Aether

Chapter Five

Over the next two weeks, my school and social lives sit on equal par as I struggle through assignment after assignment, as well as preparing my cheerleading team for our final farewell at our graduation ceremony. My weekends are taken up by parties, and my weeknights are filled with study, giving me little time to spend with my mother. I attempt to apologise to her a few times, but she just tells me not to worry about it, reminding me that "I was in year twelve once".

In fact, I'm actually quite proud of the way I'm handling things, which is why I lose my shit on the first day of October when I'm told that my efforts are going to waste.

It's the end of the school holidays, and even though I would rather be anywhere but at school, I've called an emergency cheer practice because some of the girls are a little unsure of the routine and we're behind schedule. We begin to go through some of the moves, when Britney suddenly stops, causing three other girls to walk into her.

"Why the hell are we doing this again?" she whines, studying her cuticles. "I could be with Joseph right now, but I'm stuck here with you shouting at me."

"I'm trying to help you out," I tell her, gritting my teeth to keep from throttling her.

"All you're doing is boring us with your shitty choreography," Lisa pipes up, one of the girls who took Britney's side in the Joseph argument.

Before I can react, half of the team are shouting accusations at me, led by Britney.

After a minute, I'm done. "Shut it!" I shout at the top of my lungs, and my voice echoes out over the oval long after the girls become silent. "I am here for those who want to be here. If you aren't one of those girls, leave. Now."

I expect the girls to mutter something under their breaths but stay put and shut up, but I'm surprised. Half of the team turn around and start walking away. Britney stays just long enough to say a quick farewell.

"Fucking whore," she spits, and then turns around.

Suddenly, my arms feel like lead, and it's like everything around me slows down as I glare at her retreating back. Suddenly, Britney trips over a suspended root - that I could swear wasn't there a second ago - and goes sprawling face first into the grass. The girls who've stayed to practice laugh so hard that they're wheezing, and Britney runs away, red in the face - whether from embarrassment or anger, I'm not sure.

"Now, can we continue?" I say, and the remaining girls show their eagerness by shouting: "Yes, Captain!"

When I arrive home and see another mark on my back, I'm not even surprised. I've already noticed that a new mark arrives every time something spectacular and unexplainable happens around me. I don't know why it happens, but I've accepted that no one is drugging me and tattooing me while I'm unconscious, and for some reason being unwillingly tattooed seems far less plausible.

The new mark isn't as easily deciphered as the first three. It's a circle containing two diagonal lines running perpendicular and intersecting in the centre, forming two mirroring triangles with a line near the point on each, almost like the snow-capped peaks on a mountaintop. Because of the number and size of the marks, the fourth mark is all the way up between the lower part of my shoulder blades, and I hope that I don't get many more, otherwise they'll become visible when they reach the nape of my neck.

I try and hide them from Mum as much as possible, because I don't want her to freak out like the last time she saw them, particularly because there are more.

On a lighter note, I've already had 80 people RSVP to my birthday - which is practically my entire year level at school. I decided not to be nice, so I didn't invite Joseph or Britney, which means it's going to be a great night.