How to Fall Apart

Chapter One

The first thing that I was aware of as I woke up was the taste in my mouth: stale vomit and cigarettes. I had no recollection of throwing up or smoking. I didn't even remember coming home, although it felt like I was in my own bed. I wasn't ready to open my eyes yet to check. I felt under my pillow for my phone, a hand-me-down iphone 5. It was a piece of junk with a cracked screen and only held a charge for a few hours, but it was my prized possession. My hand closed around it and I opened one eye half way to check the time, it was just after noon and the sun was shining entirely too brightly into my small room. Keeping one eye squeezed tightly shut I text Alissa. So this is a hangover?

My best friend du jour text me back within minutes. LOL eat something greasy and drink some gatorade, you'll be fine! I say best friend du jour because since moving to Rapid City a month and half into the school year I had lost friends faster than I lost hair bands. Everyone wants to be friends with the new girl for a minute. The cheerleaders were curious about the tall, thin, doe eyed girl until they realized that I was not cheerleader material. I am neither cheerful nor a leader. The athletic girls lost interest when they discovered I possessed the coordination of a newborn giraffe. The smart girls took a little too long for smart girls to see that I did not fit in with them either. I guess my intent doodling in class resembled note taking so I had them fooled for about a week. Fitting into a particular group was more work than I was interested in doing. 

Before you start feeling sorry for me in my loser-dom, let me be clear that I don't really mind being alone. It wasn't as though I was desperately trying to be friends with any of the girls that briefly took me under their wings, I just went along with it until they stopped inviting me to sit with them in class or at lunch. I wasn't rich, or outgoing, or extraordinarily pretty, or even very friendly. I got average grades and wasn't interested in sports or clothes or gossip. I was just there. 

I drifted from group to group for a few weeks until I ended up sitting alone at the end of an empty table in the cafeteria drawing a picture of a framed poster that was bolted to the wall. That's when Alissa sat down across from me, ripping chunks off of a bagel and shoving them unceremoniously into her big mouth. She didn't say anything at first, just watched me watching her, so I went back to my drawing.

"You're Veda." She had stated, mouth full of half chewed bagel. It wasn't a question so I didn't answer. "I'm Alissa, I'm in your chemistry class." My skepticism must have registered on my face because she went on to say, "Well, when I go anyway. I hate science." I just nodded, unsure of why she was sitting across from me and what she wanted. "It seems you have completed your tour of this school's finest cliques and seeing how you are not sitting with any of them it is clear to me that you just might be cool enough to be my friend." Her big mouth spread into an infectious grin, showing off a charmingly crooked top canine tooth and in spite of myself I grinned back at her. I'd eaten lunch with her the rest of the week and she even attended chemistry, rolling her eyes and throwing tiny crumpled balls of paper at me throughout the class. 

Despite my lack of caring on the friend subject, I found myself seeking her out in the mornings before school and even texting her after school. Alissa said outrageous things and her stories about her extracurricular activities were wild and only half believable, but she was fun. Her energy was contagious. 

So when she invited me to go out with her on Friday night it only took minor convincing to get me to call in sick to my job at Dairy Queen and lie to my mom. Work was easy, they liked me because I was a hard worker and didn't mess around like the other high school kids. They believed me right away that I was too sick to work and hoped I felt better soon. Mom was even easier because she was entirely too excited that I had finally made a friend.

"I thought you had to work?" Mom had asked.

"Yeah," I answered slowly, mind reaching for a lie. "I, uh, read the schedule wrong," I smiled at her convincingly.