Mean to Me

Skipping School

Flip flip flip flip flip flip flip I chased the bus for about half a block with their laughing faces taunting me from the window before giving up. Did I really want to show up two hours late for school and face the humiliation of having missed the bus in addition to having to explain to the principal why? No, not really. I started back home feeling around for my keys clearly today is not my day. I must have left them on the hook in my bedroom when I struggled to get myself to the kitchen earlier. I started to detour through the park where there was a particularly good climbing tree that I often sat in when I wanted to be alone. But the uniform makes it difficult even to reach the first branch, so I made do with the tangle of roots surrounding it.

“Hi there!” a relatively small, stout looking girl bounded over to me. She looked kind of weird with her black home dyed hair that showed her reddish brown roots growing through. It looked hideous. She looked hideous (actually she had that look which can only be described as Hatchet Face from Cry Baby – that Johnny Depp Movie). But then I guess you don’t have to look particularly good to fit into her crowd anyway.

“I’m Vikki,” she held out her hand and I shook it because that’s the polite thing to do. After I let go she dropped her self down next to me, admittedly she sat a bit too close for comfort. “Aren’t you one of those academic types? You know a good girl? Shouldn’t you be in school?” she stuck out her bottom lip and spoke in a stupid baby voice which I found unpleasant.

“I missed the bus,” I answered flatly.

“Well, I was going to invite you back to mine, so you don’t have to skip school by yourself. But if you’re going to use that tone...” she trailed off. I felt a little bad, but not as much as I probably should have.

“Sorry,”

“It’s fine,” The ecstatic demeanour returned. “Come on then,” she grabbed my wrist and dragged me off towards the opposite end of the park.

I examined myself sceptically in Vikki’s mirror, which was smudged and cracked in several places. She’d lent me some clothing so I wouldn’t have to wear the uniform all day. Surprisingly the tight pants and shirt fit me despite the extra height I had compared to her. Vikki lived with her older sister in a rundown little apartment somewhere in the more industrial part of the town. Her sister was always working ridiculous hours in one of the factories that made this place famous, fighting to pay the fees to keep Vikki in one of the better schools in the country. The schooling which Vikki skipped almost every day. She was selfish, lazy, had no taste (in music, fashion or otherwise) and I did not like her. But I don’t really like anyone, and she was the most interesting person I have interacted with in a long time, so I didn’t mind putting up with her.

She was currently in the shower so I took the liberty of wondering around the apartment. After thwacking the dust off a fairly clean arm chair, I slid down into it. All the springs had worn through the chairs upholster so it wasn’t very comfortable, but I didn’t want to touch any of the other ones due to the large amounts of questionable substances that laced them.

“Only you would choose that chair,” Vikki laughed “might want to sit down somewhere else love, that chair is specially situated for watching the football...if you know what I mean,”

I didn’t know, but it wasn’t hard to guess, it was probably some kind of sex position. “Come sit here,” she said patting the cushion beside her. I eyed the stains on the chair wearily.

“No thanks, I’ll stand, don’t call me love.”

“That wasn’t very nice,” someone announced to the distinctive crash of Vikki’s apartment door.

I surveyed the new arrivals there was another girl from my year and two boys from the year above, her name was Irene but lots of people called her Rene...I’m pretty sure she hated it. I didn’t know the two guys, but I’d seen them before in the corridors and canteen places like that.

“Jon, Theddy, and Rene,” Irene scowled, “this is...what was your name?” All except Irene looked at me.

“uh, Cully”

“Is that short for something or a nickname?” Jon asked.

“No? Why would you think that?” I wasn’t sure whether or not to be offended by the comment. 

“Well to Cull means to reduce the population of a wild animal by selective slaughter,” Irene turned to us wide eyed “and considering you are the only one of you friend still alive...it could be a nickname,” she @#!*% her head to the side in a crazed jerky movement. The room was tense and silent.

An ache lurched within me, why would she say something like that? Besides I’m not the only one, Marta was still around somewhere.

“Marta Jonsten is still alive, she was a part of that group too you know,” I said quietly.

“You haven’t heard?” She pulled a newspaper from her bag and thrust it into my hands. Sure enough, right on the front page was a photograph on the four of us with the headline “More Teen Deaths in St. Lucille”. I quickly read the first line of the article – The anniversary of the suicide of Lisa and Justin Marks, twins, from the industrial town of St. Lucille sees the occasion marked with the commemorative suicide of their close friend Marta Jonsten.

That was it, my heart exploded then and there. Even if Marta and I weren’t very close, her life was worth more than a “commemorative suicide”. She was never noticed in life and now when I go back to school it’ll be just like when the twins died. People are going to walk around crying and saying how much they missed her and loved her when they all ignored her. It will all be lies. That’s the kind of treatment that drives people like me to breaking point. Right now I feel like a perfectly rational response would be to find a gun and run into the school and shoot the people they care about just so there would be no more lies. Because then they’d really know what it would be like to lose someone they cared about, and what it feels like knowing that they’re never, ever coming back.

However Cully, note to self for next time. Be in a larger space and preferably by yourself when your friends die because you just end up more ugly when you cry. That’s not a good impression to leave in the minds of people who could possibly have ended up filling the spaces that those friends have left behind.

But before I could continue feeling sorry for myself Theddy had encased me in a tight hug. He ended up rocking me around in circles which just made me sob harder. Suddenly the room was filled with the smell of instant coffee and chocolate.

Several hours after spending time in the company of Jon, Irene, Theddy and Vikki when I’d finally finished crying and forgiving Irene, they’d invited me to a party that was being held that weekend. Of course I agreed.