“So Saint Celina, didn’t manage to dodge punishment this weekend, did she?” The serpent Jessi stretched out from her desk and carefully stroked my hair. Thursdays were the only damned class we shared in the week and I despised it.
My aunt saw me arrive on Friday night, alone, with only a simple dress covering me. The screams were monumental.
She forbade me from going out for the rest of the month, but as long as she was home, if I did, she wouldn’t find out.
I straightened up to get her hand off. What could I say? That nobody could punish me? Pretend to be rebellious? I took a deep breath, anger and impatience right now go hand in hand with me. Behind me Jessi, laughing at me with her followers and next to me, Donovan. He’s treating me like a stranger, I try to do the same, since the night of the fight at the bus stop, when I left, he hasn’t spoken to me nor have I to him. I won’t say it’s not hard for me because I would be lying, but every day is a bit more bearable.
Regarding Jessi… it’s the first time she’s spoken to me in weeks. I think her mother’s punishment for finding out she hit me has worn off.
As for Donovan, he was very careful not to even touch me when he walked by and I was very grateful for that.
I begged the art teacher to let me sit at the back of everything, but he wasn’t as easy to convince as the literature teacher and other educators, so my posture was uncomfortable, there was no way to feel comfortable next to Donovan.
There were brief moments when he glanced at my table and then turned to look carefully at his own, he didn’t move, I think I could barely detect him breathing.
I paid attention to the rest of the class, took notes on the appropriate combination of colors for different types of landscapes, did my best to focus on anything else.
When the bell rang, I waited for Donovan to leave first, but he didn’t even flinch. I turned my head just enough to see him and he was looking straight ahead, nervous.
He knew he wanted me to leave first, alright. I grabbed my things and started putting them in my bag when one of my folders fell on the floor along with all my sheets.
Jessi.
“Oops, sorry, you should be more careful,” Her acidic voice, stirred my violent side. Clearly, I wasn’t going to do anything to her, she’s not worth it, but I don’t lack the desire.
“Really?” I said bitterly, “You’re a cliche. Have you watched Mean Girls too much? Please. Surprise me.”
She just smiled and started to slowly retreat with her friends, but just as she walked by me, she fell to the floor.
Oh my God.
Did anyone record that? It would have been great.
“Did you just trip me?” she yelled, getting up and cleaning her nice bare knees. The students around us laughed at her and others pulled out their phones to capture every detail of the fight they saw coming.
If Jessi was going to touch me, I wasn’t going to be so stupid to let her hit me again.
“She didn’t do it,” Donovan declared, pushing Jessi’s shoulder and leaving the girl who invited him out a few days ago with her mouth open. He walked away without a last glance and my heart swelled, he did that for me.
My cousin didn’t answer him, she wouldn’t dare, nobody would.
“You said you invited him out?” Jessi murmured to her friend and she nodded immediately.
“I did, but he didn’t even want to give me his number and when I gave him mine, he just threw it away after.”
You know I heard every word and each one made me very, very happy?
I picked up my folder while listening to their mini argument and left the class almost running before they came after me again.
Just then, the principal entered the place and I heard him call “Black Hair”, who was actually named Julie, I was never going to find out if the man with a wary expression didn’t say so.
Julie and Donovan, not bad, just the nausea they provoke just by thinking about it, but other than that, not bad.
“Miss, you have to accompany me,” the man ordered Julie, I realized he was trying to sound as un-rude as possible, but he wasn’t doing it well.
“Why?” she asked confused. From her face I could deduce that she knew the reason, but couldn’t believe it.
“We better talk privately in my office. Your mother will be coming for you soon.”
Without saying a word to her friends, she ran into the principal’s arms and began to cry. What?
Jessi looked at me and narrowed her eyes in my direction, telling me I shouldn’t be witnessing that. Then, I left and when I left the building, Cris was already waiting for me outside with his face contorted in a grimace. He was not well.
“Did you hear?” he yelled, putting each hand on my shoulder and squeezing.
“About what?” I inquired, trying to get him to let go.
“Your best friend’s father is in jail,” he informed me and I understood why Julie reacted that way.
“What? How do you know?” I whispered trying to make sure no one else heard. Cris was not very discreet.
“It’s on the news, I knew him, before I had to repeat the year I was Julie’s classmate and I saw him a couple of times around here. He was accused of child trafficking and unsolved murders, among them, a girl who disappeared last year. I’m freaking out,” Cris passed both hands over his face, as if it really affected him. “The girl who disappeared got along terribly with that bitch. Damn Celina, there’s something really murky here.”
I got goosebumps from the shock. Child trafficking? Murders? Disappearances? That’s too much in a damn sentence. “Are you suggesting she told her father to disappear this girl you’re talking about?”
He raised his hands exasperated. “I’m saying it, damn it! That bitch disappeared that poor girl!”
“I think you’re dramatizing, nobody would be that sick.” Or would they?
“It’s not a damn coincidence that the man being accused of making her disappear is her father Celina, wake up,” I thought of all the possibilities in which that girl’s father would have made me disappear if I had hit her the day Donovan stopped me…
“Could he have known?” Cris nodded slightly to show me in the direction Donovan was going to his car.
I hated getting riled up every time they talked bad about him, but it’s things that never change, not even though we’re fighting, I knew Donovan was not a bad person. “No, don’t involve Donovan in your conspiracies. How would he know?”
Cris looked at me seriously and tightened his grip on the strap of his backpack. “Draw your own conclusions, Celina.”
“He is not involved in those things I’ve told you Cristian, enough.”
The urge to cry took hold of me, the words coming out of my mouth were nothing like the ones in my head. What if what Cris says is true? I allowed myself to get to know him, be with him, kiss him, hug him, we almost had sex for God’s sake! And worst of all, fall in love with him.
If what Cris said was true, I fell in love with a monster.
“Are you trembling?” Cris asked, worried. He put a hand on my arm and I started to walk away from him. “Celina! Celina wait!”
“Leave me alone! I want to be damned alone!”
Yes, I was trembling. Everything in me was trembling. Everything was about to crumble inside me.