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Carissa decided not to leave her house during her three day “vacation”, as Randy called it.  She spent most of her time in her room reading and writing, taking the occasional break to pee and shower.  In the afternoons, she would clean the living room, hall, kitchen, and bathroom.  By the time Randy had gotten home from work, she was back into her room. 

Carissa and Randy had barely talked since Saturday.  They spoke the normal good mornings but they had not said a word to each other in the evenings.  Carissa would come out of her room long enough to grab something to eat or a drink and went back, but that did not matter.  Randy spent every minute, when he was at home, in his room.  Carissa was not sure what he was doing but she did hear the sporadic arguments assuming he was talking to Casey.

Carissa did call April at least once a day.  They did not talk about anything.  They just chit chatted and proudly relived the fight in every gory detail.  April did hear that Destiny was not at school and there was a rumor that she had swapped to Bartlett but there was no confirmation of that on the student level except for Destiny’s absence.  For Carissa, life seemed to be straightening itself out. 

Carissa had not seen nor attempted to talk to David.  She was not sure why.  She missed him deeply.  It had only been a few days since they last parted ways but she thought maybe he would call her or try to stop by her house. 
Maybe he just hasn’t had a chance.

On the last night of Carissa’s suspension, she sat in her room thinking about all that had happened since meeting this boy.  She had found strength in herself she never knew existed.  Sure, she was strong but she never would have thought that in her short life that she would ever start to think things were looking up.  Friday, she found out she was pregnant. Saturday, she was raped by her father.  Sunday, she mended her relationship with her best friend.  Now, on Wednesday night, she was…
Optimistic? 
She was beginning to confuse herself.

Carissa decided the best idea she could possibly have is to assess the situation.  She was sure she had had miscarriage on Saturday. 
Well, pretty sure.
  She hated herself for knowing losing the child would be for best.  However, everything else seemed to be looking up for her.  Carissa’s hope made her uneasy, though. 
I am a seventeen year-old girl who may or may not be having my father’s baby.  I have to go back to school tomorrow and face everyone.  I have not seen David in days.  My little sister is gone.  My mother is dead.  My alcoholic stepmom knows I’m pregnant.  What the fuck am I so happy about?
  Maybe, it was the fact that Randy was leaving her alone. 
There is that.

When the morning light broke through Carissa’s curtain, the beam fell on an empty pillow.  Carissa had been up since 5:00 am partly due to too much sleep over that past three days and a little excitement.  It was strange for a high school student to be excited about going back to school but she was.  She was going to be with her friends, she wanted to see if the rumors about Destiny were true, and she wanted to see David.

By 7:00 am, Carissa had already taken a shower, dressed, and was heading down to the bus stop.  She was not surprised to be the only one waiting seeing as she was there twenty minutes before the bus was going to arrive.  She leaned against a pole, then started walking around in circles.  With all that she was anticipating with the end of her suspension, a clear thought was hard for her to separate.  So she kicked rocks, spun around a sign post, kicked at a telephone pole, and stepped on an ant hill belonging to what she was sure was the last above ground colony till summer. 

“Hey, freak,” Scott’s voice called from behind.  Carissa was actually excited about seeing him.  He had kept his distance since the whole unrequited Carissa and Rob love paradigm. 

“Hey,” Carissa said hiding the excitement in her voice but when she hugged him he knew she missed him. 

“Hey, guys,” Rob said jogging from the other direction.  She reached out and hugged him too.  It was strange to Carissa how much she missed them.  “And…for lunch,” Rob fished around in the pocket of his backpack and pulled out a tiny plastic bag with a little pot in it.  Carissa smiled, trying her best to be excited, but she knew she was not going to smoke…just in case. 

“So, Destiny hasn’t been at school since you beat her ass.  I heard she left!” Scott said with the usual low dose of couth.

“April told me that, too.  How is the D-squad taking it?”  Carissa smiled wanting Rob and Scott to definitely apply the double meanings. 

“From behind!” Scott said.  They laughed…hard.  Carissa loved that Rob was not trying to be calm or controlled.  He was not trying to portray some image of some guy she may or may not want him to be.  She could see he was not trying to…well, whatever the hell he was trying to do before.  He was just being her friend again.  They were all three just being friends.  There was no tension or competition or distance.  They were all together again, at the bus stop, at least for now.

The familiar squeal of the brakes rode on the breeze as the bus rounded the corner two blocks down.  Carissa was excited but trying to hide her anticipation.  The bus seemed to take on a glow as it hit the chilled morning sun.  She thought it odd she had never noticed before.  However, the bus driver looked the same.  The best interpretation, pretty fucking pissed to be driving a fuck load of high school kids this early in the morning.

The bus stopped, opened the door, and Rob and Scott hurried on.  Carissa stood back for a second.  She knew David may be in there but she also realized that everyone is seen differently after returning from the “cooldown period” described in the school handbook.  She was not sure what to expect.  In her best case scenario, Carissa would be greeted by grateful victims of the reign of bitchdom that Destiny and her minions had consumed the school with for the last three years. The worst case, everyone was pissed that Carissa had fucked up the face of the precious Destiny, and that…Carissa knew she could live with. 

Carissa walked to the top step and scanned the people in the seats.  Rob and Scott were making their way back to the same empty seats they always sat in.  Some of the kids looked at Carissa grinning, others did not want to make eye contact and yet others could not give a shit.  However, David was not there.  He was not waiting.  He was not looking out a window with his back turned to the isle.  He was not behind someone with a bigger head or hair.  He…just…was not there.

Rob looked at Carissa with an almost omniscient gaze and shook his head.  That was when Carissa realized that Rob had not seen David either.  She closed her eyes tight and her lips began to tingle.  She took a long deep breathe through her nose and out the same. 
I hope I am being paranoid. 

As Carissa made her way back to Rob, a girl grabbed Carissa’s hand, squeezing tight.  Carissa stopped, looked the girl in the eye, but did not recognize her.  It was not that she could not put a name with the face, but she could not remember this girl.  She was sure that she had never seen her…well, ever.  Maybe, she was new.  Maybe the girl thought that Carissa was someone else. 

The girl rose.  She was several inches shorter than Carissa but their eyes never faltered.  Carissa watched the girl’s tears welled.  The girl’s mouth began to shake.  Her big eyes blinked, a drop followed.  She pulled Carissa toward her wrapping her arms around Carissa in one fluid motion. “Thank you,” the girl whispered.  “Thank you so much.”  Carissa did not have to ask.

Carissa was beginning to feel the lump in her throat.  She wrapped her arms around the girl closing her grip tight enough to feel the girls pudge flatten.  Carissa whispered, “No problem.”

“Sit down,” the bus driver bellowed breaking the moment.  Carissa kissed the girls cheek, wiped a few of her own tears and then walked on to the back of the bus joining Rob and Scott but not David.  David was not here. 

The bus lurched forward just as Carissa sat down.  “He hasn’t been to school this week,” Rob said loud enough to be heard over the chattering of and in the bus. 

“Are you sure he didn’t ride with his mom?” Carissa said.

“That bitch hasn’t been to school, either,” Scott said as he rooted through all the shit piled into the bottom of his bag. 

“Really?” Carissa with a slight snap. 

“Really.”

“I haven’t heard anything about them either,” Rob said.  “Probably a stomach bug or something.  That shit has been going around.  Christ, who knows?”

“Got it!” Scott said as he held a rolled up baggy high.

“Put that shit away,” Rob Said.

“It’s just fucking pencils!”

The bus pulled into the lane next to the designated bus lanes which were, as normal, filled with the SUVs and Priuses of the people who could not read a sign or felt they were immune to its application.  Carissa, Scott, and Rob were the last to step off the bus.  “Nothing…ugh!”  April almost knocked Carissa down with her running, lunging, and clearly ill-warned embraced hello.

“Hey, man!  Do you realize we are like fucking heroes?  I have had three different people high five me.  I’ve only been here two minutes.  Kind of cool,” April said with a chopping, scattered laugh. 

“A girl hugged me on the bus!”  Carissa forced her excitement.  She was more concerned about seeing David.  She scanned as many passing face as she could.  When the four said their good-byes and parted for the morning, Carissa tracked down the hall around the corner and into the hall where David’s locker was hoping to see him there.  She did not. 

Carissa turned back making her way through the crowd back to her locker’s hall.  As she passed through the crowd, people were smiling, trying to pat her the back, and a few glares were mixed in.  She did not notice.  She could feel everything closing in on her.  The hall closed into a blackened tunnel with only a small point of light at the end, then black. 

When Carissa opened her eyes, she was on the floor.  People were all around her but she was propped up.  When her eyes finally focused, she could see Mr. Gilbert was the prop keeping her up right.  He had just so happened to be behind her when her legs gave out.  He caught her just before she hit the floor.  He was now waving something, a folder maybe a magazine, in Carissa’s face trying to cool her down.  She really was not hot, he just thought that would be the right thing to do while someone went and got the school nurse.

“Carissa,” Mr. Gilbert said.  “Where the hell is the nurse?” He yelled. “Carissa!  Answer me.”  He sat on the floor, laying her head on his knee.  “Carissa, answer me.”  Carissa’s eyes where glassy and red.  He could tell she was still having trouble focusing but she was swooning instead of passed out which meant something good, he hoped.

The hall chatter settled as the sea of kids parted letting a middle aged woman in a tan cardigan pass.  “Did she hit her head?”

“Not when she fell.  I caught her,” Mr. Gilbert said.

“What happened?”

“I was walking behind her and she fell.  That’s it.”

The nurse grabbed Carissa’s wrist and looked at her own watch.  She then took a penlight out of her pocket and shined it in Carissa’s eyes.  “Pulse is high but her pupils are equally reactive.  That means no concussion,” she said matter-of-factly to Mr. Gilbert.  The nurse rubbed Carissa’s lips with her thumb.  “Young lady?”

Carissa focused on the nurse, “Yes?” It was the first thing she had said since hitting the floor.  “Hey, Mr. Gilbert.”

“Good morning, Carissa.” He smiled.

“Your lips are dry, your pulse is high, and I can hear your stomach from down the hall.  Did you eat this morning?”

“Umm…I don’t think so.”  Carissa said, still visibly loopy.

“You should have.  Help me get her to the cafeteria,” the nurse said pointing at Mr. Gilbert.

They lifted Carissa off the floor.  “Here, eat this,” Mr. Gilbert pulled a tootsie roll out of his pocket.  Carissa smiled as she chewed.

After the nurse felt that Carissa had eaten enough breakfast and that her blood sugar had sufficiently risen, which she gauged in the color of Carissa’s lips, she took Carissa to the nurse’s office for a “more thorough check up.”  The nurse poked, squeezed, prodded, pressed, and shined a light in every hole she was legally allowed to look in at school and by her state license.    Carissa felt a little like a pet and a lot like a subject and now the humiliation was setting in.  In the middle of all the bodily intrusions, “I’m Nurse Jan. Better known as The Nurse.”

The Nurse took careful notes, looked back over them, then clenched her teeth on her pen. She then rolled her chair to her desk and started typing.  Although the monitor was facing away from Carissa, she could see it in the mirror on the back of the office door. 
Google!
Carissa’s chuckle was audible, however. 

“You can diagnose anything on Google, if you know what you’re looking for,” The Nurse said.

“I’m sorry,” Carissa was still half-laughing.

“Okay.  You, young lady, either had low blood sugar cause you didn’t eat breakfast, an anxiety attack or both.  You feel your lips or fingers tingling earlier?”  The nurse rolled from her monitor back to Carissa.  “Well?”