Right Where My Heart Should Be — Emily Meidenbauer

Grandpa continued driving down the highway, keeping a steady pace, with his sad, old, blue eyes focused on the metaphorically dark road ahead of us. Aunt Brooke only lived another 45 minutes away. Aunt Brooke was my mother's younger sister. She was twenty-six, lived somewhere near Philadelphia, was single, and an aspiring musician. That's all I knew from what little Grandpa had told me. I had only met Aunt Brooke a few times to my knowledge: at Christmas a few years ago, and on my fifth birthday. There was once when I was six or so, shortly after Mom left, but I didn't remember why or much about the visit. I always got the impression that she didn't like me much, and I wondered why I was going to live with her of all people. "Because you need her, and she needs you," Grandpa told me, the tone of his voice sounding defeated. Ever since I was a little girl, Grandpa had told me that it was him against the world, but he never gave up no matter how hard things got. That day was the first time I'd ever heard defeat in his voice. He looked in the rear-view mirror and saw his own reflection in his eyes; he waved the white flag, proclaiming surrender. I had no idea what he meant when he told me, "Because you need her, and she needs you," but I just said, "okay," because Grandpa was always right. That was something I had come to learn over time. Plus, Aunt Brooke was his daughter, and I assumed he knew her better than I did. Right Where My Heart Should Be is the story of Eliza Gates, a thirteen-year-old girl who is faced with more struggles than she believes she can handle. With the help of her Aunt Brooke, Eliza faces changes, self-discovery, and searches for the sense of belonging that she's always been looking for.