The Art of Losing Yourself (3 page)

G
RACIE

First period was physical education. Dodge ball. Hurray. I leaned against the wall while foam balls whizzed back and forth across the gym. The boys did most of the throwing. The girls did most of the shrieking. My gym teacher, who stood out of bounds midcourt, spotted me listening to my iPod and crooked his finger, beckoning me to come. I pretended not to see him. He joined me by the wall and held out his hand. “You know better, Gracie.”

Reluctantly, I slapped the iPod onto his palm.

“You can collect this at the end of the day,” he said, just as a foam ball pegged him in the back of the head.

“Sorry, Coach!” Kyle Marcello, one of Franklin High School’s cockiest and most meatheaded linebackers, called from the other side of the court. “I was aiming for Fisher.”

Coach resumed his position at midcourt, my iPod tucked away in the pocket of his shorts. Yuck. I wasn’t sure I wanted it back anymore. Kyle caught my eye, then pantomimed swinging a baseball bat with a teasing smirk on his face.

I rolled my eyes.

One hundred eighty days…one hundred eighty days…

Second period was an upperclassman elective, Introduction to Philosophy, my guidance counselor forced upon me.
“You are a smart girl, Gracie. Your ACT scores are proof. This will be a good class for you.”
When I picked apart her reasoning, the counselor said she saw this as more evidence that I was, indeed, well suited for the class. Never mind the fact that the teacher, short, bald, turtle-faced Mr. Burrelson, reeked of Ben-Gay and sported an eternal string of white spittle that stretched between his upper and lower lips whenever he talked. I stared at it while he handed out textbooks,
The Philosophical Journey: An Interactive Approach
, and droned on and on and on about class expectations.

His soupy eyes lit up when he talked about the importance of analysis and debate. He lost what little student attention he had left when he started throwing out fancy terminology like “ethical decision making” and “moral permissibility
versus moral necessity.” I fiddled with my mood ring, making the color change from yellow to peridot, and made predictions on how many inches Mr. Burrelson’s spittle string could stretch before breaking apart.

As soon as the bell rang, I gathered my things and headed into the bathroom. On my way out of the stall, Chelsea Paxton, an overweight girl in my class, walked in. Chelsea was an outcast, like me. Ever since I arrived in fifth grade, I watched her try everything under the sun to fit in. So far with little success. More often than not, she looked like a kicked puppy, which was why I offered her a smile when we passed each other. Even though she was desperate to fit in with the people I loathed, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her.

Chelsea smiled back, then disappeared into the last stall.

I had worked a couple dollops of soap into a foamy lather when the scene took a decided nosedive. Two of the school’s biggest clichés—Sadie Hall and her trusty sidekick, Jenna Smith—entered the room. As soon as Sadie spotted me, she gave me a slow, critical once-over. “Nice hair.”

“Nice face.”

A pinkish hue blossomed across her cheeks.

A toilet flushed.

I probably should have warned Chelsea to stay put. Sadie and Jenna were relentless when it came to her. They attacked her in person, they attacked her on social media, they attacked her via text messages. What was worse? She never stood up for herself and the teachers did nothing to stop it. I rinsed away the soap as Chelsea appeared. She said a breathless hello to Thing One and Thing Two, then turned on the faucet.

Jenna started making gagging noises.

Chelsea stared down into the sink.

I pressed my lips together.

“It reeks in here,” Jenna said.

I tore off a ream of paper towels.
Stay out of it, Gracie. You can’t afford to get into any more trouble
.

With her head still down, Chelsea moved past Sadie to dry her hands.

Sadie coughed and fanned her hand in front of her nose.

“What is your problem?” The words jumped out of my mouth before I could stop them, echoing inside the cavernous bathroom. Apparently, I wasn’t as smart as my guidance counselor thought.

“
My
problem? I’m not the one who doesn’t know how to bathe.” Sadie gave Chelsea a disgusted look up and down. “It’s the first day of school. She’s not even trying.”

“And some people try way too hard.”

“Excuse me?”

“Is that one bottle of foundation on your face, or two?”

Sadie closed the gap between us, completely disregarding my personal bubble. We stood nose to nose. “Why don’t you do us all a favor and grow your bangs a little longer? That way nobody will have to look at your ugly face. I know Chris would appreciate it.”

My hands took on a mind of their own.

One second they dangled by my sides, the next they shoved Sadie away, hard enough that she stumbled back. Her expression was one of such shock that I laughed. I wasn’t sure anyone had ever dared to push Sadie before. Her face twisted into a mask of ugly. She lunged at me, and somehow, we were wrestling on the floor in the girls’ bathroom on the first day of school. Sadie’s sharp nails dug into my neck. I balled my hand into a fist and connected with her mouth. She yanked my hair. I kneed her in the stomach. Jenna and Chelsea shrieked. The bell for third period rang. And a teacher pried us apart.

My chest heaved.

Sadie’s lip bled.

So much for staying out of it.

Three uncomfortable chairs lined the windowed wall of the school office. I sat in one. Sadie sat in another, arms crossed, facing as far away from me as possible, like I had cooties or something. I stretched my legs out in front of me and tapped the toes of my boots together. Sadie scowled at my feet. I began to tap to Beethoven’s Fifth, humming the tune under my breath. “Dun dun dun, duuuun. Dun dun dun, duuuun.”

Sadie scowled harder. “You’re such a freak.”

The secretary answered the phone and clacked away on her keyboard, ignoring us both.

A half hour earlier, she had called our mothers and kindly asked if they could drive to school. Meanwhile Principal Best invited the two witnesses—
Chelsea and Jenna—into his office. Maybe if he had called Chelsea in first, alone, I would have stood a chance. But Chelsea and Jenna together? That sealed my fate. I may have stuck up for Chelsea, but Chelsea would never, ever stick up for me. Not in front of Jenna.

By the time Principal Best opened his door and dismissed the pair to class, Mrs. Hall had arrived. She was an adult-sized version of Sadie, only with age lines bracketing her mouth and no swollen lip. She was head of the PTA and beloved by all the teachers at Franklin, and although I expected the full brunt of her disapproving stare, she pinned her displeasure on Sadie. A small piece of vindication. Then Principal Best gave Mrs. Hall a friendly handshake and proceeded to apologize for the inconvenience. Actually apologize. Sadie’s Mom might have been willing to give me the benefit of the doubt. Principal Best was not.

He invited mother and daughter into his office.

I resumed my boot tapping.

An hour and twenty minutes had passed since our bathroom kerfuffle. An hour and ten since the secretary called my mother. As if realizing this at the same time as I did, she looked up from her computer. “No sign of Mom yet?”

I shook my head. Nope. Zero sign. Nor would there be. I took her car. And she was probably still passed out on the couch. I touched the scratches along my neck and grimaced at the sting. Principal Best’s door muffled the sound of laughter—one voice baritone, the other more feminine. There was more talking, and then the door opened. As soon as Sadie and her mother took their leave, Best cleared his throat with a loud, guttural sound.

I guess that was as close to an invitation as I was going to get. I stood, fully prepared to fight this battle solo, when the office door swooped open and in walked my mother, of all people, dressed in black slacks and a white blouse, her hair no longer a matted tangle, but pulled back into a mass of curls at the nape of her neck. Nobody would notice the pallor behind her makeup, the slight tremor of her fingers. Those were things noticeable only if you knew to look for them. Most people didn’t know to look, and Mom was an expert at hiding her problems from the world.

“I’m sorry I’m so late. Gracie borrowed my car this morning. One of my co-workers had to give me a ride.” As soon as her attention landed on my neck scratches, her eyes widened. “What happened?”

Principal Best swept his hand inside his office. No friendly handshake. No apology. Not for us. “We can talk inside.”

Mom and I sat in a pair of chairs facing the front of Best’s desk while he took the swivel chair behind. He leaned back in his seat with his fingers steepled in front of his chin, staring at me while Mom stared at him. It was like this long, boring game of Chicken. “Gracie, would you mind telling your mother what happened?” he finally prompted.

I looked at him through my bangs. “Does it matter if I do?”

“Gracie,” Mom scolded.

“I’m speaking to a biased jury.” I motioned to Principal Best, sitting there in his chair all puffed up like a peacock. The guy had a serious case of short-man syndrome. “His mind is already made up. Jenna’s testimony dug my grave, and Sadie’s buried my casket.” I’m sure Best’s set-in-stone opinion of me grabbed a shovel and kicked in. If I’d learned anything from my mother it was that we were all creatures of predictability. Our worlds were most comfortable when we saw what we wanted to see. And when it came to me, Best wanted to see the worst.

“I’m really sorry about this,” Mom said. “I don’t know what’s gotten into her lately.”

Principal Best drummed his steepled fingers together. “You’re right about one thing, Gracie. Our actions do form an impression. Whether you think it’s fair or not, past behavior does have a bearing on what a person believes in the present.”

“So you admit this isn’t a fair trial?”

“You have a history of violence and lying. Miss Hall, on the other hand, has never once been in trouble at this school.”

“Sadie Hall is a bully. You should see the way she treats Chelsea.”