It was towards the end of my grade nine year, which I had spent friendless and tormented, that something changed me. I had not gone out once, I had spent all my time in my room, but I was proud of myself. I’d done well in my classes and I had focused so much on my poetry and writing. My parents were fine with me. Sure, my mother would occasionally ask me if I’d met any new friends, but I wasn’t getting into any trouble. I was a good kid. There was no reason to really worry.
It happened at the end of that school year. All that was left were exams, then a few months away from the assholes. The school was pretty empty that day, just a bunch of exam-stragglers kicking around, and I was heading out after writing a geography exam. It was very hot outside, and as I opened the back doors of the school, a rush of heat swept over me, contrasting the air-conditioned cool of inside.
I saw Brandi leaning against the wall. Her eyes narrowed when she saw me. I was confused. She wasn’t a bully who would wait for their victim out back. I began to walk past her.
“Hey, bitch,” she called.
Of course I ignored her.
“I said, ‘hey, bitch.’ You should listen to me when I’m saying something to you,” she hissed and grabbed my shoulder from behind, turning me roughly around to face her.
I was absolutely, completely stunned. Not only had I never had any sort of violent confrontation before in my life, but I had never been so physically close to Brandi. I could see light freckles on her nose. I could smell her coconut perfume. It was too intimate and I felt overwhelmed and sick.
She leaned in close, with that familiar smirk on her face, and I recoiled. I was afraid she was going to hit me — I knew I couldn’t fight, and I didn’t know what was going to happen.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Brandi sneered. I knew she could see the fear on my face, and I hated that. I hated it so much that my eyes welled with burning hot tears.
She laughed. “Are you going to cry now?”
I felt the strength that I’d tried to bolster myself with over the school year collapse. My reserve of proud nonchalance was destroyed. I’d tried to be so arrogantly numb to people like Brandi, almost amused by their stupidity, and here it was: in the moment it counted the most, I succumbed. I wilted. I felt tears roll down my cheeks.
“Fucking retard.” Brandi seemed to lighten up, giving me a pretty smile. “You want to know what? Next year, I’m going to fucking get you. Do you understand? I fucking hate you, you ugly bitch.”
Then she pushed me, hard. I stumbled backwards and fell on my ass. Instinctively I curled up, hunching my shoulders and moving my arms to protect my face in preparation for her attack. But there was none, and when I looked up at her, she was laughing.
“Ugly bitch,” she repeated, and then walked back into the school.
I got to my feet and walked quickly across the schoolyard towards the back gate and the sidewalk that would lead me home. I wanted to run, but part of me feared that Brandi was watching me from the back door and would get such a laugh out of that. Watching the stupid, ugly bitch run home.
xXx
As I walked down the streets that I had walked so many times before, I tried to calm myself down. I could worry about next year at school later. If Brandi planned to get me, whatever that meant, I’d have to deal with it then. I had time to figure something out.
I hated myself for showing her weakness. If only I hadn’t cried. If only I had stood up for myself. Slugged her right in her smiling pink mouth. Made her cry. Made her afraid of me. I clenched my fists so hard that my nails dug into my palms. I was absolutely furious at how weak I had been. She’d won. I’d had the power to change the outcome, and I had collapsed.
A car pulled up to the intersection beside me and paused at the stop sign, and my ears filled with a sound that made me stop in my simpering, faltering step.