills so that they can start all over again. Yet the check doesn’t say who it was from. The family, with all their greed, use it all without any question.

A few more years later Mark's father got into a bar fight. He was very intoxicated after a party for a friend and made the wrong decision to attempt to drive home. He crashed going 70 mph head on to an 8 foot thick concrete column holding a bridge up. He died on impact. The family has a funeral for him and his mom notices a man standing by the grave with flowers. John knows who it is. He tells his mom that is Mark. His mom then runs over to Mark and starts yelling at him for disappearing. Mark gets yelled at for hours. His mother blames him for the death of his father and all the financial issues they were in. She tells him she wished he was never born and then says why couldn't you turn out like John. Mark then left but John ran up to him and was about to say something yet Mark said “Nothing has changed…” and continued walking. Weeks later his mom receives another check with enough to keep them going for a little longer along with a note saying “I will always love you”. Yet she wasted it on lottery tickets and beer.

A few months pass and Mark's mother was watching the news on the television when she then saw Mark on it. She instantly starts crying. John walks in and begins to cry as well. For the first time, they saw who Mark really was and realized the horrible things they did.

Mark Smith ran away from his life because he was not happy with how he was treated. During his junior year he finally finished the project he was always focused on during school and at home on his computer. He had created the .ZIP file for computers which allowed for large files to be transported easily. This was a huge breakthrough in computer science and earned him millions of dollars and a salary from other companies wanting to use it. All in all, Mark had enough money for the rest of his life to live how he wanted. He was sick of being treated like he was a failure. He tried to show his parents and friends what he was working on but they made fun of him for being a nerd. Mark had enough so he moved away and worked for Google and ran his own company at the same time.

People are not always what they seem to be. Just because they don’t talk or do things differently than other people doesn't mean they are failures or weirdos. Sometimes the people you least expect to be successful actually do. Never make assumptions until you truly know who the person is.