Stop: A Short Story

Chapter One: Fault

I could feel it. I could feel it deep inside. The pain. Then came the shame. I heard it. I heard it loud and heavy. I felt his anger. I felt his hard, mean, hot anger, ripping through me like the razor blades that cut my arms. I just want to die, I thought as I felt the cold earth I was laying on creep up. Swallowing me, drinking me down, 6 feet under.

I woke up shaking and sweating. The same dream, over and over again. Playing in my mind on repeat.

I knew better than to keep my mother waiting. On with the baggy school uniform. "Melissa Margaret Abigail Jones! Get yourself down here now!" 

Fuck.

Running down the stairs, my mother is glaring up at me from the foyer. For a woman of only 5 feet 6 inches she's quite frightening. "Oh Melissa, when are you going to order a new school uniform? That one has gotten so ripped up and baggy on you."

Christ just leave me alone.

"Sorry mom, I'll order one tonight."

"Good now get in the car, Daddy's waiting... Oh and Melissa?"

I look back.

"Drink some water today, you're looking awfully bloated"

I could almost smell the smug sneer on her face.

"What took you so long? Jesus!" 

Good morning to you too dad. 

Before I could say anything in response, he was on his phone again, yelling about some "jack off" client. Sometimes I really wish that I could live in a normal neighbourhood, with a normal mom and a normal dad. I mean, I'm obviously grateful for what I have, but when you're dad's a lawyer who's always working, and your mom's an agent for some of the best models in California, you get lonely. My dad isn't so bad, when he is home, and is relaxing, he's pretty cool. But my mom... It's like all she thinks of is modelling. Just because she's 5'6 and I'm 5'10, doesn't mean she can live out her creepy model dreams through me. I'm so fat any ways, I'd never get hired. Sometimes it feels like my parents are so hard on me because of my weight. Maybe that's it. Maybe that's the reason why it happened, if I wasn't so fat, so "curvy" so "sexy" as he it put it, maybe then it wouldn't have chosen me. No one wants to touch bones, to be inside a bag of bones.

For the first time in months, I got out of the car in front of the high school with a look of hope on my face.

Walking down the halls feels like a nightmare, as usual. I know that no one's looking. But at the same time, everyone's looking. 

My footsteps sound like a giant elephant, the one that was always in the room at my best friend's parties. The elephant that he it turned me into. 

I finally get into my first period class. English. I've always loved English class, it just feels like home. I'm not talking about grade nine applied English, where all the ass hole's that couldn't give less of a fuck about literature go. I'm talking about the glorious, grade eleven advanced English, where all of the interesting, poem writing, and quiet souls go. Of course I'm not one of them. I'm a terrible writer and I honestly have no idea how I got into this class. Either way, I love it.

Of course it all ends too soon, and I have to drag my elephant self-upstairs to math.

I don't hate all my classes, by the way. I just... Tolerate them. I am a class A over achiever, as my dad would say. Which is great, as my parents would expect nothing less. As a perfectionist, I pride myself in getting straight A's.