Her High School Hell

Chapter 1

   I have always been quiet. It's not that I want to be quiet, it is just like a switch in my brain is turned off, when it should be on. I can't speak. I have no name. As interesting as my life might seem, it's not, but this isn't my story. I am nothing. I am just the narrator trying to pass along a message, a story. Anyway, I need to tell you this story. It is about a girl named Jemma and her mental issues. She is not very special. She is just a girl who's story needs to be told because others' are not.

    I have been in the same school district as Jemma since as long as I can remember. I know everything about her, but she has no idea who I am. Jemma was a normal child; when she was young she played on the playground with the other kids, played sports, and did all the other normal things that kids do. It all started to go wrong when she was in fifth grade. That was when the girls started wearing makeup and the boys started figuring out that girls were hot. She always new that she was not what society said that pretty was. She had beautiful blue eyes, a chubby body, frizzy brown hair, and an awkward stance. She hated how she looked. Throughout middle school it got so bad that she stopped looking in the mirror. She attempted to brush her mess of hair, put on a baggy t-shirt and jeans, and went through the motions of the day. It was like that every day.
     She did have redeeming qualities, though. They kept her alive so they were definitely pretty good. She loved singing. It became her everything. She sang when she was stressed, or thinking, or bored. It was her coping mechanism. She also loved theater and reading. They co-in-sided in her brain. Books took her to fake worlds where she could be another person, and theater actually let her be a different person, if only for a few hours. These things helped her through those awful middle school years and I'm glad for them because there was nothing I could do but watch.
Then the bad started. It was during the middle of 8th grade and the teachers had started pilling on the homework to 'get us ready for high school,' but no one was digging that shit. Jemma had play practice and cross country practice every day. She normally got home at 8 or 9 then stayed up until midnight getting all of her homework done. She was only getting 6 hours of sleep in order to make all A's, keep her running and acting career going, and to have a social life. She slowly fell into depression and gained a lot of weight. She got kicked off the cross country team and the musical production. Her parents were worried about her so they took her to a doctor. The stupid doctor did not believe in depression so he just gave her weight loss pills and sent her on her way.
After that she seemed to get better. She lost a lot of weight, was very popular, and got back her role in the musical. Her parents would not let her go back to running because they that it was too much on her plate. Everyone thought that she was fine. I do not fault them as much for not noticing the signs. They were minuscule: sometimes when I walked into a room that she was alone in, she was just staring at the wall. She did not even notice me walk in or out even though I made a lot of noise. Another sign was the fact that she did not cry. I know that sounds weird but it is a sign; her inability to show proper emotion. The third sign was her inability to make decisions. You asked for her opinion and she would somehow avoid the question. She could not  even decide what to eat at lunch. she just chose whatever her friends chose and throwing it up later because they loved blueberries but she was mildly allergic to them.

    Everyone thought that she was fine, and she had gotten better in some ways; but then high school started and they discovered that she was only in remission. The real deal was about to start.