The Class Reject: A Damsel in Disguise (Featured Story)

Chapter 3

Miren smacked her lips, tasting the artificial sweetness that was almost bitter, before realizing she had made a mistake. It wasn't water.

It was diet soda.

Her head immediately snapped toward the theater's ceiling, where the hell storm originated. She saw someone in black scatter from the spotlight's walk bridge like the cockroach they were. But she didn't have to turn around to hear Penelope's sickening chortle of a laugh. And apparently it was infectious, because most of the crowd was jeering along with her.

Parker brushed off some residual drops from his sleeves. He didn't look completely amused, but his eyes were almost laughing on his mouth's behalf.

There were three almost simultaneous throat clearings. However, Imani Higgins looked more horrified than annoyed. This was how these spoiled school kids treated her donation? To make matters worse, a million flashes that didn't belong to the cameraman were going off. Along with red recording lights. This was definitely going to be on YouTube...

"Who the hell is responsible for this?" Headmaster Edsel said, storming onto the stage.

"We do not condone that type of language here!" Sister Francesca declared, before moving toward Ms. Higgins, probably to shoo her away, reassure her that St. Rosemunde didn't house devil children. Good to know that mattered more than the drenched damsel on center stage. Miren should have been shivering from the bath (Which also had ice. What a nice addition.), but her blood was boiling.

She had dropped her trophy. Which was apparently cheaper than it looked, because it was now a shattered heap on the ground.

Miren closed her eyes, her nostrils flailing. I can get through this. If anything, whoever did this will look bad. Not me—

But the laughter was agonizingly overwhelming. She couldn't even bring herself to look at her drenched form. So instead, she just stared at Penelope. Tried to see how could so much evil contain itself in a size two teenaged girl. Her nemesis merely grinned a wider, more deviant grin. Somehow it didn't faze her until Penelope's mouth formed to say the words that ruined their friendship—Miren's life—in the first place.

Then that was it.

Something snapped inside of Miren—something animalistic and grotesque. Something that couldn't be mended by calming words or reaffirmations of her logical, reasonable nature telling her to just walk—to run—away. To end this day just as it had begun, hunched over the girls' bathroom sink, convincing herself to be impenetrable—to be unaffected by the bitch's infantile wrath.

It would have been so easy to succumb to her inadequacies, but if Miren did, that would be it. No one was going to save her. Even the so-called "faculty" was exhausting most of their energy calming down the students, as if her pupils were the ones who were drenched and exposed.

Indeed, no one was going to save her.

Miren didn't know how or when she summoned the fist to strike Penelope with. She was definitely stunned—but not nearly as much as Penelope, who stumbled backward. Miren was heaving, having trouble seeing from the absurdity of the day, her actions. She shook her head, turning away from Penelope as she retracted her hand. No. This was wrong. She was leaving now—

Penelope lunged for her before she could walk away from the battle. As she pulled at her braids, Miren gave her a quick roundhouse kick to her chest. Van Helsing fell off the stage, only to land in the massive crowd of students, whose compensation was to jerk her back toward her sticky nemesis, simultaneously jeering: "Fight, bitches, fight!"

This wouldn't end until someone was out cold. Or until a teacher intervened. Oh why hadn't they intervened?

They threw random tosses at each other the way angry girls who never fought would fight. Miren dodged a weak punch and sent another one. This was countered by a swift kick to her shin. She faltered forward, only for Penelope to take a jab at her neck, ripping the chain of her necklace in two.

Miren's face fell in an angry grimace. It was her mother's.

With an enraged yell she began to pummel Penelope's face, with her fists forming a hard, repetitive flurry of punches. When she noticed the girl step away, she left her mark by tearing at Penelope's vest, ripping off the school's seal and a couple of buttons. She screamed in a high-pitched grunt, before scraping Miren's face with her long, manicured nails.

Ow. She winced before stepping forward and pushing the girl down with all of her might. Once she was where she belonged, Miren's eyes fell to one of the band members standing a little bit too close to her. She didn't like the idea of wasting a guitar to break Penelope's neck, but it would have to do. Her nose was flailing and her breathing was heavy and jagged as she pulled the instrument rather easily from the students grip.

As Miren held up the guitar over a distraught Penelope, she was running purely on fury, her simple pursuit for vengeance. She wanted this to be over. She needed to be victorious.

"Are you completely out of your mind?" Parker tackled her like a linebacker, forcing her to the ground as the guitar skidded off the stage.

"GET OFF OF ME!" But his grip held on strong. He was like a human straightjacket, and although the idea would have made her mind surge in euphoria or some other rainbow bullshit, she didn't need him standing in the way. Not again. "CAN'T YOU SEE WHAT SHE'S DONE?"

"I can see what you've done." His voice was strained as he fought to keep her from thrashing in his arms. "Seriously, Miren? I thought you were better than this."

Tears lined her eyes as she looked around her. Everyone was looking at her. Like she was crazy. To them, she was crazy. She wasn't the girl that Penelope tormented on a daily basis, from pushing her down stairs to stealing the one guy she loved when Penelope was...

"B-But, I—"

"Miss Eze." It was the headmistress. To say she looked pissed would have been a gross understatement. Frankly, she looked like she wanted to kill more than Miren did. "What do you think you were doing?"

Miren scowled. "Do you not see what was done to me?"

The woman wrinkled her nose. "And you thought attacking Miss van Helsing would undo the damage?"

"She caused the damage!" she tried to reason to Dr. Castro. But deep inside, she knew that the woman had already made up her mind. And whatever decision it was wouldn't be in her favor. "She harasses me on a daily basis. Please, you have to believe me."

The woman's eyebrows furrowed. Maybe it was occurring to her that the school's star student wouldn't lie about bullying. Particularly about who was bullying her. But violence was violence. Not to mention, it was a school violation. She shook her head before clasping her hands.

"Alright, assembly over! Headmaster Edsel will dismiss you all as he sees fit. Have a good weekend, I suppose."

She then motioned for Miren to move forward. With her voice barely above a whisper, she said, "My office. Now."

Dread and shame enveloped the girl as she traveled out of the auditorium. But not without seeing the horrified gaze of Imani Higgins, Sister Francesca nodding almost in confirmation as if she knew it—knew Miren was obviously some street nigga that had somehow thugged her way into the shining sanctuary that was St. Rosemunde's. Good riddance that she was finally being put in her place, right?

But it was the cold gaze of Parker as he embraced the enemy that hurt the most—now he didn't need an excuse to deny her his hidden affection. And she was the one who basically gave him his out. The broken trophy was also too much, but not as much as the sunlight that poured from the hallway as they emerged from the sphere of her public humiliation. She sighed. It was going to be a beautiful day.

So it was only natural that it was the second worst day of Miren's life.