The following content contains triggering content such as self harming. Viewer discretion is advised.
/ Audrey Tan hasn't got everything. Everyone else did. At 16, she's disfigured after an incident in school. Now, she has to try her best to cope w...
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It does feel kind of sad when you eat alone for recess.
It feels like isolation, as if everyone is walking past you, giving you a glance – pity, mockery. Poor girl, she has to eat alone, does she have no friends? I bet every one hates her, maybe that's why.
What a fucking shame.
I am eating one of the rice meals from the rice stall in the school. It is cakey, dry white rice, toppled with some kind of chicken that was marinated and soaked in at least a dozen different sauces. More isn't better. It is not that good, almost like eating soy sauce from the bottle. But I cannot argue. I fall asleep in class almost every time I skip a meal. Besides, the queue for the other stalls are almost thrice as long... And the lady maintaining the stall is sickeningly nice, and it makes up for the despair I feel in school in some weird way.
I have just stuck the spoonful of rice soaked with the chicken soy sauce, chewing on it mechanically, blinking slowly as my eyes scrolled past the words on the book in my hand. I always have a book by my side, a sort of anxiety oppressor, I presume.
Though, it doesn't always work.
I am on page 54 when I see a figure hovering above me. I figured that perhaps some guy was trying to move to his seat, since the canteen is always packed. My spoon is awkwardly hanging in my mouth, and there is a spoonful of rice pressing against the back of my throat. I awkwardly try to shift my chair so that the guy can move.
Under my breath, I mumbled.
"Sorry..."
It comes out like a weird gargle, and I always rolled my eyes at myself. If my mother was here, she would be fuming to the high heavens, screaming at my table etiquette.
Put your elbows away from the table, Audrey. Don't talk when you eat, Audrey. Can you eat more silently, Audrey?
Why can't you be a perfect daughter, Audrey. Why aren't you like Mrs. Clair's daughter? She's funny and smart, and all you are is you-
"Hey."
I froze. My body is suddenly ice cold. The spoon still laid in my mouth, I let my eyes focus onto the page and the words but nothing is getting through into my mind. I'm not breathing.
"You mind if I sit here?"
It took me a few seconds, but my eyes finally broke away from the book, and they burned as I blinked them.
Zac.
Holy, fucking, shit.
I try to swallow the rice in my mouth, so I could answer him without sounding like a total idiot. But my throat is dry, and the rice is like sandpaper down my throat. I decided I wasn't going to answer him - but then I took a deep breath, and the rice got lodged in my throat.
Immediately, I started coughing. I turned to the side, gagging and coughing out the whole chunk of rice that managed to get into my trachea. The glob of rice, slicked with saliva landed on the ground.
