Chapter 4
Bruises and Heavy Hearts
Jem
Ellis Chan was a massive bitch.
She made me want to strangle somebody.
Kick a wall.
Be a better person.
Shit like that.
My annoyance faded as I watched her tiny, petite frame slinked off into the distance, carrying the mop as she disappeared into a corner to start on her cleaning. Her words echoed as she regarded me petulantly just a few seconds ago, her eyes wide with disgust, defiance...and hurt?
"Just what the hell is wrong with you?"
Oh, where do I even began with that question.
I gazed at the toilet door in resignation, tugged the gloves on and pinched my nose as I head into the boy's toilets. The cracked mirrors displayed me walking onto the dirty, sodden linoleum tiles as I carried a bucket with some old rags and cheap bleach. The smell was horrible, rancid with urine and something else that I didn't even want to find out.
Sighing and breathing the smell as my eyes watered, I picked up a rag, filled the bucket with water and bleach, then began cleaning up the mirrors. The broken mirrors were filled with childish graffiti annotated by the sophomores, writing shit like who had the best ass or tits on the edges in red, scrawly Sharpie. At the corner of my eye, I froze at scrubbing off Tabitha's Kay tits are amazing and spotted someone had written: Secretly Sexy: Ellis Chan.
Un-fucking-believable.
Ellis Chan fucking qualified?
Since when?
Well, I guess she was attractive- there was no doubt it. She was not a total dwarf. And yes, she was not tall or had incredibly long legs like Calista Dames or shiny blonde hair like Astrid Gilbert. Nor was she as well-endowed like Tabitha or stunning like Savannah Di Pierre. She had her strengths- her pure, faultless complexion which was white as rice, her twinkling dark eyes and her smile was quite nice but other than that, Ellis Chan was kind of a bitch and I didn't see why people find her attractive.
Sure, she was smart and she was a 'challenge' to 'possess', which was some kind of male anti-feminist campaign I was starting to become disillusioned with, because she wasn't the type who put out but she was also shallow, vain, selfish, entitled, self-absorbed, uptight and a bossy know-it-all who thought she was all that just because she was some trust fund rich kid who could sail through advanced trigonometry.
Honestly, she wasn't that great of a person.
Bored out of my mind, I slowly and laboriously used the standard metal scraper to chipped off the disgusting chewing gum stuck to the edge of the sink. When it finally came off, I sighed and scooped it up. God, I need something. A joint. That would do. I needed one right now. Taking a break, I ducked into one of the toilet stalls, opened my backpack and pulled out a plastic Ziplock bag from a zippered compartment. I rolled myself a joint as quickly as I could and held the smoke in my lungs, my mind easing up.
I always find weed helped eased my mind a little, clear my head and relaxed kind of like a spa session without paying for anything.
On the grimy tile, I propped myself as I adjusted the smoke properly between my fingers and sucked on the tip almost feverishly. I checked the toilet stall lock and slid the silver bar across. The smoke vapour rose out of the stall from the top, like black clouds out of a chimney. Soon, I felt myself melting into an equilibrium where my problems- even the pain in my shoulder- started to fade away.
Yeah, this was it. Man, it felt good to smoke after how much shit blew up in my face. Especially after the day I had. First, I was interrupted by what could've been a very blissful morning with that pretty little blonde by Mr Montez, the pesky guidance counsellor and then was forced to relieve the fourth period with him, discussing the many lists of faux mental issues I had. And the next was Ellis Chan.
There were too many emotions associated with her. She made me think too much. And right now, with this joint, what I would like to do very much was not think. But just the thought of her caused the memories to resurface.
There was once when we were both nine when our parents were organising the town's fair together. I could remember an incident when my mother, Heather, was telling me to behave properly and politely to Mr and Mrs Chan in the car before we pulled over at the curb of their massive steel and glass mansion, completed with an immaculate lawn and Mrs Chan's award-winning garden of poppies, roses, gardenias, hydrangeas, lilies by the side of the polished, clean cobblestone driveway. I remembered thinking Mom for the love of God, stop nagging me as she craned her head from her shotgun seat to lecture me. I also remembered thinking holy cow this place is fancy when I pressed my face against the smudgy window screen.
I've always known of Ellis Chan- but I didn't really know her. Truthfully, I always hung out with my friends- a group of boys whose interests only extended to the point of football and Oreos. She was a girl, she wore pink and she liked talking about piano and how she performed her first concerto and how she met so many great scholars. We didn't mix. However, I always did tease her for being such a suck-up to teachers, bringing them apples and voluntarily staying back to talk to them. She was the annoying little midget who reminded the teachers about homework. I didn't outright hate her.
But I didn't like her either.
Nine-year-old Ellis was standing by the foyer, near the spiralled staircase when Mr and Mrs Chan invited us into their glamorous home. She adjusted her Burberry headband, smoothed her shiny sleek black hair, re-pined her gold heart-shaped clip onto her reindeer cardigan and marched up to me. She was only nine at the time, exceptionally tiny for her age and yet already commanded the aura of a business-like, coordinated woman. "Hello, Jeremy," she greeted robotically, a slight posh lilt to her tone. "How are you doing?" Very professional. Curt. Mature.
And then there was me.
"Hiya. I'm o-kay."
Her eyes dipped down to my jeans and a plaid shirt. She wrinkled her nose but still found the decency to plaster a sweet, little girl smile. "Would you like some sparkling water? I could ask Miss Sheila to get you some." So polite and picture-perfect with her Misses and Misters.
"What's sparkling water?" I was intrigued. The mud on my shoes created flecks on to the sparkling marble tiles as I walked with her. "Don't 'cha have normal water?"
She pursed her lips, something she still does every time she disapproved of something. "We do have normal water," she said primly, raising her head haughtily like a little princess. Her Yale cardigan was mint apple green that day. "Sparkling water is just better, Jeremy. Have some."
She was always an assertive, bossy creature. It was then I realised I didn't like her- she told me what to do and what I couldn't do the whole time I was in her house. And she never stopped talking in the snobbish tone of hers.
I felt sorry- back then- for whoever was stuck with her for the rest of their lives.
Then as the weed began to dwindle halfway through, I heard the bathroom door swung open. I panicked, throwing the smoke down onto the ground and quickly putting out the sparks with the soles of my Converses as I stood up from the filthy floor. My hands were already shaking and my fingers twitching from the buzz as I stuffed the packet into my bag and zipped it up.
"...Jem?"
"Here, Porcey. Just taking a leak." I created a zipping sound with my bag. I sighed as she continued to barge the door down. "Do you mind a bit of privacy?"
"Don't lie to me, Jeremy. I knew what you were doing in there."
"What, jacking off?" I offered jokingly. "Why, would you like to help finish me off?"
I could pretty much envision the disgust and horror contorting her delicate features; she'd be pinching the bridge of her nose. "Ew!" she cried out, grimacing- probably. "As if." Really, she was the Asian version of Clueless.
"Hmm Porcey, you're not really against your case here."
"If I was ever going to do it, you will not be my first choice. Or any of my choice."
I rolled my eyes as I leant on the door, bored yet amused. "What do you want, Porcey?"
"I knew you were smoking marijuana in there!" She banged the cubicle door relentlessly. Finally, I unlocked the door and pried it open, swinging a wide arc to reveal her. She caught her fist before it collided into my face, holding it aloft and suspended in the air and dropping it when she saw me. There she was; dainty like a porcelain teacup but the ferocity of her fury burned in those dark pools she had for eyes. She crinkled her nose as she glared and crossed her arms. "I could smell it."
She hated me. She saw nothing but a wreck on the side of the road, the dirty downtrodden gum beneath her shoes. Like I cared what she thought.
"Well done, Porcey. At least we know you're nose is working."
"You're so clever, Jeremy," she retorted with equal heat. "How clever would you be when I report you to the principal?"
I smiled coldly at her, my hazel eyes glittering as I stepped towards her. She retreated, suddenly uncomfortable with the enclosed space between our bodies. Heat radiated from our skin and as I leant in, a whiff of her scent entered my nostrils. Ginger herbal tea was emitting from her hair. She must've used it for her shampoo.
"I'm already here in the bathroom, doing a janitor's job because of you. I don't think it can get worse."
She huffed, blowing a strand out of her face. "You provoked me."
I laughed harshly. "Provoked you?" I echoed as I exited out of the toilet cubicle. "I do that every day. It's not my fault that you were on your period today."
I expected another slap but she just shot me a withering look and proceeded to put a saucy hand onto one hip. "Stop doing that," she ordered domineeringly. "Stop assuming just because I'm infuriated I'm on my period. It's offensive- not only to me but to every woman out there."
"You should consider being an activist," I smiled sarcastically at her as I grabbed the grizzly mop I left by the door. "But they might not be able to let you join- height restrictions and all that."
"Stop that too."
"Stop what?" I began drenching the mop into the bucket of soapy water and sliding it across the grey tiles that used to be sparkling white. It was now tainted with the marks of the soles from many student's sneakers.
"The tough act. The insults. It's not nice, it's not cool to be mean and you know it."
She could see right through me.
She perforated me with an intense stare that demanded a willpower of mine to look away from her: it was serious, demanding, decoding me as though she was endeavouring to set my fibres and molecules apart to pry out my soul- a blackened piece of lump at the bottom of the abyss I was standing at the edge of. She couldn't save me even if she tried, despite how much she convinced herself she could. Don't you hate it when girls thought that? Don't you hate it when people thought that? That someone will change themselves just for them, just because they thought that person loved them?
A person will only change if they wanted to change, And I didn't want to change.
I feigned interest for the ground and the laborious process of moving the mop back and forth. "Don't act like you know me, Porcey. We had six classes together since the 3rd grade and you've never uttered a word that wasn't full of contempt towards me." She was silent for a moment. I cleared my throat to diffuse the tension. "What are you doing here anyway?"
She looked down onto her skirt and I realised she was avoiding my eyes too, studying the intricate patterns of the red crossing into the black. "I wanted to apologise for my behaviour a few minutes ago," she spoke rather tightly as she tucked in a wayward strand of wandering dark hair behind her small ears. "It was rude and uncalled for. We both had an equal share of the blame for being here. I dragged you into this. And I thought it was unfair for you to clean the bathroom all by yourself so I decided I wanted to help."
I grandly opened my palm towards the cleaning supplies by the door. "By all means, please do."
"Thanks." Gracefully, she floated over to the rags and the glass cleaner, grabbed them and marched daintily towards the sink. Pinching the bridge of her nose to block the smell of pee, she spritzed the acidic liquid onto the sink and gently wiped the basin. I observed her for a couple moments before snorting, clicking my teeth in disapprovingly and rolling my eyes.
She heard me. "What, Jeremy?" she queried defensively. "Do you have a problem with how people clean or shall I just install you a mute button?"
"Witty."
"Why, thank you. Though I supposed with someone at the equivalent number of your brain cells, it shouldn't be too hard to impress."
"Hmmm...who got the bonus marks last year in Newman's test....why, I don't know, me!"
She scowled at the reminder that she lost to me last year as I smirked and winked. "Oh really?" she drawled. "I haven't heard about it...but oh wait, yeah, I forgot- it was all that you could talk about for the next six months!:
With incredible ease, I volleyed the next one just right into her face: "Funny," I stretched lazily, one arm pulling the other. "At least I have something to brag about."
"Screw you."
I grinned like a maniac. "You can't even say it."
She spritzed onto the tap. "What?"
"Fuck- you can't even say 'fuck'."
She sniffed boisterously. "Because it's vulgar, Jeremy, it's appallingly so."
I found another jab to provoked her with. "Oh yeah? At least I don't speak like an old person. Jesus, Porcey, act your age."
"At least I don't act like a- a five-year-old!"
I shrugged. "Hey, I'm having fun, aren't I? You, on the other hand, I can see wrinkles." How untrue. Her skin was faultless.
She gasped and clutched her forehead. "It is not!" she exhaled loudly and she was pretty much clawing at the glass cleaner bottle to stop herself from ripping my throat to shreds- I drove her mad. Mission accomplished. "What do you want, Jeremy?"
"'Bout to point out that you clean like a freakin' rich snooty princess."
"What are you trying to say?" Her tone was bordering onto the fact that I was trespassing into a field not meant to trespass. Oh dear, I've found a flaw in Miss Little Perfect. Call the authorities.
I sighed and strode up to her. I snatched the rag out of her hand and demonstrated how to clean properly. Her forehead scrunched up, creating wrinkles upon her clear skin- due to her relentless, virulent mediations of spa treatments. She was confused in a sense that she had no fucking idea what she was doing wrong. "You don't put any force into wiping it," I explained. "If you don't, how is the dirt going to come out?"
She lowered her gaze. "Alright," she nodded with clear understanding. "I got it."
I shifted from foot to foot. "Cool." I watched her for a few moments, pushing her bottom wrist onto the rag as she scrubbed the sink clean. She was obviously put under pressure under my watchful eye, wanton for an impression. Ellis Chan was ostensibly a people-pleaser. She longed for the approval of adults, the compliments of teachers and for the rest of her high school career, she had always been in a position of power- it was what she was used to. In middle school, she was junior student representative vice president to me- because I've won throughout the popularity ranks and Ellis, though not really hated, wasn't exactly favoured by the class because of her relentless pursuits in beating all of them in their academics. Maybe I wasn't too shabby with my grades but I never exactly bragged about them to the extent of Ellis Chan. She had the sort of persona that effortlessly demanded perfection- not from others, though sometimes partly, but mostly herself. She was born rich and she needed to stay rich.
"Why don't I help for a bit?" I offered as nicely as I could.
She shook her head, reluctant. Agh, Ellis and her fucking sanctimonious pride. Was it that hard to believe I could be a nice person?
"C'mon, you're messing up the mirror already."
The heels of her flat ballet shoes clicked the ground. "Fine," she sucked in her teeth and tossed me a spare. "Jeez."
I raised my arm up to reached the areas she couldn't and we were in this agonising peace and quiet as we split the chores. Unbeknownst to my awareness, the faded V-neck I was donning began to slip past my arm and revealed my shoulder. Ellis's head craned back and caught sight of my bruises, then her eyes widened and asked me a question that jarred my soul:
"What the hell happened to your arm?"
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