Short Stories

Veronica

This is in no way a Riverdale thing. I promise. 

~Scar

Veronica looked around, her blonde hair tangling behind her in the wind. Autumn colors surrounded her as she pedaled the scenic trail. The rising sun combined with the colorful leaves gave the illusion that she was pedaling through a forest of fire. The air needled her skin; her fingers began to turn blue. Her lungs ached for air; she took a break to glide down the hill into the park.

She passed a family playing on the playground. The swings squeaked forlornly in the breeze as the children played on the ramshackle playground that crouched like a spider about to devour its prey. There was a man sleeping soundly on an iron bench, covered only by his coat. She continued on past a rainbow of trailers in the trailer park. There were people outside picking the last of the vegetables from their gardens, playing with their children, and heading off to work in threadbare clothes and beat-up cars. Still, she did not stop. She continued to ride until she reached the brick school that was rising like a veteran before her.

She chained her bike up and snuck through the grimy glass doors, down the crumbling hallways, and to her rusty locker. She wiggled the handle a bit before it popped open with a metal-on-metal screech. Veronica placed her tattered books in her locker and hung up her holey jacket. She closed her locker with difficulty and walked towards the locker rooms with her backpack. The locker rooms reminded her of a cave, they were musty and wet-smelling, covered in mold. She walked in and noticed several other girls were already showering. Their chatter echoed off the brick; Veronica turned the sink on and washed her hair with the hand soap.

She finished washing up, borrowed some deodorant from someone, and went out to the hallway. The stench of body odor, cigarettes, and day-old alcohol flooded her nostrils. The kids stood around talking in groups like clusters of grapes. Students' clothes were tearing apart at the seams; many of them had grimy hands, worn shoes, and tired eyes. Veronica pulled her shredded hoodie over her face to avoid a teacher whose class she was failing.

She found her regular group of friends and pulled an apple out of her backpack to share with them. It was her day to bring breakfast for all of them. They shared the apple between the three of them as they walked to their first-hour class together. They counted their money during their first period and calculated that they could afford to buy soup and a sandwich for the three of them to share. Usually, they would have had a bit more money, but Jim had to buy his little brother a birthday present and Tammi had not worked as many hours as she wanted to the previous weekend. They were all of them tattered and ragged, but they were surviving.