How Do You Love Someone?

Chapter 4 - Daddy Never Showed Me How To Heal

Sarah still hadn’t gotten over what had happened at school. She knew that when she went back to school today she would most likely have the same thing happen to her again. She reached over to her bedside table and started doing her homework that Mr D had given the class. It wasn’t until an hour later that Sarah realised that she would have to face Alex and Justine again tomorrow morning. She stopped what she was doing and put her homework away. Turning off the light and laying in silence in her cold dark room she wondered what would happen the next day.

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When Sarah woke up she was upset. Not wanting to go to school she dragged herself out of bed and got dressed. Wearing baggy jeans and a light blue t-shirt she packed her bag and walked downstairs. Ginger was already awake walking around the kitchen hoping to see Sarah before she went to school.

“Why are you still at home mum?”

“I just wanted to make sure that you were okay.” Ginger said smiling at Sarah.

“Why?” Sarah asked

“Because you have to face all those people again”

“This is why I don’t tell you things mum! You never let go of what people have done to you or what they have done to me and then you feel really bad!”

“But that’s because I worry about you” She said still trying to smile.

“I don’t care! I’m not telling you anything that’s happening to me anymore.”

Sarah walked out the door, slamming the door shut. Ginger sat quietly as her smile started to fade with the realization of what just happened. Ginger felt as though she had just lost something and she knew she wouldn’t get it back if she kept asking questions. Ginger walked over to the door, grabbed her bag and car keys and walked out to the car. Ginger’s 1991 Mazda had been a good friend to her since she bought it. It was no one of her only friends, and as she got into the car and turned the key she drove to work.

Sarah was not in a good mood already. Knowing she wasn’t a morning person she knew that what had just happened with her mum had just made her angry for the day. Walking through the gates of the school and walked around the corridors to her classroom and sat in her normal seat, waiting for the class to begin.

“Oh, good morning Sarah, you’re here early.” Mr D said loudly even though there were no other students in the classroom.

“Morning Mr D.”

“Have you done your homework?” He asked, knowing that Sarah always did her homework.

“Yes I did “

“That’s good, you will be one of the few.” He said smiling.

Sarah turned and stared out the window. The classroom was in perfect view of the front school gate. As she looked at who was entering the school she saw Alex and to her dismay Justine, both hand in hand. Sarah knew that the day wasn’t going to go well and when Justine walked through the classroom door, hell had started again.

“Where should I sit today?” Justine said looking around the room. “Oh I know, as far away from the loser!” She said laughing.

Sarah mimicked Justine’s voice and turned to face the window again. Staring into the distance Sarah didn’t realize the time fly by her. When she finally started listening to what Mr D was talking about, everyone was seated, including Alex. Sarah stared off into space again, not paying attention to anything. This made Justine furious as all her remarks did nothing to Sarah. Justine always had to say something mean, and because Sarah wasn’t responding, she through a large piece of crunched up paper at Sarah’s head.

“Hey Sarah just letting you know, you will always be a loser, so you just have to accept it!” Justine was trying to get Sarah rallied up.

Sarah turned around slowly to look at Justine. The whole class went quiet. There was an awkward silence while Sarah thought about what she was going to say.

“Well that’s interesting” Sarah replied

“Really, I though you had always known.” Justine smiled

“No that’s not what’s interesting, what’s interesting is that you think I’m a loser when obviously you have to maintain an image to keep your fiends. They all just use you to get popular. You have parties that you think people will like just to retain you’re school status and you pick on people. You never get to show who you really are and that gets you angry, so you use that anger to bully people.”

“Too bad nothing of what you said was true” Justine looked at her with confidence trying to hide how she was just told off by a loser.

“Okay… class over” Mr D said trying to urge people to leave the room.

Justine got up and walked out of the classroom, holding Alex’s hand. Alex turned back to look at Sarah as to say goodbye but was stopped by a glance of anger from Justine.

Sarah started to think about her dad, and how he still hadn’t gotten over what happened to his marriage. It was a sad story because everything bad seamed to have happened to her dad and not her mum. When he got divorced he lost everything, including his job and even his friends. She was the only thing left in his life. In the back of her head she could hear her dad saying “You have to learn how to let things go and heal with time.” The only problem was, it had been three years and he still hadn’t gotten over what had happened. Sarah realized that in some ways she was exactly like her dad. She still hadn’t gotten over the fact that she didn’t have any friends and she most certainly still hadn’t gotten over the fact that her dad was working from home doing something quite impossible for his brain capacity while her mum was still acting like a child herself. Her life was in ruins and she had no way of controlling how it was going to turn out.