September 25: Janey

Janey

I sit on the bed. The ticking clock echoes in my brain, counting down the seconds until I’m forced to leave and go back to Hell. I run my hands over my skinny black jeans until they are red and raw. I pinch the skin on the underside of my wrist and wince just a little at the perfect pain that shoots up my arm. Deep, easy sighs, I remind myself and breathe out slowly.

A soft knock on the door pulls me from my trance and I open my eyes. “Janey," I hear my dad's voice from the other side of the old oak door. “It’s time.”  He doesn’t wait for me to respond, and I hear the steps of his shoes pad down the hallway.

I stand reluctantly and stare at myself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door. My favorite jeans are ripped at the knees and squeeze my sides a  little. I’ve lost almost all of the weight I gained last year, thanks to a special diet that my therapist thought would help. My new striped, long-sleeved shirt doesn’t fit as nicely as I would like for it to, but I cover it up with a puffy black vest. A pair of old checkered green vans fit comfortably on my feet. I like comfortable, familiar.

I hate different, new, change. Except for when it comes to my hair. It’s just been cut; my bangs- red this month- hang low in my face and cover my right eye. The rest of my hair, cut choppy and hanging at my shoulders, is chestnut brown and streaked with black and a few strands of blonde.

As much as I hate different, I am different.

I look over my body, analyzing every inch. My cheeks are too fat, my freckles are too dark, my skin is too pale, my hips are too wide, my chest is too flat, my stomach is too not. My eyes are a weird blue, like old China. Traced around them are thick layers of mascara and eyeliner. I chew on my fingernails, painted black (typical, I know).

I pinch my arm again, then slide a few bangles on each wrist to cover the red marks and the scars. I managed to fight the urges this morning. I look at myself once more and sigh. This will just have to do for the first day. Who cares, it’s not like anybody will be looking at me anyways. They haven’t noticed me for months.

Not since everything changed.

I grab my old book bag, the same one I’ve had since the beginning of last year. It is tie-dye (too bright for me) and has the letters JRB stitched on the front. My dad thought it would be nice to get my initials on it for me. It was nice then, I guess.

He sits at the table drinking a cup of hot coffee and reading a John Grisham novel.  My bowl of granola and fruit is sitting at the seat next to him, along with a glass of water and a cup of yogurt.

“Thanks Dad,” I mumble and sit down beside of him.

He looks up from his novel and nods. “Are you ready for your first day,  Kiddo?”

I nod and take a long swig of the cold water. The breakfast is okay, a little too much pineapple today. But I eat it in slow bites and wrack my brain for something to say to my dad. I can tell that he is doing the same while reading the words in his war novel. We haven’t had much to talk about for a while.

 It’s just him and me, has been that way since my brother died and my mother left. Cody was only four when he died, and I was nine. I was supposed to be watching him while we were playing outside by the pool. I ran inside to fix us some drinks, and when I got back, Cody was at the bottom of the deep end. His foot had gotten twisted in the hose and he’d fallen in. I hadn’t even heard the splash.

Everything changed after that. Dad worked longer shifts and Mom could barely look at me. She left a few years later. We don’t know where she went, but Dad says it was probably for the best.

“Are you babysitting the Law boy tonight?” Dad looks up from his book.

“Yeah,” I mumble.

“Don’t forget to pick up the truck when you get done.” He takes a sip of his coffee. “I hate that you have to ride the bus on your first day.”  

“It’s alright.” I just got my license a couple of weeks ago on my sixteenth birthday. I’m old for a sophomore, but my dad gave me his old truck. He’s been delaying the repairs for years now, and finally took it to the shop a few days ago. So I am forced to ride the bus on the first day of school.

“I better get out there.” I stand up from the table once I am done with my breakfast.

He marks his page and stands up too. “Me too. I’ve got to get to the station. You know everything is crazy with elections coming up.”

He walks around the kitchen in his starched gray uniform and adjusts his badge. He’s been a cop for twenty-something years. I worry about him when he is out, especially around these streets. He kisses me firmly on the forehead before putting on his hat and grabbing his keys.

“Have a good day at school.”

That won’t happen, I am almost sure of it. But I don’t say that aloud, just hoist my book bag onto my shoulders and follow him outside. He pulls out a few seconds later in his deputy car, leaving me at the end of the driveway outside of our small house.

Once he is gone, I pull a pack of cigarettes out of my book bag and light one. I don’t smoke them too often, just when I need to calm my nerves. Like now. I puff slowly from the cigarette and finish it just before the bus comes. I am one of the first people to get on and I sit near the front.

The bus fills up quickly with each stop and close to the end of the route, we stop at West Division Street, where twenty or so blacks and Puerto Ricans get on. They are gang members, terrifying and loud. I avert my eyes to my lap when I notice one of the black guys.

His name is Jeoff, and we’ve only spoken one time. It was last summer when I was at the  health clinic. My heart was racing and my palms were sweating and all I could think about was how bad I wanted a straight razor and a cigarette. I sat there,  anxious to erase the result of the biggest mistake of my life, and thinking of an excuse for where all of my babysitting money had gone. I knew my dad would ask. And there was no way I could have told him the truth.

Abortion is not something that would sit well with my father. Especially after I’d already killed his son. No, this secret will go with me, alone, to my grave. So when Jeoff had asked if I wanted him to go with me into the room, I quietly declined although a large part of me wanted to accept. I could feel his eyes burning into my back as I stalked down the hallway after the nurse. He was judging me. She was judging me. If there is a God, he was judging me. I was judging me.

When I slipped under and into a world of red rivers and black clouds, I remember wondering what it would feel like, the erasing. When I woke up, I knew. Blank, with ripped pink remnants, scratched and scarred. I couldn’t fight the urges that day.

The bus pulls into school and the dread that had been flirting with my head pulls tight against my chest and chokes me. I follow the rest of the dread-filled kids into the school, ignoring the obnoxious yells of the gangsters behind me. I pass the mob of terrified freshmen and can’t believe that I was one of them just a year ago. They are like a different species.

Everyone scurries to their cliques: the blacks, the preps, the nerds, the stoners. They have all perfected their fake smiles, carefully and painfully painted on. They walk around in new clothes to fit whatever clique they represent, desperate to stay a part of it, to avoid exile. They greet each other with tight hugs and forced laughs, pretending they missed each other, this place. They act like they are happy to be back here, and maybe they are. They think to themselves: this year will be different.  But they are wrong, all of them. Because nothing ever changes in this place.

I push past the fakes and go outside to the back of the school. My friends are waiting there,  with the same clothes as last year and headphones around their necks. Cordelia, Jacey, and Layne are sitting against the brick wall laughing about something. The boys, Ross and Mogley, are standing up, smoking cigarettes in jeans that are as tight as mine.

“Hey guys,” I say and sit down next to Cordelia.

“Hey girl,” Jacey and Layne say.

“New Cannibal Corpse,” Cordelia says and hands me her headphones. I stick one in my ear and listen to the heavy metal song playing. She is a music addict.

“Janey will agree with me.” Mogley looks at me through his shaggy black hair. “The Shining or Pet Cemetery?”

“Easy,” I say quickly. “The Shining.”

“Told you.” Ross smiles.

“What?” Mogley shakes his head. “You guys are crazy.”

They argue for a few minutes over Stephen King novels and I listen to the rest of Cordelia’s song.

“Nice bangs,” Layne says excitedly. Her own bangs are cut perfectly straight above her eyes and pitch black. She was blonde the last time I saw her.

“Thanks.” I run my hands over my hair. “I like the black.”

These are my friends. Layne is wearing a long white skirt with lace trimming and a tight blue tank top that is the same blue as her big eyes. Her newly dyed hair is pencil straight but curls just under her chin. She is the bubbly one. Jacey is the quiet one. She sits there with her headphones in and writes in her leather-bound journal. She is a poet with choppy brown hair, milky white skin, and dark eyes. She is really skinny, and wears tight dark blue jeans and a brown men’s sweater that hangs off of her shoulder. Cordelia has long, dark brown hair that curls at the bottom and around her face. Her skin is tan and she wears gold and green makeup. She is curvy and beautiful. She, unlike me, doesn’t hide her scars. She wears her thin red lines with pride on her wrists, like pearl bracelets.

Mogley is half Chinese and half Dominican. His real name is Makasi, but he looks like Mogley from The Jungle Book, so we gave him the nickname. He wears tight black jeans, a studded belt, and a tight green v-neck. His bangs are cut like mine, angled across his face. He has perfect white teeth, and a big smile with a deep dimple at each end. Ross has blonde hair that is cut short. He wears tight jeans too, despite what people say.

This is us: the outcasts, the punks. Shunned from our previous groups, we have banded together to form one dysfunctional group of exiled bleeders, who stopped being fake and dared to be different. I have been friends with them for less than a year, but they accepted me when the cruel high school world turned its back. They are older than me, but they are the few that I trust. Although some would argue that we are just conforming to each other, we are all different. Like pieces of a puzzle, we fit together to make one solid image. Something abstract, of course.

The fakes at Five Points have labeled us the ‘Emos.’  I hate that word: emo. Isn’t it just short for emotional? Aren’t all humans emotional? Don’t they all have emotions? Except for the robots here who train themselves not to feel. They walk around here pretending, insisting that they are fine, that everything is okay.

Nothing is ever okay when you are in high school.

“I would rather die than sit through eight hours in this torture chamber.” Cordelia throws her head back and sighs.

“Suicide pact?” Layne suggests, and I give her a mean look. I hate when they talk about suicide, death. Although I’ve considered it more than once, I don’t like to talk about it.

“Not funny.” I pinch my arm a couple of times.

“What’s wrong with you?” Jacey finally closes her journal and looks at me.

“Nothing, I’m just bitter.” I bite my lip and look up at the gray sky.

“Aren’t we all?” Ross puts out his cigarette. “I can’t wait to count the number of times I hear ‘faggot’ today.” He points to his jeans.

“Screw ‘em.” Cordelia rolls her eyes. “I’m already up for ditching if anyone is interested.”

“Depends on my schedule,” I tell her.

When the bell rings, I walk with Jacey to our homeroom. We walk slowly, discussing her newest poem and biding as much time as possible.  When we walk into the classroom, the stares are expected. I am used to them by now, but I feel my face flush as insecurities bounce through my head. We sit in the back, ignoring the snickers of a few people in the front row. Assholes.

Mrs. Crane passes out our schedules and I immediately compare mine with Jacey’s. No classes together. Of course God wouldn’t be so kind as to ease the pain of this place by giving me at least one class with her. I hope for better luck with the others.

“Alright folks,” Mrs. Crane says loudly. “Listen to the announcements.”

Ruby St. Clair, our president, appears on the television. Her smile is so wide, her voice so smooth, that I can almost taste the fear in her. She is the biggest fake of them all, and my peer counselor from last year.  Mrs. Richards had forced me to get one after my teachers sent her concerns about the cuts on my arm. Twice a week I was in her office and meeting with Ruby “just to talk.” She pretended to care, but I know my problems were just adding to the long list of extracurriculars that she gets to put on her college applications.   

People like Ruby, the ones who strive for perfection and are desperate to appear perfect, are the ones with the most problems. People think I’m messed up because I cut myself when I’m sad. Someone like Ruby, who pretends that sadness doesn’t exist, is dying on the inside. And her blood is toxic. Of course I will never tell her that. She has to figure it out on her own.

I ignore her announcements and listen to my iPod. My schedule sucks, with Civics and Economics, Geometry, Communications, and Physical Science.  Once the announcements are over, the bell rings and I follow Jacey out of our class and back outside. Our friends are waiting with their schedule cards out.

“Tell me you’ve got Precal third period,” Cordelia says to Jacey.

“I’ve got Precal third period,” Jacey says with a straight face while Cordelia jumps up and down.

The downside to having older friends is that they have all taken the classes I’m in. I’m stuck with four shitty classes and no friends in any of them. But we do all have lunch together, and for that, I can be thankful.   

I get to Civics and Economics a minute before the bell rings. I barely have time to pull out my notebook before my teacher starts ranting about what is wrong with the government today. I blank out, listening to my iPod and writing down bits of the notes on the slides he puts on the screen.

During break, I sneak a few puffs from Cordelia’s cigarette and listen to Mogley complain about his English teacher. The routine has started, right where we left it in June. New year, same old shit.

I’m left alone in geometry, while my friends go off to their junior and senior math classes. Mr. Reeves is ancient and lecturing before the second bell even rings. My head gets fuzzy as he begins to review from Algebra One, even though it has nothing to do with circles and squares. He squiggles a problem on the board and turns to the class.

“Does anyone know the answer?”Silence. “Anyone?”

I continue to draw the rainbow I’ve been working for the entire period in the corner of my notebook. If you avoid eye contact, they usually don’t call on you.

Except he does call on me.

“Miss Boyd. Janey.” I tense up and start to chew on my nails. I don’t even know why I wasted the time painting them this morning.

I stare at the piece of paper in front of me, which doesn’t have a single bit of notes on it. I look up at the board, but the problems and formulas look like Chinese to me. I chew on my thumbnail until it bleeds.

“Janey?” He stares at me. The class turns to stare at me.

I don’t know the answer; don’t know how to even begin to find the answer. I sit there, unable to speak. My face gets hot and I bite harder into my nail. The blood tastes like pennies, but I swallow it and silently beg them all to stop staring at me.

“Janey?”

“Thirteen,” someone finally says. Everyone turns quickly to see who answered. It is some kid a few seats down from him. I don’t recognize him, decide that maybe he is a freshman.

“Well, Mister…”

“Reid,” the guy mutters. “Alex Reid.”

“Thank you, Alex Reid.” Mr. Reeves smiles and turns back to the board. I take notes for the rest of the class, ignoring the blood spots that seep into my notebook and mix with the lead from my pencil. In my head, I thank Alex Reid. He might be an angel.

My third period is communications, and for the first half, my teacher talks about how important communication is in our lives. As if we don’t already know this. She then tells us to get into groups with the people around us and talk.

“That’s all you have to do. Don’t take notes; don’t try to memorize everything you hear. Just talk. And make sure everyone is doing an equal amount of talking and listening.”

The assignment seems easy, unless of course you hate to talk, like me. I especially hate talking to strangers, and I hate talking about myself. I am not a communicator.

The people around me are a guy with thick glasses and pants that are too short (classic geek), a girl with blonde hair and tight clothes that show too much (typical prep), and a black guy with baggy clothes and hard eyes (total gangster).

We all reluctantly push our desks together and I stare at the clock, willing the seconds to tick by faster. The blonde, who introduces herself as Lacey, goes first. She rambles on and on about her rich parents and all of her horses. I love horses, but I’m sure that I would hate hers. Finally, the black guy interrupts her and tells us to call him ‘G.’

“I like cars, girls, and making money.” He slouches low at his desk and looks at us with a serious face. “And I hate school.”

“What kind of car do you drive?” The geek, who later tells us his name is Nathaniel, asks. He pushes his thick glasses up the bridge of his nose.

G doesn’t respond; I’m assuming that means he doesn’t have a car. Nathaniel smiles awkwardly and rubs his sweaty palms together.

“Well, I am Nathaniel. I am in Science Olympiad as well as the Chess Club.” So typical. “I like cars too.” He smiles at G, who doesn’t smile back. “Anything to do with engineering, really. I would like to be an engineer for NASA one day.”

“That is so cool,” Lacey says with a little too much excitement. “What about you?” She turns to me.

“I’m Janey,” I mumble. “I like horses, too. Sometimes I volunteer at these stables about an hour away.” I wrack my brain for something else to say. “My dad is a cop. I like music and writing. And I love cameras; photography, old recording devices, stuff like that.”

They all stare at me and I stare at the desk.

“Alright, let’s get the room back in order.” Miss Gribbs stands at the front of the class. “Looks like we have got very interesting and diverse group this year. I heard a lot of different interests and personalities as I was walking around and listening to you. That’s going to make this a very fun class.”

When the bell rings I rush out of the classroom, my face still flushed. I hurry to the cafeteria, trying to beat the crowds. But C lunch is always the most crowded. Everyone scurries to their designated spots and I walk towards the soda machines.

I pass the preps, a group of athletes and self-proclaimed super stars. My kind-of-cousin, Anderson Stone is the leader of the pack. His step mom is my Aunt, and a bitch from hell. She and my mother never spoke to each other when we were still a family. I see Anderson once a year at family reunions, but besides that, he ignores me. Especially at school. The head jock talking to a chubby emo girl is enough to knock even him Anderson off of his high horse.

He notices me, but doesn’t say anything. And I definitely do not wave. I’m not paying attention when someone bumps into me and I almost fall backwards.

“Sorry!” Ruby St. Clair looks up at me from her phone. “Oh hey, Janey. How are you?”

I run my fingers through my bangs and nod. “I’m good, thanks.”

“That’s good.” She smiles her expensive, forced smile.  “Well, are you going to need a peer counselor again this year? I’m still free the same time as last year.”

I cringe and disregard her friend looking me up and down. “It’s cool, I’m doing okay now.” I can’t help but start to bite my nails.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” I insist. “I’ve got to go. I’ll see you around.”

She sighs. “Okay, well my number is the same if you ever need anything.”

I don’t respond, just walk away and buy a soda. I know I need to eat something, but school food is so unhealthy. I decide on a bag lunch and hurry outside to where my friends sit. A couple of stoners whiz by me, and I wave at Brian Phillips, my dealer. He sells me weed once in a while when I really need it. He waves back and keeps on skating. His hair is getting long, and for some reason I think he is so hot. He wouldn’t give me the time of day though; not after his last girlfriend, who just so happens to be Ruby.

“Glad you could join us,” Mogley says from a Downward Dog position.

“Sorry, I needed caffeine.” I hold up my diet soda and take a long swig from it. “Did you guys eat already?”

“I’m not eating.” Jacey doesn’t look up from the notebook she is writing in. Big surprise.

“I’m not giving money to that poisonous food,” Ross sighs. He takes out a paper sack and unloads his lunch: dry tuna and some Ritz crackers.

“We were waiting for you.” Cordelia takes a bite of the hamburger on her tray and sticks her tongue out. She stuffs a few fries in her mouth and laughs. She will probably puke that up later, but I don’t say anything about it for now.

I take out the apple and pickle from my bag lunch and eat them slowly, telling myself that each bite is filling me up. Cordelia eats all of her hamburger and shares her fries with Layne, who also brought rice cakes and peanut butter. Mogley eats a piece of pizza and two blueberry muffins. He doesn’t have to worry about his figure.

“How are everyone’s classes?” Ross asks between bites.

“Suck,” Cordelia says with a full mouth.

“Fascinating,” Jacey says at the same time.

“My British Literature teacher is a babe,” Layne says in reference to Mr. Fossett.

I chuckle softly, admiring how different each of my friends are. I pull out my old camera and take a few snapshots of them before they notice me and shy away from it. We finish our lunches, talking about our classes and our newest projects. Every couple of minutes, I find myself staring across the way at my ex-best friends, Audrey and Dakota. I used to be one of them, although they are seniors. We spent all of our time together before last year, when I went away. They still don’t know what happened; I didn’t have the heart to tell them the truth.

I started cutting when I was in eighth grade. I was still depressed from my brother’s death and my mom’s absence. The first time I cut myself, it was an accident. I broke a lamp and was surprised when a piece of glass nicked my finger as I was cleaning it up. I was surprised because it felt good. After that, I did it more and more.

My dad found out when I was a freshman. He begged me to stop, and I told him I would. But I was addicted. I couldn’t stop and he sent me away. For two weeks, I lived in a hospital with other kids just like me. I realized then that I was different than Audrey and Dakota. I realized that I was angry and sad, and that it was okay.

When I got back to school, nothing was the same. People stared at me, and I barely talked to my friends. One day after school, Cordelia noticed the scars. Then she showed me hers and invited me to eat lunch with her group the next day. After that, I was different. I started dressing differently and finding my real self. Dad didn’t like the new me very much, but at least I had stopped cutting.

For a while.

 When we are finished eating, Cordelia brushes her hands off.

“Bathroom,” she demands.

Layne and Jacey get up and so do I. I know what this means, and the boys do too. Ross shakes his head and Mogley rolls his eyes. We go to the bathroom near the prep hallway, because it is usually empty during lunch. I follow the girls into the last stall in the gray and white bathroom.

“Give me your hair tie,” Cordelia says to Jacey, who slides the elastic band off of her wrist and hands it to her.

Cordelia ties her hair loosely behind her back and gets down on her knees. The three of us crowd around her and ignore the sounds of her retching into the toilet. I close my eyes so I don’t have to look at it. Layne laughs a little bit.

“Anyone else?” Cordelia stands up and takes a breath mint from Jacey’s open palm. None of us want to today, so Cordelia takes the hair tie out and shakes her curls over her shoulders.

She reaches into her purse and pulls out a small, tin case. In it are a straight razor, three rubber bands, and several pink band-aids.

“I have to,” she says, as if trying to reason with us.

“Me too.” Layne nods and lifts up her skirt, exposing the red cuts on her thighs.

“Not me.” I shake my head. I’m thirteen days clean, and I want to see how far I can go. Besides, I don’t really need it right now.

Cordelia shrugs and drags the razor across her wrist without any hesitation. She doesn’t even gasp anymore. She tears off some toilet paper from the dispenser and hands the razor to Layne. Layne makes three quick cuts on the outside of her right thigh. She exhales long and slowly as her body collapses and she is relieved. I know that relief.

She offers Jacey the razor and raises an eyebrow. “You want it?”

“Whatever.” Jacey shrugs and takes the bloody razor, as if she has no choice. She rests her foot on the toilet seat and digs the corner of the razor into the inside of her ankle.

I take one of the rubber bands and snap it hard against my wrist. Seeing the relief in their eyes, the blood on their flesh, makes me want to do it. I smack my wrist harder with the rubber band and tell myself I don’t need it.

This has been our ritual for a while. We eat, find an empty bathroom, Cordelia pukes (sometimes the rest of us do too), and then we cut. We’ve formed some sort of secret “club.” Cordelia, who was once a prep, presses the tissue on her arm and breathes slowly in and out. Jacey, former over-achieving nerd, lets the blood drip into her shoes. And Layne, who never fit in anywhere, wipes the blood slowly from her thigh before covering the fresh cuts with band-aids.

“Shut up.” Cordelia whispers all of a sudden. “Someone is coming.”

Sure enough, footsteps echo through the bathroom a few seconds later. A sink turns on and we all freeze. Cordelia quietly stuffs her kit back into her purse and I suck in my breath. A moment later, laughter echoes through the bathroom. The voice of a bitch rings in my ears.

“What are you doing in here, Brainiac?” Prep. Blonde, possibly brunette, approximately five-six, fake tan, could possibly be armed with one or more other blondes.

“I just needed to use the bathroom.” I recognize the second voice as Audrey’s. Instantly I want to run out of the stall and be next to her. But I know I can’t.

“This is our bathroom,” says the first voice.

For the next few minutes, the group of five or so blondes messes with Audrey. They call her Bloody Mary (a nickname I always despised), and poke fun at her body. Her voice is shaky and I can tell she is scared. Finally, another voice I recognize speaks up.

“You guys, the bell is about to ring and we still need to freshen up.” Samantha West, Queen of Blonde-dom. “Let’s let her slide this time.”

“Are you serious?” Bitch number one spits.

“We’ll get a freshman after school.” Samantha. “Come on.” She’s not the meanest person, although she doesn’t actually stop the meanness either. I take care of her horses at the stables where I volunteer. Every once in a while she remembers to say thank you when she is there.

I hear Audrey hurry out a few seconds later, after the first bitch threatens her. But the blondes don’t leave just yet.

“I can’t believe you let her go. You’re getting soft.”

“Not soft,” Samantha says. “Just sick of the same old shit all of the time. We are seniors this year. Let’s start acting like it.”

A few seconds later, the bitch sighs. “What the hell is her problem?”

“Who knows?” One of the other bitches says. Finally, they leave and my friends and I breathe.

“Shit.” Cordelia chuckles.

“Better her than us.” Layne shrugs and opens the stall door. We are the easiest targets for the preps, especially since Cordelia used to be one of them.

We leave the bathroom quickly and head back outside for the last few minutes of lunch.

“Finally,” Ross says “We thought we were going to have to come in there after you guys.”

“Don’t worry, we are fine.” Cordelia smiles. “Just a minor road block, that’s all.”

“Do you guys want to come over after school?” Mogley asks. “We can smoke and watch I Spit on your Grave.”

“Can’t,” I mumble. “I have to babysit.”

“Argh,” they all groan.

“You always have to babysit.” Cordelia sighs.

“If I don’t work, we don’t have weed to smoke,” I remind them.

“She has a point.” Layne puts her arm around me. “Have fun with the kids. I owe you.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

When the bell rings, I walk alone through the crowded school towards the math and science building. People bump into me from all sides. Clearly I am still invisible.

When I get to Physical Science, I sit at the lab table farthest away from the teacher standing at the front of the room.

After calling the roll, Mrs. Locker rambles on about science, the beauty of it, and how it applies to everyday life. I force myself to stay awake as she calls out our lab partners.

“Okay, for your lab partners we are just going to go down the attendance list. So Robert Absher, you will be working with Sarah Alton. Manuel Aviles…” She pauses and looks around the room.

Everyone turns and looks at the Hispanic kid sleeping a couple of seats away from me.

“Somebody wake him up,” Mrs. Locker says and continues down the roll. “His partner is Janey Boyd.”

Of course I get paired with Manny Aviles, the biggest gangster in school. Mrs. Locker continues down the roll and I let out a long sigh. Nobody wakes him up.

When the final bell rings, Manny gets up quickly, sending our lab assignment to the ground next to my shoe. I pick it up and tap his shoulder softly. I’ve got to talk to him sometime.

He doesn’t turn around, so I clear my throat. “Here you go.” He turns around quickly and I hand him the paper with shaky hands. “You dropped this.”

His eyes are cold, blank, distant. “What is it?”

“Tonight’s homework.”

He takes the paper and shoves it in his book. “Oh, thanks.” He starts to walk away.

“You’re my lab partner.”

He turns back around. “What?”

“Just so you know.” Insecurity bites at me. “I know you were sleeping most of the time. We’re lab partners.”

He chuckles and shakes his head. “Oh, sorry about that. I’ll try to stay awake tomorrow.”

“Yeah. Well I’ll see you.” I walk away before he can say anything else and wonder if he’ll even bother doing the assignment.

I don’t have time to stop and talk to my friends before I get on the bus, a different one from this morning. I turn my headphones up and ignore the screaming freshmen in the seats around me. I get off at the Blue Dolphin Motel, much to the bus driver’s discrepancy. That’s where Davie, the kid I’ve been babysitting for almost a year, lives. His mom said it was just temporary, but I don’t know how temporary and I don’t ask questions because she pays me fifty bucks a night, sixty for weekends.

I sit outside of their room in a plastic white chair and smoke half of a cigarette while I wait for Davie. Several minutes later, he hops off of the bus and charges across the parking lot with a wide, toothless grin on his face.

“Miss Janey! Miss Janey!” He squeals and claps. I put the cigarette out quickly and stuff it in my pocket.

“Hey Davie.” I muster up as much enthusiasm as possible and pat his back when he squeezes my leg. “Where is your key?”

He slides his Spiderman book bag off and takes the room key out of the front pocket. I unlock the door and before we are even in the room, he is dumping out his book bag to show me his projects from school.

“Look what I made!” He pulls out a piece of paper with a picture drawn at the top and a few sentences written in big, bulky letters at the bottom. “It says,” Davie bounces on top of the bed and points at each word, “’I love my brother and my mom. They make me food and play with me. I love third grade.’”

I chuckle at the randomness of his eight-year-old mind. He pulls a book out of his book bag and looks up at me.

“Can I read this to you?”

It’s a thin book about tractors, and I cannot deny his big pleading brown eyes so I nod and sit down next to him on the bed. He reads it slowly, like he’s tasting every word, registering the way it sounds, the way it feels when it rolls off of his tongue. When he is finished, I put my initials on his reading log and he stuffs everything back into his bag.

“Can we get ice cream?” He jumps up and down. “Please?”

I sigh and nod slowly. “Let me do some homework and then we will go.” I know that the ice cream shop down the street is always packed for the first couple of hours after school.

I sit at the small round table in the corner by the door and work on my science lab while Davie watches a rerun of Spongebob. When I decide that the lab is good enough, I stuff it into my notebook and stretch.

“Alright, Davie.” I grab his jacket and hold it up. “Let’s go get some ice cream.”

“Yay!” He hops up from the floor and grabs the coat. I have to wait five minutes for him to tie his shoes, but he insists that he doesn’t need help and finally gets it right on the seventh or eighth try.

Scoops is just a couple blocks away and we walk fast. When we get there, no one else is in the shop. I recognize Gabe De Carteret behind the counter. I know him from school; he’s kind of a weird guy. Weird but happy.

“Hey Janey,” he says.

“Hey.”

“Ice cream,” Davie squeals.

“Yes, Davie.” I roll my eyes. “We’re going to get some ice cream.”

“What can I get for you, buddy?” Gabe smiles at Davie.

“I want chocolate!”

Gabe scoops a lump of soft chocolate ice cream into a paper bowl. “Do you want anything on top of it? Gummy Bears? Nuts? Cherries?”

“Cherries!” Davie claps his hands.

Gabe hands him the bowl that is overflowing with red and brown syrup and looks at me. “Anything for you?”

“No thank you.” Ice cream is poison. I reach for my wallet. “How much is it?”

“Don’t worry about it.” Gabe smiles. “It’s on the house.”

“Thanks.”

I stuff my wallet in my back pocket and sit next to Davie at a table in the corner. He gets the ice cream all over his face and hands and I wait patiently for him to eat every bite of the sugary pacifier. He rambles about school and I try to listen, but for the most part I don’t.

When he’s finished, I wipe him down with wet napkins and take his hand so we can walk back to the motel. I fix him a bowl of canned pork and beans for dinner and he settles in front of the television. Crash gets there shortly afterwards while I am doing my geometry homework.

“Hey,” he says as he comes through the door.

“Crash!” Davie shoots up to hug him.

“What’s up, little man?” Crash squeezes him and I start putting my homework away. “Hey Janey.”

“Hey,” I mutter.

 “Thanks for watching him. My mom will pay you at the end of the week.”

I sling my backpack over my shoulder and shrug. “No problem.” I’ve got to get to the car garage before it closes.

“Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.” He opens the door for me.

“See ya.” I push past him and hurry across the parking lot. The air is cooler now, and I walk quickly for the several blocks to the garage.

Eddie’s Garage is a little run down, but I ignore that and the smell of car oil and walk into the front of the open shop.

“Can I help you?” I hear a voice, then stop.

Standing in front of me is Riley Sutton. He is taller than he was last year, and even more handsome (if that’s possible). He smells the same, like leather and sweat and poisonous temptation that no girl could possibly resist. He is beautiful. And I hate him.

He is the reason I started cutting again.

I bite the inside of my cheek so hard that it bleeds. “I just came to get my dad’s truck. He brought it by earlier.”I avoid his eyes and stare at the floor.

“Oh, the dodge.” He grabs a pair of keys and speaks to me as if I am just another customer. I guess that’s all that I am. “I fixed up your leaks and made a few tweaks on the engine. Everything should be as good as new.”

“Okay,” I manage. I get into the truck and start it up. It revs nicely and I start to pull slowly out of the garage.

“If you have any other problems, tell your dad not to hesitate to call us.”

I wish he would shut up, talking to me like he has never seen me before. I don’t say anything else, just pull out of the garage and out into the street as fast as I can. Tears start to pool at the bottoms of my eyes as I drive through traffic towards home. I curse Riley under my breath, stab him with an invisible knife in my head, then punch myself in the thigh for letting him make me cry again.

Riley Sutton was the first boy I kissed, the first boy I touched, the first boy I liked. Cordelia had introduced me to him. He was a bad boy, she had warned me. But she assured me that he would show me a good time. He took my virginity at the end of last year when he was too high to care and I was too high to stop him.

He didn’t talk to me much after that night, and two months later when I found out I was pregnant, he told me it couldn’t be his. He said it wasn’t possible, because we used a condom and he had ‘heard about me,’ insinuating that I was both dumb and a whore. That was my first and last time.

I never told him about the abortion. I guess he still assumes that I was just crazy, had read the test wrong. I sliced my arm so deep that night that I went dizzy in the bathroom.

Relapse is a bitch.

When I get home, my dad has a pot of chili on the stove and biscuits in the oven. The smell takes over and I drop off my stuff in my room so I can splash cold water on my face and wipe my makeup. Dripping mascara always gives away a good cry, even to oblivious dads.  

“How was school?” Dad asks me once I am in the kitchen.

“Good,” I mumble and sit down at the table. He sets a bowl full of chili and two biscuits down in front of me.

“I made your favorite.” He smiles and pats my shoulder. He tries hard sometimes, I know he does.

“Thanks, Dad.” I blow a spoonful of the chili and wait for it to cool off. “How was work?”

“Eventful.” He sighs. “Chased down a couple of kids today over on North Division. Someone robbed a minimart this afternoon, took some batteries or something. Anyway, the store clerk called us, but we apparently went after the wrong kids. So whoever it was got away with a pack of triple A’s. That’s about it.”

“Hm.” I take the bite of chili and instantly I feel better. Food does that to me.

“How does the truck run? Is it going to be okay for you?”

“Yeah, it runs fine.”

He sits down next to me and we eat, mostly in silence. He pops open a couple of RC Colas for us and I drink mine slowly. Later, we have vanilla ice cream, plain. I decide that plain vanilla ice cream doesn’t count as poison.

He goes into the den to read his novel and I go into my room. If I turn my music up too loud it gives him a headache, so I put headphones in and lay on my bed. He comes in around ten to tell me goodnight. His eyes are tired and his smile weak. He’s trying.

When I take a shower, I am careful while I shave. The tiniest nick could trigger me to keep going. I wrap myself up in my mom’s old robe and go out onto the back porch, which is screened in and has creaky floorboards.

I sit in an old wooden chair and stare outside at the dark world beyond the wire screen. I imagine myself running away, leaving and never coming back to Chicago or Five Points again. But running away would kill my dad. I’m all that he has, and I’m not much to have.

I think about life, the world, and how cruel it is. How people leave us, the people we love the most. When I think of life, only negative things come to mind: betrayal, heartache, pain, suffering, death. I look into the heavens and beg for some sort of answer. But the heavens don’t have time for a girl like me.

I fight the urge to cut myself, to let myself bleed just for proof that I am still alive. I haven’t felt alive in a long time. I try to fight the urge to cry, but big, wet tears still spill down my fat cheeks and soak the fluffy white fabric around my neck. The urges are too much. There is too much urge and not enough will to fight them.

The urge will never stop.

And I have lost all the fight in me.