I Was Replaced by the New Girl

I Was Replaced by the New Girl (Twenty-six)

And what will be the case when he suddenly becomes an integral part of our (Emie’s) friendship group? Will I have to gamble and choose certain days where I would think he would not be around? How would that be? Would I have to forge a smile, a non-uncomfortable presence with him around?

Am I just overanalysing?

Nonetheless, I had made it to school without knocking myself out with my nonessential thoughts.

Walking into my new homeroom, I thanked the heavens that it was just an intimate group of who I’d call my friends. Nina, Jo, Helene and myself were the only ones from our previous homeroom group who had made it into the next year without being separated. At last there would be no undesired gawks squealing about who had asked them out during the party on Saturday night. None of that this year.

   ‘Hello, beautiful,’ Jo embraced me. ‘Long time no see. If you don’t mind me asking, what horrible incident caused the mark on your face?

Jo was just so lovely. Who would have the mental and emotional capacity to be rude to this beguiling individual?

   ‘It was just…’ I stammered, questioning whether it would be beneficial for me to answer with the truth. ‘An accident. Nothing more.’

It was not beneficial, for at least the moment.

   ‘You’ve lost weight!’ I was going for rounds of embracing, and Helene had noticed a change in my body. Embarrassing! ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t pry, and… I’m not saying that you were not skinny before but-‘

   ‘It’s okay,’ I cut her off. ‘I take it as a complement. I think it was because of th-‘

This time, I cut myself off. I had bordered on stating the truth, because during those two and a half weeks before school had started, where Jamie was officially my ex-boyfriend, I’d refused to eat. When speculated by my parents, I’d blamed the wound on my face causing pain when I chewed. In reality, I’d honestly think I’d throw up if dinner hit my gut.

   ‘Never mind,’ I continued.

I had endured the school photos and second period, where the teacher introduced us to the basic laws of Physics, etc, etc. Whatever, that’s not important. I was going quite satisfactory until it was recess and forced to socialise, more sit through, endless, meaningless rants of what Emie and Jess were up to during the holidays.

I wanted to slit my wrists badly. To the bone. Ugh, not really, but that was how her voice made me want to do.

I couldn’t imagine that any of it could get any worse, until Emie directly mentioned me.

   ‘Oh mahh gAWddD,’ Emie screeched. If her spoken words were written into text, that would be ideally how it would be written. ‘I forgot, Sami, how was your break up with Jamie? I’m sorry I didn’t text your or anything, I just didn’t feel it was my part to pry.’

It was now when I started to get bombardments of, ‘Oh, I didn’t realise!’ (from Helene), and ‘I’m so sorry!’ and ‘Oh my god, what happened?’. And this was when I wanted to cut myself, or something along those lines.

It was always on her part to pry, which had led me to the conclusion all of the time, that whatever she was saying to me, even if she were stating the truth, was an attempt to degrade me in some way. Which was exactly what I thought at that moment.

   ‘Ah,’ I smiled, faking a laugh. ‘Yeah, it didn’t really work out between us two. We thought it was best if we ended it due to all of these things that came up in the recent, you know?’ I tried to compact as much information as possible in order to avoid anymore “prying” in that sense.

   ‘Oh, yeah,’ Emie reached across the lunch table to clasp my hands in between hers, trying to console the poor, excuse for a girlfriend. ‘Did everything end well? Are you guys still friends?’

In saying this, I had a strong premonition that Emie and Jessica would share a look, possibly recalling a conversation with Jamie himself about our break up, which more or less did not end on good terms.

My premonition was correct.

Upon my accurate prediction, I had an extremely strong urge to rebut in an awfully fervent manner. There was no doubt that Jamie and Emie had developed a trusty friendship, to the point where sharing details about each others’ love life was of the norm, however publicly shame an ex-girlfriend in front of her peers was all too much for me. If I was not mistaken, the “look” shared between Jessica and Emie was a sign that I was eventually going to be pushed out of the picture that was my friendship and emotional state. I was going to take no chances, after all of the oppression she’d caused me? No way.

   ‘What was that look?’ I pointed out. ‘Between you and Jessica? Did that mean anything?’

   ‘What look?’ Emie quizzed me, playing the innocent game, pouting her lips to make it seem like she was a sweet, loving teen. No.

   ‘That look,’ I answered. ‘Between you and Jessica! It had something to do with Jamie didn’t it?’

   ‘No…’ Jessica was ridiculing me, in front of my face. ‘Geez Sami, you’re just naïve, we weren’t referring to Jamie at all. In fact, we didn’t even share a look.

   ‘Just stop…’ Emie stared directly into my eyes, lecturing me and pronouncing each syllable forcefully, like I was a child. ‘Stop imagining things, not everything is about you.’

My nervous adolescent heart pattered, not experiencing this sort of emotional and physical panic since a bullying incident in primary school. Not much had changed, hadn’t it?

Adrenaline pumped through my body like a deer being preyed. My hands were beginning to sweat as I thought about pulling her fake, over-straightened hair, maybe strangling her with it in the process. But instead, came these words, I had highly expected to be much more powerful.

   ‘No Emie, you just stop. Stop telling me what to do, how to feel, etcetera, because breaking news; the world is not centred on you. Stop making assumptions about what’s right, wrong, what happened, because with regards to Jamie, none of it has got anything to do around you! If you have a problem or an issue about it, don’t go preaching it to the world, especially around me, because quite frankly, I have nothing to do around it anymore, and have the decency to not talk about it when I’m around. Not even a glance to your friend.’

I stood up in the process of my “speech”, ready to leave, before Emie snapped back. I was expecting some, “oh, I don’t know what you’re talking about, what glance? Oh he he he, lame haha!’ response from her, but she even stood up to refute.

   ‘I’m sorry, but what?’ She might have snapped her fingers, but I wasn’t sure. ‘You’re telling me that I’m not the centre of the earth? Excuse me, missy, but who’s the girl making a big deal about how Jamie left her and whatever? Don’t go placing your anger on someone else, who’s innocent, who has nothing to do with it. News flash; the world doesn’t centre on YOU. And if you hadn’t noticed, we’d do fine without you, because what have you got to bring to us? An extra laugh? You’re pointless, and Jamie left you for a reason. You’re no help to the world. And if you’re wondering why me and him are such great friends now; it’s because he needed someone to bitch to. What’s that? Another news flash? And that would be about you. Just get out. You’re for no one.’

There was an awful silence among the group. A nasty, rotten silence that was too close for comfort. Emie sat back down and continued snacking on her muesli.

   ‘Since when did it get so fucking personal?’ I evaded eye contact and stepped out of the bench, leaving my rubbish on the table, because quite frankly, that was what they were. Nothing to me.