Chapter Three:
I brushed a bit of dirt off my clothes. No need to make it painfully obvious that I had to clean. I was made fun of enough.
I walked onto the so-called ‘playground’. It was really just a recess area where kids went to hang out yet they persisted with that childish name for it. Whatever.
I scanned the crowd for Arianne. She was my best friend, but I didn’t get to see her often. We were in completely different classes and she lived across town. It didn’t help that Lenora wouldn’t let me get a cell phone or computer.
All she knew was that Lenora was ‘over protective’. I didn’t tell her about what I had to do for them. She didn’t need to know. I felt trapped in a web of lies at school; I had to make excuses for enough things I didn’t have or didn’t get to go to because of Lenora. I remembered my explosion yesterday and didn’t regret it. They were words that needed to be said.
Not that it helped in any way.
Arianne popped up next to me, grinning. Her brown eyes were alight and her blonde hair was up in a messy ponytail.
“You’ll never guess what happened last weekend,” she said. “And you look nice, by the way,” she added. I smiled.
“Thanks. And what happened? Didn’t you have that date with Greg on Saturday?”
“Exactly!” she squealed. “We went to dinner and then a movie and he was so sweet!”
Arianne had had a crush on Greg for a few months, and he had finally asked her out the week before. She seemed to be floating on her own personal Cloud Nine ever since. My eyes darted to Brandon, who was standing across the playground. No, Ella, I chastised myself. Ignore him.
“That’s so cool!” I said. “You have to tell me all about it later, okay?”
“Definitely,” she assured me. “How was your weekend?”
What was I going to say? I decided to tell a warped version of the truth.
“It was pretty boring, but yesterday I had a huge fight with Lenora,” I said, grinning.
“Nice!” Arianne said. “What happened?”
“Just some screaming. She said if I do anything else I’ll be banned from all things Homecoming,” I said, trying to sound like I didn’t care. Arianne snorted.
“Nice. She’s such a pig.”
“Tell me about it,” I agreed. I noticed Corrie, who was standing near Brandon and his group of friends. Her friends seemed to be laughing about something. My expression must have been angry because Arianne tapped me on the shoulder.
“What’d Corrie and her friends do?” she asked knowingly. Arianne always could read my mind and tell when I was upset or angry.
“They came over to pick her up to go to the movies and started making fun of me because I was-” I stopped myself. I had been about to say ‘I was serving Lenora’ but that would violate my code: School and home don’t mix. “My hair was a mess and they just felt like it, I guess.”
“That sucks,” she sympathized. “I don’t get why they tease you.”
“Corrie,” I said bitterly. “Ever since she came to live with us she’s made my life a living hell. I mean, I even helped her out yesterday and she still starts them teasing me. Anne’s no help. It’s like they’re afraid to be nice to me around their friends.”
“God, I’m so glad I don’t have sisters,” Arianne said. “All I have is an older brother. At least he’s in college so I don’t hear from him.”
“Lucky,” I sighed. The bell rang and I trudged off the playground and into the building that held my homeroom class.
The hallways were congested with the snot of the school- that is, us freshmen. Each grade had their own building though some classes were in different buildings. Those were the ones for the super-smart kids. I fell solidly in the upper middle class when it came to grades- that is, A’s and B’s.
I turned into my classroom and sat down at the desk that had been designated as mine. I started tapping my fingers again, acting on that weird urge. I was one of the first ones in, so I looked around the classroom.
The desks all looked chipped and written on and about to fall over. Mine was no better. Someone had proudly written ‘TINA + ADAM’ on it in red Sharpie. Idly I wondered what happened to Tina and Adam. The posters on the wall were starting to peel, revealing the brick underneath.
Our teacher rushed in, looking disheveled. The rest of the class trickled in after her, still talking and laughing. Everyone got into their seats and the bell rang.
The teacher started calling roll. I zoned out completely, looking out the window. I was doing my best to ignore the fact that Brandon was sitting so near my desk. I was jumpier than usual. I couldn’t get him out of my head. Ignoring him really wasn’t working.
“Ella? Ella. Anabella.” I snapped back to reality.
“Here,” I said feebly. A few of their giggles made me sink in my seat, embarrassed. I put my hands on the desk and immediately felt germy. Who knew what germs were crawling on that thing, just waiting to contaminate me? I started feeling the need to wash my hands. It was like an itch I couldn’t scratch.
I sat on my hands and had to bite my lip to keep from screaming. The germs. They were on the seat too. They were crawling up my arm, contaminating me, getting me sick-
Finally, the bell rang, and I rushed out, forgetting even Brandon in my eagerness to wash my hands. I heard something rip in my haste to get out of the classroom. When I looked behind me, I saw that all of my books and papers were strewn across the floor haphazardly. I was going to have to pick that up and still make it to class on time. Washing my hands would just have to wait. Fantastic.
“Need some help?” I heard Brandon ask. I was down on my knees, hurriedly trying to gather all my papers and folders.
“Yes, please,” I said, sounding somewhat desperate. “I need to get to class on time or they’ll give me a detention and Lenora grounds me when I get detentions.”
“Here,” he said, handing me a stack of my stuff. “Actually, I have a spare Wal-Mart bag in my backpack. I was using it to carry around some project stuff for social studies and forgot to take it out. You can use it since your backpack seems to be out of commission and that’s a lot of stuff to carry around for seven hours.”
I was touched, but wasn’t sure what to say. I’d get teased even more if I was seen with a Wal-Mart bag.
“Sure, why not,” I decided. “If they want to tease me they can just kiss my- ah… insert bleeping noise here?” I said, trying to avoid cursing. Brandon laughed.
“Nice,” he said. He dug the bag out of his backpack and I began shoving my things into it. “Good luck. I’ll see about making sure they lay off you about it. If they don’t they can kiss my insert bleeping noise here.”
I had to laugh but rushed out of the classroom, heart pounding. I had just had a conversation with Brandon, my longtime crush, and he had helped me out and promised to try to keep his group from teasing me about the bag.
My head was in the clouds as I walked into Algebra, just before the bell rang. Mrs. Peere looked at me disapprovingly.
“You’re cutting it a bit close there, Ella. And why do you have a Wal-Mart bag?” Several of my classmates laughed or started whispering. I just sat down with a shrug.
“My backpack broke. Brandon lent me this until I can get a new one,” I said flippantly. That shut them up. I saw Corrie, who was on the other side of the room, eyeing me evilly. She’d been chasing him for the past few months, Anne following her.
“Yes. Well. Moving on, class.” Mrs. Peere began to drone on about the test we would be taking Wednesday. I barely heard a word of it. I was daydreaming and couldn’t help it. The urge to wash my hands was still there but I just ignored it until the bell rang again. I rushed out of the class and into the girl’s bathroom that was across the hall. Finally, I could scrub the germs off of my hands.
I started to turn the water on, but Corrie came in.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked me, lip curled. I saw her posse behind her. It was remarkable how much she changed when she was around them.
“Uh, washing my hands. I’m fairly sure that’s still legal.”
“Oh, ha-ha,” one of her posse said. I remembered her to be Jessica. Her long, black hair was almost painfully straightened, and I saw that she was another Aeropostale wannabe. “What were you doing with Brandon?”
“Nothing,” I answered. “We were in class together. My bag broke on the way out. He helped me with it. It’s hardly like we were making out in a closet. Seriously, guys. It was the decent thing to do.” I was more trying to convince myself with that statement than them. I didn’t need to get my hopes up over a guy because that just meant they had farther to fall. I had enough disappointment already.
“Whatever, Ella. Just stay away from him. And carrying around a plastic bag? That’s so trashy.”
“Yeah,” Corrie agreed. I finished washing my hands, trying to count to ten like I had always been told to when I got angry. I didn’t need to lash out and end up in a fight again. The last time that happened, I was punished severely by Lenora- I was her personal servant for a month. My fingers still smelled like that stench on her feet. I shuddered at the memory of the foot rub.
My arms still felt germy but this was more important. I faced them.
“You know what’s trashy, Jessica? Cornering a girl in the bathroom when there’s no one around to stop you.” With that, I walked out to go to my next class, leaving them looking at me with curled lips. I didn’t want them to see that they hurt me.