The Reflections Of Our Tears

Part Four

Isabella.

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      With the end of the Christmas Holidays came my return to Hell.  There was one thing that helped though, and that was Oliver’s constant (and I mean constant) presence in my house.  Every day after school I would walk home and wait, and every day after school, precisely ten minutes after I walked through the front door, Oliver would be there.  Sometimes we talked, sometimes we watched movies, sometimes we did homework, and sometimes we just sat in silence together, thinking.

     The second Monday after getting back was the most memorable though.  And I do not mean in a positive way.  After the initial talk of fresh post-holiday gossip wore off, everyone was right back to taunting me.  That day was the worst of it.  Two weeks off from making Isabella Jett’s life Hell was way too long, right?  Ignoring the name-calling, I kept my head held high; something I was good at doing by this point.  I had managed to hold it together until I saw him.  Ty Robinson himself.  The accused.  The guilty.  Him.  And he didn’t even have the courtesy to ignore me.  He walked right up to me in the hall.  And you know what he said to me?

     “Hey, Isabella. Remember that night?  Wasn’t it amazing?  I did you a favour, Sweetheart, don’t deny it.”

     I felt like I was falling as he said that.  Falling down a dark, endless tunnel, and into a two foot wide, six foot deep prison.  I had been defeated.  He had broken me.  I held it together long enough to stare into his eyes.  The dark, dangerous eyes that I loathed more than even my own.  His friends cackled, and they moved on down the hallway, onlookers staring out of curiosity, or maliciousness. 

     As soon as he was out of eyeshot, I made my escape.  I dropped my books somewhere in the hallway and ran.  I ran past teachers.  I ran past the principal.  I ran past students, who laughed at me.  I ran out the door and into the freezing January air, without even a coat.  As soon as the wet snow hit my face, my eyes overflowed with tears.  How was I supposed to deal with this every day?  How could I possibly make it through another year and a half of school?  How could I possibly make it through today?

     Somehow, my feet had carried me to the river.  The clouds over my head were prison walls, inside of which I was convicted.  The feeling inside me was a worse pain than any I’d ever felt before, but it wasn’t physical.  My head felt heavy, weighed down with thoughts, and my mind was running ten miles a second just trying to hold it up.

     I had been so desperate to find even the slightest relief from this unbearable pain that I even resorted to breathing techniques as suggested by Debs.  Things hadn’t been this bad in a long time, I reminded myself.  They were getting better.  This was just a minor setback.  I could get through it, like always.  It’s funny – isn’t it – to hear the lies one feeds themselves in desperate times.

     I sat down on the edge of the river, ignoring the quickly oncoming signs of frostbite.  I simply didn’t care anymore.  I just let the air freeze my tears to my cheeks, one hundred percent defeated.  I lost.

*

How much time had passed before I heard him, I don’t know.  But lo and behold, there he was.  Like an angel.  A guardian angel, appearing to save me.  Despite everything, I almost chuckled at the fact that he even held my books in his hands. 

     “Izzy!  There you are.  I’ve been looking all over town for you,” he said, sitting down beside me.  He looked at me, waiting for me to speak, but I refused to as much as look at him.

     “You’re going to get frostbite on your butt and I’m going to have to deal with it,” I said finally, trying to hide a small smile.