Rebel Girl

1} It Was So Cliche it Needed A Soundtrack.

© Amber Kalkes 2014

Song: "Dumb" By Nirvana

Chapter One: It Was So Cliche It Needed A Soundtrack. 

My life is a crappy pop song.

At least it feels that way as I walk through Jefferson High School. No one notices me and if they do I am quickly dismissed. I don’t smell or anything I just didn’t mean much to anyone here or anywhere really if I'm honest. This seems especially true in a place you're supposed to have a designated area of quarintine. 

Teenage angst feels too overplayed and I’m not cool enough to be a hipster. Popular is out of reach and being a nerd has never been in the cards for me. I’ve haven't even seen half the fandoms everyone is going on about. I suck at sports and my artistic skills are subpar. Sure I can play the guitar and sing but no one knows that. I'll call that a personal decision. Hell, in choir I just lip-synch with the class hoping no one can hear me.

I’m a ‘C’ average student with zero history of boyfriends, friends or even important enough to have a name when the subject of ridicule. I’m kind just known as ‘oh that girl’ which is usually followed with, ‘Isn’t she the one who ate shit last year at assembly’. Okay, the tripping thing I did actually do because I am extremely lame and inherently clumsy but how can I help that?

My activities usually include sitting at home and strumming on my beaten up guitar while watching The Simpsons or listening to music. I also have some odd reputation as a wannabe hipster, which is a classification I didn't even know was a thing. I think it’s mostly due to the fact I use a CD player to listen to, cue gasp, my CDs. Shocking, I know.

The truth is I am just too poor for an I-pod. I don’t even own a laptop. My cell phone was a flip phone from 2006 that my grandmother had bought me before she died. Her estate even still pays for the bill since I never could have.

I could have a job and want to but my dad forbids it. He said it was because I was in high school and needed to focus on that. Again, the truth isn’t that exciting. He just doesn’t want me out making mistakes, like having friends or making human connections in any way.

Luckily for everyone involved, I’m not much of a people person anyway.

If you can talk to me and turn oxygen into carbon there is little to no shot of us hanging out. Selfishly I just don’t want to be talked to. Unselfishly it was for your own welfare to just not even try.

See, I have a bully. An odd state of affairs for someone who just told you I'm practically ignored everyday of my life but its true. The irony is not lost on me. I don’t even know if you can call it a high school experience if you don’t have someone to ruin your self-esteem everyday. That being said with Stefanie Quinn on my ass I don't really need to worry about missing out on anything. 

Stefanie used to live in the same Trailer park as me with her mom. They were fresh off a divorce and had moved from a different town. I was a bit lonely being the only kid in the park and Stefanie and I became friends. When her mom began dating then married some rich lawyer type they moved away. She swiftly kicked me to the curb for more fitting friends and I never really refilled the friend position. I figured I was fine before her and I would be fine after her.

At least that’s what I told myself to discourage any dramatic declarations of loneliness. 

Looking at her now you wouldn’t think she used to wear a dirty tweedy bird shirt and cut off shorts while we played in the mud. Nope, she was high-class stuff now with her designer labels and perfectly groomed appearance. Just as that through crosses my mind though the perfect little queen bee Carrie Dewitt takes her seat and my attention.