Kipapa: rewritten beginning

Read some Neil Gaiman, so decided to begin the Kipapa story from a different angle, i.e. first-person retelling of a story. There is something much more natural about telling the story from the first-person perspective, something more conversational about it all. Third-person narratives, it's hard to decide where to be, or how omniscient to be (i.e. can I report how this person feels? Am I allowed to poke my finger into this character's brain?)... So, despite the fact that this will throw a wrench into the ending which I just wrote, let's see, yesterday (already having second thoughts about that ending anyway), here goes: REWRITTEN BEGINNING.

You wouldn’t believe it, if I told you. How a couple of kids survived the Night Marchers.
Heck, I hardly believe it myself, especially after all this time. It was like a dream, or a nightmare, fading away after years of waking up. But it happened to the both of us, and even though we’ve never openly talked about it afterwards, we both shared something terrifyingly real and unforgettable that night.
In fact, it’s what brought us together, if you can believe it.
It was early October of my sophomore year. Things were going fine. In fact, it felt like something great was sort of coming together, not quite there yet, but on its way. Just like a cherry blossom in springtime, right on the verge of blooming (don’t mind me- never saw a cherry blossom, and I know it’s the wrong season, but I just like Japanese-y imagery). While the academics had always been easy and comfortable for me, my classes were actually starting to engage and interest me in a deeper way. My second cross country season was well under way, and our team actually had a decent set of runners; at one race, five of us placed within the top ten. And there were a few girls at the school who actually had a personality, and I was on comfortable speaking terms with at least one of them. It felt like a- what’s the word- a confluence. Like a bunch of things were all joining up and merging, and carrying me somewhere wonderful.
I guess it was just about when I started being aware of this feeling of optimism, on, let’s see, October the 12th, to be exact. That’s when my dad came home with the news. He received orders that, by the end of the month, we’d be packing up and leaving our home on Wheeler Air Force Base in Hawaii, and moving to some place in Nevada.
So there you go.
It wasn’t all that bad, in the large scheme of things. And, being in a military family, you learn to take these sorts of things in stride, no complaining. It’s all about sacrifice, right? The whole military way of life is founded on it. So my mother and my younger brother and sister, we eat a little bit of that sacrifice that my father so willingly gives, so that we all stay strong together.
I decided not to tell anyone at school. Not my classmates, my teammates, the girls I had set my eyes on. Not even my best friend. I’m not good at goodbyes, see. I don’t know how to act. I decided to keep it a secret, leave abruptly without a word or a trace.