Battle Scars

She unplugged her alarm clock and threw it halfway across the room, swearing loudly. Her morning routine was always the same. Get out of bed, throw on the first thing you see. Put some makeup on, without it you look like a fucking ogre. Take your Prozac like a good girl, grab your shit, and catch your bus.

At school most of the faces just blurred by her. She didn’t know half of their names, but she didn’t care, either. That small handful of friends is usually by their lockers, talking about the latest concert they went to. She hadn’t been to a concert in five months; she’d gotten high and gave a stranger a blow job in his car, and after that none of her friends would take her to shows anymore. They asked her how she was doing, and the smile she shot at them was something she’d rehearsed sixteen times.

They only see me as a charity case.

The trek to her first block was a long one as she listened to the perils of teenagers; who was fucking who; who partied where this weekend; who was failing and who wasn’t. She still couldn’t believe that she had two more years of this madness.

Like always, the biology room smelled like formaldehyde. Her tight-ass teacher stood in the front of the room, listening in on student’s conversations. Throwing herself into her chair, she smiled at Jake. Jake, one of the only people she actually considered a friend. Jake, who understood that she didn’t like to talk about herself. Jake, who she could call at three in the morning, crying, and tell all her problems to.

Jake, who just so happens to be Bryce’s best friend. During the milliseconds it took Jake to smile back, she prayed that Bryce hadn’t told him what happened; Jake might be able to ignore a lot of the things she does, but he wouldn’t be able to ignore that.

He smiles back as if nothing has changed, and the pressure on her chest goes away. Class starts, and sitting through biology is probably worse than the hell she knows she’s destined to go to. The bell rings, and she’s out of there faster than anyone else.

She shakes her hair onto the sides of her face as she goes through her locker, and she doesn’t notice that someone is walking up to her until she senses their presence, right beside her. She looks up and the pressure in her chest is back.

Bryce.

He scratches the back of his head, eyes shifting all over the place. “Listen, Alli… about Saturday night, I’m sorry if I sounded like I was being pretentious.”

Underneath her stone exterior, a piece of her laughed, hidden away from Bryce and the rest of the world.

“You have no reason to be sorry, you know the sort of person I am.” She closes her locker and goes to leave, but his hand wraps around her wrist, his grip tight.

“No, wait. What I’m trying to say is that I might hear things about you, but it doesn’t mean who you are. But maybe they are true, and if they are, then maybe I could help you, you know, if you ever needed anything…” he trails off at the end, and she sees him look around, as if afraid someone if going to see him talking to the crazy addict bitch.

“You know, Bryce, you look pretty nervous right now, as if someone is gonna jump out and laugh at you for talking to me. I’ll make it easy for you, fuck off.” She wrenches her wrist from his grip and quickly walks away. He calls after her, but she’s too far gone for him to pull her back, physically and emotionally.

Walking into her next class, remedial math, she sees Ben, a member of the charitable handful. He looks at her and smiles, expecting her to sit with him. She looks towards the back of the room and sees Jon, someone who used to be a part of her life, before everything blew up. For a moment, she looks back towards Ben, knowing that she really should go sit with him. But then that feeling from Saturday is back, and she can taste that ghost taste of cigarettes, and she walks over to Jon’s table and sits next to him.

He doesn’t even hesitate. “Haven’t seen you in awhile,” his tone is casual as he scribbles on his textbook.

“Things came up; I had to prioritize some things.” She says back just as smoothly, making her voice as velvety as she can. Hopefully, Jon will give her what she wants without demanding sex.

“Well we’ve missed you.” He says, referring to everyone else that used to be part of her life. People that were fun, people she actually enjoyed herself with, people that didn’t give her a nosebleed out of boredom.

“I’ve missed you too. You busy tonight? I need a fix of something in a really bad way.” She purrs, giving him the closest thing she can to puppy dog eyes.

“What is it you need?” his tone is just as casual as before, but she knows that at this point he’s all business, just like he always was.

“Newports and weed, booze if you could get some. Pick me up at nine at the end of my street.” In that moment, she knew that she was about to lose herself again.