May Kill Me

Six

Delete.

Why was I typing in all caps? I sounded angry in my text. I didn't want to sound angry. I wanted

to sound serious, yes, but not angry.

And the other thing: did I actually want to renew communication with Jonathan after not speaking to him for over three months?

Twisting spaghetti around my fork, I kept reading and rereading maybe: Mia Batista Ortega's text. I tried to picture in my mind how she got my phone number, and how ballsy she was for actually texting me. Was it a conversation she had with Jonathan about people he used to date, and I came up? Maybe her exes came up too.

And what kind of person was Mia Batista Ortega? Her Facebook profile didn't reveal much, which made me think that I was either blocked from it or that she had an alternative profile that wasn't meant for potential employees and family members.

There were four pictures in total: a graduation snapshot with Mia embracing another girl, a Christmas photo of her family all wearing the same ugly sweaters, Mia dressed as a witch for Halloween, and a final photo of her with sunglasses at a beach. I did find out that she attended Sarah Lawrence. In fact, she marked last year as when she began school. This meant she was either older than Jonathan or graduated early. And there was one more thing, something that caught me by surprise.

A post of I Forgot That You Existed by Taylor Swift was one of the very few dotting her feed.

The post got over 100 likes and twenty comments. One comment from someone called Allison LeRoche read: A choice, not a mistake.  

***

I found the neatly folded piece of legal pad paper taped to the front door of the apartment with tape when I came back home from school on Monday.

The writing was big and bold, written in what looked like a Sharpie.
While I agree with what the note said, but ultimately found it mildly disturbing that someone went through the trouble of writing it, coming all the way to the apartment complex, sticking it to the door, and then leaving while marinating anonymity. The note wasn't there in the morning, so whoever hung it up must have left school early or during lunch break so they could do it without being seen.

The buzz of conversation and whispering seemed to have followed me through the day wherever I went.

Girls' bathroom, bam! 

A group of girls would stop talking as I walked in, eyeing me with a mix of disdain and sympathy. In classrooms, eyes would burn into my back. And I came to realize, that it was not so much what the said, but the fact that he said it at all. 

Before Jonathan, I was a nobody, and not in the offensive sense of the word. What I mean to say was that I was just as anonymous as whoever wrote that note. I would walk the hallways, and sit in class, and no one, literally no one, would care. Oceane Becker was just another face in a sea of faces dotting the landscape of our high school. 

I didn't stand out in any way, shape, or form: not academically or artistically inclined, I was (in my own opinion) rather average. Or at least so I thought. Because there had to be something about me that attracted Jonathan Bauer's attention, something that made me stand out from the crowd. Something that made me special.

Well, whatever that was, it came to bite me in the ass.
Mom always said I was a pretty girl, and that I had a striking face. Don't all parents think that about their kids? And anyway, was a pretty face enough to sustain a relationship? Jonathan was a very good-looking guy, there was no doubt about it. My mom never really warmed up to him, but even she admitted that he was a very handsome young man. So was that all we had in common, attractiveness?

***

It was early June, and I was standing next to my locker, getting my calc. book out when I heard a barrage of laughter to my left.

Turning, I saw Jonathan and his buddies — Eric Nam, Chris Johnson, Ryan Goldberg — the golden boys of Columbus High, cackling at something Jonathan was saying.
He didn't even look at me. He hasn't been looking at me for a while now. But how the hell was it even fair? How did Jonathan get this free pass after humiliating me at the party, after hitting me? His life just went on as if nothing happened. If anything, it almost felt like people liked him even more now.

The thought of it made me so mad that I could see myself in my mind's eye marching up to him and slapping him really hard across the face for all his buddies to see.
"... I know, right? That's so messed up!" The locker next to me slammed shut, making me look away from Jonathan.

Serena Pugh and Veronica Cho walked away from the lockers, the soles of their tennis shoes squeaking against the linoleum in a steady rhythm.
Their heads were close together as they walked, still engrossed in whatever conversation they were having.

I noticed it then, looking down, a single drop of blood at my Conversed feet.
Unclenching my fist, I saw the shards of blue plastic digging into the palm of my hand.
In my rage, I snapped my multi-colored BIC pen in half.