Still Alive: Part I

Chapter 5

It's Monday. Ughhh. You roll onto the floor and stay there for a few minutes, dreading the day ahead. You really don't want to see her, or maybe you do. You don't really know. You're kind of disgusted with either her or yourself, and you're not sure how you feel. You drool a bit on the carpet, and finally decide to get up and put on your glasses.

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On Tuesday fencing, you play glove tag as a warm-up, a game where you put fencing gloves hanging out the back of your pants and try to keep everyone else from grabbing it. You swoop down and snatch up a glove first thing, and go stand out in a corner to shove it down the back of your pants. She comes after you, arms stretched open and knees bent. You defend yourself as best you can without hurting her, but then you notice something on her arm that wasn't there before. Three dark red lines, to be precise. You stop suddenly as they catch your eye, and she yanks the glove from your pants and runs off with a grin.

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You spend the next week trying to avoid her and fluctuating between hatred for yourself and hatred for her and love for her and worry for her and wondering if it was your fault and wondering why she did it. By Friday, you've barely seen her the whole week outside of fencing. You don't even know what to think now, and you're feeling kind of sick. You drop by the group of guys that you both hang out with at lunch, and they're eating in the hallway of lower quad A. She's there, of course. A rush of emotions flare up every time you look her way. She's wearing a really nice outfit today; a sea-green tee over a long-sleeved shirt with pale gray and white stripes. The dark skinny jeans give a nice contrast, and her red beaded necklace gives a perfect accent.Why does she have to be so damn perfect and gay at the same time. People who I'm attracted to are officially not allowed to be gay by the esteemed proclamation of screw you. You announce your queasiness and leave to reevaluate everything.

You eventually actually almost puked, so you decide to go to the nurse and skip off the last two periods. Any excuse to skip this bs. Also, you couldn't have paid attention even if you'd wanted to. You never do, anyway.

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You sit on your bed with your chin propped up by your scabbed fists. It has been a week since you woke up to see the red stripes on your arm. You obsessively think about her arm. You know that it was unscathed on Sunday... So it had to be between Sunday and Tuesday afternoon. It probably wasn't done at school... So it must have been something that happened Sunday afternoon or Monday. You wrack your brain to think of something, anything other than yourself as a reason why she did it, but you don't know anything because you avoided her all week. Tears begin to well up and the all too familiar ache in your throat starts again. You just cry into your pillow at your pathetic self.