The Things We Don't Say

THE UGLY TRUTH

Noreen's POV:
Karma. You get served what you deserve. What goes around comes around. Most people find it comforting that some unexplainable cosmic force has always been looking out for us. Most people who have been scorned or in pain would equate Karma with revenge. I am no exception.
Come a little closer, I'll let you in on a secret and I don't need your judgement because I'm sure that way or another you have wished someone who have wronged you to share the same pain that you felt. I remember when I first rolled in this town, I was hesitant leaving the city for a small, sleepy town. When I first got here in Pinegrove, there is a funeral for Elaine's parents, they unfortunately died in a car accident. I took it as a bad omen, but my parents could not be bothered. They just told me that it was just a coincidence. I spent the summer holed up in my bedroom. My plan was to stay a fly in a wall, as if I have never existed and leave when I'm old enough to go to college. The townies had been mourning over the death of the Sommers it at least give them something to talk about the entire summer.  My Mom and Dad were busy with their real estate business in the town square and were making themselves known by the neighbors and the two neighboring towns to notice my isolation. However, like all good things, my period of isolation has come to an end. When school started, all eyes were on me. The new girl. I was known as the city girl with cool clothes, cool bags, and good hair. I never expected to be such a big deal here, where in the city I was just an ordinary girl. Heads did not turn, my life was safe, but here, everybody is friendly.  Elaine and Zola had been my constant lunch mates. I guess in a town this small, I have no choice not to be noticed.
Things were looking up and I actually enjoyed life here in Pinegrove rather than my old life in the city. Added to the cherry on top of my wonderful life here is I've met Kevin. Back in the city, I never had the chance to fall in love because I was too busy with a lot of things, but Pinegrove gave me the chance to feel the magic of first love. I spent most of my free time with Kevin. None of the other things really mattered when I'm with him. When we were not together we would burn the phone lines talking about our dreams, our life experiences before we knew each other. My parents knew about our relationship and they gave their approval because ever since I had Kevin, my grades were better and I am happier. My friendship with Zola and Elaine seemed to take a backseat, I was easy to assume that they would understand. I see them in the school hallways, but they seemed to avoid making eye contact, pretending that they never see me. In the mall when I see them, and I'm sure that they see us, they would suddenly go inside the hardware store just not to cross paths with me. I'm to happy with Kevin to be bothered by their sudden shift in treatment.
I took a part time job in a diner in the town square just to have my own money. Kevin would always visit me at the end of my shift and take me home. It was one of those lazy days, the diner doesn't have much customer when Nancy, one of my trusted friend in the diner told me something. "You and Kevin are going strong. You look good together. I'm surprised that Elaine is okay with this set- up."
I'm confused, but maybe what Nancy meant to say was about me not spending time with Elaine and Zola. "I haven't spent much time with Elaine and Zola ever since Kevin and I were together. "
"I see. Do you know that Kevin is Elaine's ex? He was her greatest love."
I did not know this of course because no one, not even Elaine told me about it. I dropped the spray bottle that I was holding. This was difficult to process. So many thoughts crammed my mind. I don't know if I should be angry or not. Suddenly, I was not feeling well.
"Oh my God. I'm sorry. I thought you knew seeing as how the three of you were super close at the start of the school year."
Nancy felt super apologetic that afternoon. We spent the rest of the afternoon in silence. I texted Kevin not to take me home that afternoon. Suddenly, the magic of our first year together had waned. How could he not tell me about his past with Elaine. Why did Elaine not tell me about Kevin when we first started going out? I don't know who to be mad at. Maybe this is the reason why Elaine and Zola had been avoiding me. I need answers. That night, I ignored Kevin's messages and went straight to Elaine's house. When she opened the door, she was surprised but she welcomed me in. Tension hanged in the air that night.
"Why didn't you tell me that Kevin was your ex?"
"Because I didn't have to. I lost Kevin. I lost my parents too. Saying it out loud hurts more than the times I think about the many losses I had in my life." She cried that night. She used the death card and after that I do not know what to say, so I said "Sorry. I really did not know Elaine. No one told me."  Elaine never said anything after that. I waited sending furtive glances her way but she was just staring at her mug. After minutes of uncomfortable silence, I said goodbye to her and the wonderful months that we've been friends.
When I got home, Kevin was seated in our living room he hugged me when he saw me. I hope that I could instantly stop loving him, but I couldn't. It felt so good to be with him. I pushed him back a little so that I could see his face. "You didn't tell me that Elaine is your ex."
I remember how he explained that his past has nothing to do with us so he didn't really have to tell me about it. He get it that Elaine was my friend, but he can't help falling in love with me. If the situation was reversed, Elaine wouldn't consider their friendship too and  just go with what she wants because she thinks she is the center of the universe. I did not broke up with Kevin that night. We pick up where we left off and everyone in town love us together except for Elaine, whose mission in life was to make me feel guilty. Most people said to not be bothered but this was the worst advice that I have been given, and this had greatly changed my life. Just when I was inevitably attached to this town and its people, Elaine schemed into making me the most hated person in Pinegrove. All it takes was one incriminating rumor that I'm sleeping my way to honor class and this baseless accusations spread like wildfire and its flames fanned with convincing story telling and theories that were never proven. It was unbelievable how this small town folks dug up all the dirt they need for my smear campaign.  They went as far as knowing about my therapy sessions with Dr. Altman five years ago when I was battling with anxiety and paranoia.  Even the lies became truths that my parents and I have started questioning ourselves. Our hearts were all broken, its not easy to be rejected, to be hated that I suggested to my parents to just move back to the city. Dad said that we cannot go back because all our money was invested in businesses here and eventually people would stop and get tired of hating us. However, the rumor mill never stopped until it has affected my parents business, and then later their marriage. Mom blamed Dad for moving here, I blamed Dad too, but really I think all this just started because of me. I'm really the one to blame. Our family seemed to disintegrate every day. Every single time that we had dinner it turns into a blame game until we stopped eating dinners together because we could not stop hating each other. I spent nights crying, praying for things to be back to normal. Mom had enough one day and started packing our bags to move out of this miserable, judgmental town. I remembered her last words to my Dad "you go rot alone in this town."  I looked at Dad as our car wheeled away. After Pinegrove, I was never the same. I mostly keep to myself, my heart hardened with pain. My life in Pinegrove was something that I will never forget because it was where I felt attached and then broken, the kind that made me felt a sting in my chest and made me cry every night, it has made me bitter. For many years, as I try to just get through each day, I have always imagined Elaine or Zola, or just anyone from Pinegrove asking me for apology that they regret what they did to me, but it never came. Mom said to just let it go and let karma perform their much needed retribution. I think karma was selective because the retribution that Mom said never came to Elaine or Zola. Nine years after it happened, the desire to get even, to put justice into my own hands has been getting stronger and I know that it is the only closure that would heal the still tender and gaping wound that I have been nursing.
I was thrilled and couldn't sleep the night before I planned to return to Pinegrove. I dyed my hair a different color, and I look different now than when I was in high school. I'm sure those traditional folks at Pinegrove won't recognize me. When I arrived at Pinegrove, my palms are pooling with cold sweat, I have difficulty breathing and there was a stinging, burning feeling in my chest. I wiped my palms in my jeans. Everything in this town looks the same. I felt the same unwanted and rejected. I remembered hoping for a chance that I think I deserved, but was not given. What happened to me is more than a highschool tiff, it was a character assasination. As always, the new girl in town gets all the attention, but I kept a low profile by not talking too much about myself. I just smile when somebody asked me personal questions and people stopped bothering me when they could not get anything from me. My father decided to move to another city a year after my mom and I left. He never tried to contact us, I guess everybody had moved on but me. My mind almost changed when I became close to Zola's abuela. I applied to be her shop's assistant and I have spent many afternoons with Abuela teaching me the use of each herbs and formulating healing balms and organic shampoo. Abuela had been my ticket to Zola and Elaine's tight knit group and I hate that I have been using her because she is the wise old friend that I never had. One night I volunteered to be Abuela's dishwasher because she said that she's baking muffins and cookies. Fortunately for me, Elaine and Zola were talking about their highschool experiences until the conversation drifts to me. They were reminiscing my relationship with Peter and Elaine smiled smugly saying that I'm really just second best compared to her, but that I'm not really special as I claimed to believe. Abuela said that the town has been harsh to my family and that the town needed to apologize for that. Elaine just chuckles and said that I deserved to be banished and to be guilty for life, if I may quote her exact words "Who does she think she is? I'm Elaine Sommers, Pinegrove revolves around me and I intend to make it stay that way." My ears rang and I dropped the plates, if I never heard that I might have dropped my dark plans and just continue life as Noreen Waters. This is the straw that breaks the camel's back. Elaine  thinks she can just get away from everything. Well, I guess its really time to teach her a lesson that the world does not revolve around her. Every morning, I would give Elaine her non-fat, less sugar, no whipped coffee with little doses of arsenic. Just enough dose to make her appear crazy, to make her see things that were not really there and let the town know that she was not as golden as they claimed her to be. Elaine would be seen in the middle of the night, wearing her long, white night gown, running barefoot along a deserted highway and when asked says that someone was coming after her.  To see her once smug face streaked with terror, makes me feel that somehow justice was served. But the thing with revenge was, once you started it, it is kind of difficult to know when to stop. Every time Elaine loses her mind, I would think of ways on how she can embarrass herself further. To add to the rumor mill that was getting ridiculous everyday, I pick a random name in the missing sections page of a newspaper, Andy Forbes, and let the towns people believe that Elaine has an imaginary friend. Coincidence or not, turns out Andy Forbes is a real person and she's here in Pinegrove. Everyone thought she was the murderer, but turns out she was here to start over again and she was in hiding from an influential family in the city. I know people have started to look at her differently, but it was more of pity rather than hatred. People seemed to understand her rather than judged her, It was the same treatment that I would have wanted back then, but I guess the rules of the world was different for someone like  Elaine and for me. Another problem with revenge is, it can backfire. I was not getting what I needed to move on. I put all the arsenic that I have on hand to the coffee mixture and suck it up to Elaine, poured her praises that she had been used to hearing. I wanted to vomit because she was so full of herself and snatched the cup of coffee in my hands as if I'm her rightful servant. While she was drinking her coffee, I texted her to meet me at the old Knox house at 2am and pretended to be a big shot client from the city.  Elaine confirmed the appointment, even for someone who used to get what she wants, she bends for money and the only thing that makes her feel insecure? Hot shot city entrepreneurs. She wanted to prove that she can be as good as the city people,so when someone from the city texted her to meet an ungodly hour of 2AM, she won't question the strangeness of it.
And while the rest of the town is deep in sleep, Elaine braved the dark and creaky Knox house. If I may say so, she looks divine in her cream colored blazer and matching pants. At least, she would die beautiful. I went out of the shadows and Elaine was annoyed. "You at least owe me a coffee, if this is a prank." And this was her last words to me as she convulsed, vommitted, and splashed her non fat coffee over her corporate outfit. I stared at her as she looks at me with pleading eyes, I know she wants me to help her, as her body writhed from the spasms of pain attacking her body. I looked at her and got confused with what I'm feeling, I pity her but at the same time all the vile and darkness inside of her was finally coming out. If only people could see how rotten she was inside. When Elaine took her last breath, she took with her a decade of pain and bitterness. I left the crime scene sure that the next morning people will find out that their most beloved committed suicide because she had lost her mind.
Next on my list was Zola. I know that I wouldn't have to go to the extreme of killing her because she's relatively nicer than Elaine ever was, but she's still evil because she was an accessory to ruining my life. Elaine and Zola, they both think that they're the most decent people in town. They thought that they were still right even if they're the once at fault, but if they're the once offended they could never forgive. How dare them?! Zola was easier to manipulate without Elaine. I feed into her insecurity of being just a fly in the wall, of her being replaced in Elaine's life. I almost did not need the sweet pea extract to make her lose her mind, but I have to make her see things that were not really there so she can be put away where she belongs, in a mental institution. I guess when I heard about Amy's story, I got a good inspiration for ruining her life. Too bad, this came too late, Zola and Elaine could have suffered in Castlewood.
I was really the one who found out above Jackson. I was the first to know that he is a cousin of Amy. I want Zola to get heavily involved in this case because she has this thinking that she is a hero and that she has to solve everyone's problem, plus I know that Jackson would be her type. I'd like to let her experience the goodness of life before she gets locked up in Castlewood to make her feel how painful it is not to be able to forgive one's self. Oh and I forgot about Lucas. Lucas is a friend from the city and I told him about Pinegrove, he went ahead of me to have a relationship with Elaine, use her and eventually break her heart. Lucas used Elaine to pay his bills and to send money back home to the city. I never really asked Lucas if he ever did love Elaine. I guess I never wanted to hear that someone as wise as he is, could still love that self-centered bitch. He likes his anonymity here and his job at the mechanics shop that he stayed here for good.
It is true what they say about life that it is never fair. But, I refuse to be on the losing end. I have lost a lot and it would only be fair that the people responsible for my many loses would also lose something that they love about. I have accomplished what I came here for, and I feel that this is the right time to move forward to the horror that was Pinegrove.
I pack all my bags and go back to the city to start over again, but before I leave I need to go to Castlewood. Castlewood is not your typical mental institution, perfectly manicured lawns, outdoor tables and chairs. It is a beautiful,  brick building that looks more like an old mansion rather than a clinical, boring place that most institutions look like. Inside it is eerily quiet, none of the screaming, groaning ghost-like sounds that I see on TV. Zola came out of the visiting lounge wearing normal clothes of jeans and a shirt. I was expecting to see her in a hospital gown, the shapeless, thin-fabric gown that makes you look sicker than you really are. If there is such a thing as that. She smiles at me, her hair looks freshly washed instead of the matted, limp, strings that I hoped for. She clasps my hands. She misses me.
"Noreen. Thanks for visiting me. How is everything in Pinewood? Are they still talking about me?"
Conceited. "No, they're not. I think they have forgotten all about you just like how you and Elaine had easily forgotten how you ruined my life!" I pull away my hands and cross my arms so she could not touch me again. Her brows knotted in confusion.
"I don't understand Noreen. How can we ruin your life?"
"You really have forgotten, don't you? In highschool, don't you remember how you ruined my life?"
"Highschool? Wait Noreen, I really don't know what you're talking about. You're fairly new in town. There is no way that I could have done something bad to you in highschool. I knew everyone as Pinegrove is a small town."
I must have really done a good job of transforming myself that not even someone who has done me wrong never recognized me, even if we are rubbing elbows on a daily basis. "Does the name Alex Bailey ring a bell to you?"
"Yes, she moved away in senior year.  What does Alex have to do with you?" Zola still look confused. She really is dense and nothing than a mere shadow of her evil friend Elaine.
"I'm Alex and you ruined my life." I'm proud of myself for the calmness when I said this. I stared into her eyes not blinking. Hoping that she marinades in her own shame that her biggest mistake is staring right in her eyes.
"We were just kids Alex. How can kids ruin your life? It was just a silly rumor."
I thought Zola was nice compared to Elaine, but really they were just two peas in the same pod. This is worst, Zola use the youth card to get away with her mistake and I can see that she's not even sorry. " I was a kid too, but the silly rumor mill, it never stopped until we get out of town and ruined my parent's business and marriage. Zola, this is the price you have to pay for the things you did not say. If you're not sorry for what you did then you better rot in this place and I want you to know that you never really lost your mind. This is all part of my wonderful plan."
I sit back and watch as she process everything.
"Did you kill Elaine too?" She asked, her eyes wide.
"Yes I did. Remember how you thought me about the herbs? I concocted the same poison that you tried to kill her with. The lip balm for Amy? But Elaine was so greedy that she took what is not meant for her. You were guilty for Elaine's death. The balm did not kill your evil friend. I gave her coffee triple the dose of what you put in that balm. Talk about giving her a taste of her own medicine."
Zola cries and run to the one in charge of the visiting lounge. "I'm not insane, but that woman over there is. She is Alex Bailey and not Noreen. She drugged me to see things and she killed my bestfriend. You have to believe me." The officer in charge look over me, but it's my word against hers. Zola continued explaining, flailing her arms in desperation. The officer tries to calm her and when she doesn't calm down she was gently drag back to her room.
At last, the universe seemed to be in my favor. This is what the other half of life looks like, when you get what you want.  At this point, I cry and tell the person in charge that Zola slapped me and that she's becoming violent. Zola stared daggers at me while shouting "You have to believe me. I'm not losing my mind. She drugged me and she murdered my bestfriend." The big nurses in the facility held both her arms as she tried to escape. She flailed her arms and stomp her feet. She was injected with tranquilizer because she suddenly dozed off and she was carried away back into her room.
The nurse said sorry for the incident. I feel certain glow in my heart with the word sorry. For so many years, people have wronged me but they never thought to ask for forgiveness. While I say sorry for all the little things, like sneezing in public. I have always believed that if you consciously avoid doing bad things to other people, people would do the same for you but, no life is unfair. Sometimes karma lets most people get away with bad things. It favors the beautiful, the popular, and the powerful. But, it doesn't have to be that way. Maybe in my case, karma just needed a little nudge.
I drive away from the drama, the pain, of Pinegrove. I hope that from this time I will never have to do what Karma should have done.