don't speak.

chapter twenty-four

Of course it bothered me that I was alone again. It's not something you can get used to – but I'd been by myself enough now to know how to at least survive without the people I thought myself dependent on. And without them to keep me rooted I had to keep myself in control. I had to remind myself again and again that I didn't need them, and that I shouldn't want them – no matter how much I actually did.

"What will you do for a fifty?" Jeremy Rabinowitz howled, throwing a handful of monopoly dollars at me while his girlfriend – Aliyah Shakovitz (better known as Skankovitz) – came over and twerked around me as they 'made-it-rain- colourful bills around us.

"You're all idiots." I grumbled as I continued on my way to class.

Nothing was worse than having to sit in those rooms – assigned to sit next to the people I wanted to see the least and most all at once. I constantly had a tornado of emotions swirling around in my brain as I wanted to be with them, regardless of what they'd done. However, the tug-of-war going on in my mind was a welcome distraction to everything else; because at least if I was distracted I was still in control. Something that had once again become a luxury.

When the lunch bell finally rang I couldn't get out of the classroom soon enough. I got up from my desk and practically sprinted out to the back doors of the school. I needed air. I needed space. I needed a break from being me.

"Hey." A voice rasped from behind me. I turned around to see Maria Willis sitting on the steps, looking very un-expelled as her uncontrollable mane streaked around her head in the wind.

"I heard you were expelled." I sat beside her as she pulled something out of her pocket and laughed.

"I've heard a lot about you miss Maya Hart. But let's not let the rumors get between us." She unzipped the zip-lock and put some white powder on her finger, "You want some? I only share with people who are also in fucked up situations." I hesitate for a moment, seeing a shimmering, glittering, Riley floating around my head telling me to know better. Before I can say no my stomach lets out a grumble and Maria laughs.

"It'll help with that too. The not eating thing." I turned away. It wasn't some body image issue or something superficial that kept me from my meals, it was the hunger. It drove me to grip on to the steering wheel in my mind and keep control. To stay here, in spite of my isolation. Finally, I tell the shimmering, glittering, Riley to go fuck herself and nod to Maria, admitting that I'd never done anything of the sort before,

"It's fine it's just like this." She demonstrated, and before even asking what it was I snorted the white powder and felt a moment of relief, followed by a drop a regret. We did it again and again, just for that brief moment of where we could breathe before the inevitable crash. Eventually I could feel nothing but euphoria.

"You know what?" Maria yelled, my head was now resting on her lap. "You should go inside and tell your friends they're living proof evolution can go backwards."

"My body is tingling."

"They don't deserve you!"

"I feel like my soul is on vibrate mode." I held my hands in front of me and couldn't tell if they were shaking. Was I dying? Did I care?

"You need to march inside right now." She propped me up against the wall while I stared with unbreakable concentration at my tremoring hands. "And tell them that they're a bunch of pricks."

"YEAH!" I shouted more enthusiastically than I intended to – but it felt right. I felt so self-assured, like I could do anything. With Maria's support I trooped back inside and looked for my friends. I ran into Farkle in the hallways and immediately went off on him.

"I am better than ever and it's no thanks to you. Everything I am is in spite of you and we were never friends. I told myself Maya don't trust people. Maya there's no such thing as a good person. Maya they'll leave you some day. And guess what? I was wrong. Right? No I was wrong. Because I left you. Look at all you lost." I twirled around with my hands above my head.

"Whoa, Maya calm down." Farkle stepped forward, gently placing his hands on my shoulders. He took a step forward and look at me like he was studying me, "Are you high?"

"High up in the clouds looking down on you." I crossed my arms proud of my insult when, in retrospect, a kindergartener could have probably come up with a better offense. "You, and Lucas, and glitter Riley can all fuck-your-selves." I clapped between syllables and he rolled his eyes and guided me to a less populated part of the school.

"Lucas lost his football scholarship to Wash-U when they found out he was associated with 'a prostitute'. Princeton was threatening to pull me out of early admissions because I wrote about you being my hero in my application essay. All of our futures were in jeopardy because we're associated with you. So we all thought we'd keep our distance until the representatives can come address the situation and clear all of our names."

"Bullshit! Fuck your associations yoooou could have just told me! I would have understood but nooo." I covered my eyes, distracted by the light. Farkle held my hands, dropping his voice to a whisper,

"It's so much more than that. We're all trying to protect you Maya." He looked over his shoulder like he was afraid someone would hear him. "Trust me."

"Give me five dollars."

His eyebrows knit together, "What?"

"Give me five dollars." I repeated with the same tone, holding out my hand. Reluctantly, he pulled out his wallet and placed a crisp Lincoln in my hand. I shoved it into my back pocket and grinned.

"What did you need that for?" He sighed, looking as fed up with me as I'd been feeling with him. I walked forwards and grabbed his face with both of my hands and kissed him until he pushed me away. I laughed shaking the money in front of him,

"It was payment for my time." I chortled as I shuffled away, my palms still shaking when I went back to where Maria was. She'd left her jacket and a notecard but she, herself, was absent. I picked up the card and it read, 'M, same time tomorrow? –M', I smiled and held the card to my chest. At least Maya Hart had one friend.

When I got home I slammed my bag on the floor, immediately regretting it as the sound seemed to resonate in my brain.

"What the hell is this?" My mom stormed up to me, "Farkle called me today to tell me that you were high? Is this true? Is this what you've been doing in your room instead of eating dinner with your family?" She was flustered, and I had to remind myself it was just because she cared.

"I wouldn't trust anything that Farkle – or any of them - say mom. They all think Liam is telling the truth. That he paid me for that night." I could tell my mom thought I was deflecting and, to be fair, I was. So I decided to meet her half way, "I still won't be joining you for dinner but I'll leave the door open in my room if you don't believe me."

"Maya honey do you want to go out somewhere to eat? You've skipped out on family dinners for the past week now. I can make something different." I shrugged her hand off of my shoulder,

"I'm just not hungry when you guys eat. But I eat mom. I snack all the time." I grab an apple off of the counter to prove my point, but I roll it down the fire escape as soon as I get in my room. I'm not losing control. Not today.