ʍoɹplǝss, ᵇⁱˡˡⁱᵉ ᵉⁱˡⁱˢʰ

013: Smart

Just what I needed to have was a bunch of chattering assholes following my every move. The same thing repeated over and over and over again: I heard Ambrose was caught in a stall with some girl. Is she really going to start up her bullshit again? Couldn't she wait till she got some privacy? Jeez! Really going for girls now, huh. Guess she has gotten desperate. Why doesn't she just—

It never ended.

"Guess I'm going to have to deal with whispers for shadows for a while, huh," I muttered behind my teeth. And with last night, today's going to be a shit show. Fuck, I thought, the want to smash my fingers with my locker riling up my joints.

Dishonorable, dishonorable, dishonorable. That's all I heard. It resounded like a drum in a hollow cave. Like a drill jammed into my ears, ripping into my eardrums until the tip sliced a paper cut on the flesh of my brain. A warning. That much I knew. The drill was so big, yet small. I couldn't reach in and pull it out, crush it under my foot. No, no, I couldn't. Blood was spilling out from my ears, drowning me in the red.

Would I go crazy, insane, mad by the end of the day? The only good outcome would be that this shithole excuse for a school would suffer the aftermath.

The whole morning was a bust. And, summarized, it went as such: placed backpack on floor beside my desk, note flew onto my desk, I tossed it, then another, I tossed it again, a while after, another note, I tossed it, then another class came rolling in, snickers and elbow-shoves to the head while students walked past me while I sat quietly doing my work, the principal walked in, stared at me for the majority of his short little pathetic lecture, then left, and I felt like I had just been searched for drugs.

I'd go insane just to wrench his neck. Rip out his teeth or something. Clean them with bleach, then shove them back into place. Out of order, though. I'd put the molars at front, the buck teeth at the back.

Of course, I'm just joking. I'm just incredibly, unbelievably angry. A conflagration was probably lit up in my bones, cracking them with flames.

And, even through all the fire in my body, all I could hope was for Billie to be fine. That the rumors had not wedged themselves somewhere inside that pretty brain of hers, like the thorn of a rotting rose.

It's lunchtime. Where is she? I hope she won't start avoiding me now. I could go look for her. . .

"Ambrose!" A blonde head of hair blocked my blurred, spaced out vision. I blinked. She's here. Golden halo and all.

"Billie?" My voice was hoarse. Had I spoken out loud at all throughout the day? I couldn't remember. I reached up to caress the column of my neck.

"Woah. Did a cat scratch your throat or something?" She sat down, wearing a skirt, I noticed, and shined her pearly eyes, with a pearly smile decorating the bottom half of her face.

"Guess so." I cleared my throat, but it didn't work much. It felt raw and ache-infused. "Weird."

"Need a cough drop?" She pulled one out of her chest pocket, the color of the wrapping blending perfectly with her hair.

"You just... have a cough drop?"

"Well, yeah." Billie placed it on my hand. It's a pale yellow thing, oval-shaped and jeering. I unwrapped it, the color of the drop just a shade darker than its wrapper.

"Thank you," I said before plopping it into my mouth, savoring the bitter, cold flavor.

"Yuck, right?" Billie watched me, eyes set on my jaw. I stared back strangely, her blue pearls becoming warmer, like they're trapped in their cozy clams. The cough drop wasn't that cold anymore.