Breaking Faith

by E. Graziani

  In the bathroom I was wrapping the humongous pad’s wings around my underwear when I heard a soft knock at the door.

  “You know you can get pregnant now,” said Gran.

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “And you know how that happens, right?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “So don’t do it, then—you understand?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  That was the extent of our “talk.” Gran was never one for conversation.

  In terms of attitude, I learned that if you had a badass one, people wouldn’t bother you. But I wasn’t that kind of person—I didn’t have the self-confidence or the balls to pull off something like that, so I chose the disappear-into-the-background option, and with guarded optimism, I hoped for the best.

  I sincerely wished that middle school would prove to be a better experience for me, as I couldn’t have tolerated another sad and sorry day at Land Street Elementary.

  Chapter 10

  If elementary school was a nightmare, middle school is an anxiety-inducing, self-esteem-bashing incubus hatched from hell—wait—worse than hell. It’s a place where the bus drops you off so you can be ripped apart piece by miserable piece by your so-called peers. A place you’re so excited to go to right after you get out of elementary school, but within a week you’re wishing you were back in elementary. A place where everybody talks about everybody behind their back then talks about how they hate two-faced people.

  The teachers are there to teach you crap you will most likely never use. They revel in giving you five hours of homework a night and in-school detention for doing something totally harmless.

  The popular kids like the same brands, wear the same clothes, have the same phones, and are there to make you feel absolutely worthless. If you’re not a popular, you can’t win. For example, a person can like the same music as a popular and will automatically be called a poser, but when you don’t like the same stuff as the populars, you’re called a geek/nerd/loser—WTF is up with that?

  You’re just starting to go through puberty, so your face is covered in red, angry pimples, and the people who haven’t gone through puberty make fun of you for it. The Sacred Cows (that’s what I called the popular girls) wear padded bras that turn them into double-Cs when they’re only an A-cup, and everybody hates everybody else and cuts themselves or has body image issues and is bulimic. And everybody fakes Starbucks obsessions when really they can’t stand the stuff.

  I spent my first year at Lakeview Middle School trying to be invisible, but was ultimately unsuccessful. I wallowed in my cloud of Darkness, trying to fade into the shadows. At first, no one from my elementary school gave me so much as a “Hi, Freak, you look like hell today.” And I certainly didn’t speak to any of them, as they were already well established in their respective cliques. The kids from all the other feeder schools were, too.

  I did remember my anger management strategies that Shelley had taught me. I practiced them religiously, though I did show my anger in ways that, now that I look back, were bizarre. I didn’t shower regularly or wash my hair. My clothes were usually scruffy and old—and in truth, I liked it that way. I was content to flounder amongst the multitude of new faces in the hall. Maybe I could stay unnoticed for my entire three years at Lakeview. But, of course, that was not to be, as my skin was starting to break out, my hair was constantly greasy, and my clothes were from Value Village. Now don’t get me wrong, some girls can really do vintage up well in Value Village attire, but I was never one of them. I stood out like a turd in a punch bowl due to my appearance. And that’s just a tiny window into my three years of middle school.

  My gran practically stopped doing all things that a parent would normally do for a kid. She said she had her hands full enough with having to keep tabs on my mom’s current crisis and looking after Des, and that I was old enough to do things for myself. And I still missed Connie terribly—we only saw her once a month now if we were lucky. She was busy with her riding lessons, gymnastics, piano, and God-knows-what-else. I’d talk to her on the phone, though. I’d complain about my horrible days, and she would tell me that I had to try to make friends. Having friends meant I had allies.

  The days came and went, fall, winter, spring, and summer. In that year, Momma turned a corner. The way I see it, when you take drugs for a long time and it looks like you either have to stop or you’ll die, or alternatively, you know you’ll never kick it so you just go at full throttle and hope that the end is quick. Well, I pretty much think she chose the latter. As I watched her spiraling down, my moods sank with her and things got really bad again. The Darkness wrapped itself around me like a heavy shroud, eating away at what little happiness I had. I hated school but at least it was a distraction; home was hell because it gave me too much time to think.

  But in all that hell, in the winter of grade seven, I did find a couple of friends—they were just as screwed up and lonely as I was.

  Norma would wear long-sleeved shirts in the stifling heat, and everyone knew that she cut herself, but she denied it vehemently when people were mean enough to bring it up. Her mom and dad were lawyers and were successful—albeit, only in terms of the lawyer part, because if you’re a successful parent, your kid isn’t inflicting gaping wounds on her arms.

  Norma’s parents moved into the school catchment area just as part of their hipster-lawyer-urban-renewal lifestyle, latching on to the latest trend of re-gentrification of old houses in the downtown core—this according to Norma—whatever. Anyway, she came from affluent suburbia to inner city Lakeview Middle School, where the “have-nots” outnumbered the “haves” five to one—what a culture shock!

  And then, there is Ishaan—kindhearted, sweet Ishaan. He has been the victim of hounding from both his father and schoolmates for most of his young life. Ishaan is gay, but unfortunately for him, our school population and, more importantly, his father have not progressed enough to be able to accept someone who is not like the majority of our middle school male jock, nerd, or emo population.

  Norma’s parents were always working, and she lacked any kind of direction from them—except when they occasionally interacted with her to critique her defiant attitude, sullen behavior, and school marks. Ishaan had only his dad, who was a stressed-out dry-cleaning store franchisee trying to make a living supporting Ishaan and his two older sisters, who were both in university. His mother died shortly after she gave birth to him, from complications due to a stroke.

  I met Norma in January of grade seven.

  ...

  I’m in one of the study carrels in the school library, hiding from the rest of the student body. I hear someone say hi, but it can’t possibly be directed at me, so I keep reading my graphic novel and take another bite of my sandwich.

  “Hi.” I look up, wondering who else would be in the library at lunch—usually it is only me and a few teachers, who try their hardest to ignore me. I turn my head and there stands a girl in a floppy maroon sweater and leggings. Her brown hair is styled so that her bangs fall over her eyes, which are hazel gray and almost the color of smoke.

  “Hi?” I respond in a suspicious tone. My eyes do a quick sweep around to see who else is there, in case this is a prank.

  “You’re in my English class, right?”

  “I don’t know.” I genuinely don’t, because I sit at the back, always enter through the rear door, and the only view I get is of the back of people’s heads.

  “Yeah, you are. I’m Norma. Do you have yesterday’s notes? I was absent and so was my other friend in that class. I skipped out, kind of.”

  “How do you ‘kind of’ skip out—you either do or you don’t—and how do you skip out in middle school?” I was intrigued by this concept. Most days I could manage school, but sometimes I begged Gran to let me stay home if I was having a really bad Dark spell. She always sent me to school, even if I had a fever and was coughing up a lung.
“Didn’t they call your parents once they realized you weren’t there?”

  Norma tilts her head, looking mildly inconvenienced at having to explain herself. “Actually, I just stayed home all day—I faked that I was sick. My parents are too busy to argue with me, so they just call the school and clear me. Now, do you have yesterday’s notes?”

  “You fake sick but you want notes so you can catch up?” To me that sounds contradictory.

  “That’s my parents’ condition—they clear me but insist that I keep up—I’ll just photocopy them tonight and bring them back.”

  Still suspicious, I reach for my English binder, which is tucked away in the corner of the study carrel. “I don’t take notes, but you can have the handout we got.” I extract it from the mess of papers sticking out of my binder.

  “I’ll return it tomorrow.” Her voice has a flat quality, like she’s bored with me already.

  “Whatever,” I say. “It’s not like I’ll ever look at it again.” I go back to my book.

  I have no further contact with Norma, until I meet Ishaan.

  About a month later, I’m having a particularly bad day. I had set my alarm clock the night before, but as usual I had trouble sleeping and I slept right through it. Gran is working most mornings, so Des and I can’t rely on her. I just grab whatever is on the floor of my room, almost stepping in the cat litter, and rush Des out the door. I go to school looking like a disheveled mess, with a perpetual hair tangle at the back of my head that I try to smooth over but never quite manage to unsnarl.

  “Oh—my—God,” I hear one of the girls say as I board the bus and walk to the back. Someone giggles. Others pretend to ignore me until I walk past them, and then they snicker and whisper. Everyone avoids eye contact with me, even the losers, who are still a rung or two above me on the social hierarchy. I’m pretty much on my own—the lowest freak on the freak totem pole.

  I get to school, go to my locker, endure more stares and giggles, then go to my first class. Again, the looks, snickers, and comments. Why won’t they just leave me alone? Skulking to my seat at the back of the class, I open my book to a blank page and cast my eyes down to wait for the teacher.

  “Oh my God,” murmurs one of the Sacred Cows to her posse, just loud enough so I can hear. “When’s the last time you think she washed her hair?” A wave of laughter ripples across the room.

  “I dunno,” says a kid I call Ass Kisser because of how he sucks up to our English teacher, Ms. Emerson. “Maybe sometime last year.” More laughter. Tears well up in my eyes while thousands of previous humiliations cross my mind. He laughs at his joke, and I put my head down. Still I say nothing because if I do, I will lose control and I know I’ll hurt him. That’s when I hear a shrill voice pierce the laughter.

  “Shut up!” The voice is familiar. “Leave her alone.” The laughter stops, though only for a moment, clearly out of shock that someone’s speaking out. Then the jeers start, not from everyone, just from Sacred Cow, her drones, and Ass Kisser.

  “Oh, look—the cutter’s standing up for Pig-Pen over there!” says Ass Kisser.

  “Who do you think you are, Asshole?” A guy’s voice cuts in. I still have my head down so I can’t see who it is. “Making people feel like shit! You have no right—just leave her alone.”

  I begin to feel the tiniest sliver of relief. Who are these people coming to my rescue? Was one of them the girl from the library?

  “Oh, now the faggot queer speaks.” Ass is angry now.

  “That’s harassment, you idiot. No one should be subjected to that!” says the boy.

  “You know what you’ll be subjected to later, right? You fucking—”

  At that moment, I hear Ms. Emerson’s heels enter the class from the hall. “What did you say, Jack?” I look up and see that she has stopped dead in the threshold of the doorway, her brow is furrowed.

  “Oh, excuse me, Ms. Emerson. I was talking about a gaming event and it just slipped out.” Jack’s entire demeanor changes. He is “smooth as silk,” as my Gran would say. “Sorry about that, Miss.”

  Ms. Emerson looks around the classroom, unconvinced. Everyone’s eyes dart from me, to Norma, and to the Indian boy sitting across the aisle from her.

  “I’d like to speak with you after class.” Ms. Emerson’s brow arches. “Stay behind, Jack.” Jack’s face goes plum red. “Okay, Miss.” He smiles at her as she strides in and places her books on the desk, but when she turns to write on the board, he twists to his right and makes a cutting motion across his neck to the Indian guy across from Norma.

  Indian Guy then proceeds to flip him off, which I think is ballsy, because Jack the Ass Kisser is almost twice his size.

  I can’t believe this really happened. Did two people I don’t even know defend me?

  I keep my eyes downcast, as I don’t have the courage to make eye contact with the two kids who spoke up, but after a while I feel that I owe them at least a thank you. I stare at them until they notice, then I mouth, “Thank you.” Norma shrugs her shoulders and gives me a half smile. The Indian guy nods in my direction. That’s the extent of our exchange that day.

  ...

  The Indian guy comes to English class the next day with a fresh bruise on his cheek—it’s angry red in the middle and purply-blue at the outsides. I have a horrible feeling that he didn’t walk into a door or anything, because Ass Kisser smiles in a most sinister way and asks, “How’s your face today, Faggot?”

  At lunch, it’s all I can do to muster up the courage to venture into the cafeteria and ask him how he got the bruise. If Ass Kisser punished him for daring to defend me, then I had to thank him personally.

  “Hi,” I say softly. Norma and Indian Guy are sitting at the end of a long table, their heads together, scrolling through their Instagram feeds. They look up at me suspiciously.

  “Hi,” they reply in unison.

  “I want to thank you guys for yesterday.”

  “No worries,” says Norma. “This is Ishaan, by the way.”

  I smile weakly at him and survey the big purple and blue bruise just under his eye. “Did you get that because of me?” I gesture toward his cheek.

  “Maybe…. What if I did?”

  I knew it. That bastard Jack the Ass Kisser punched him in the cheek because he defended me. “I’m so sorry. He’s such a jerk. Next time just let him talk. I’m used to it anyway.”

  “No fucking way!” says Ishaan.

  “You can’t ignore that shit,” says Norma angrily. “Ignoring it makes it okay. And what he was saying to you was not okay.” She looks at Ishaan, then back at me. “Even if, and please don’t take this wrong, even if he kinda has a point. You know, about the clothes and the hair…”

  “And the smell,” says Ishaan. “Is that cat urine?” He waves his hand in front of his nose.

  “I do have a cat.”

  “Does he have a litter box?”

  “In my room.”

  “Maybe he’s using your clothes instead,” he says. Norma snorts out a laugh. I smile and, surprisingly, am not offended by what they say.

  “Maybe tonight I’ll move the cat box outside. And use the washing machine to wash my clothes.”

  “Capital idea,” says Ishaan. “Use the shower, too.”

  Norma glares at him, then turns to me. “Sit down with us and stop hermitizing, or whatever you call it, in the library. You look like you could use some friends.”

  “Yeah, but sit a couple seats away,” Ishaan jokes. Norma slaps his arm and I laugh. Our conversation is light—what school did I attend before Lakeview, do I have any siblings, where do I live. I respond and ask the same questions. We come from very different backgrounds—no surprise there. But in an unspoken way, the three of us know that we have one major thing in common—we are outcasts because we are different. I have that feeling I had when I used to talk to Shelley. Like there
is hope for me. I feel a small degree of redemption, a sliver of release from the days at school that I spend alone, which I know are very much my own doing.

  That night, I have a long shower and throw a couple of loads of laundry in the washer, along with some of Des’s stuff.

  Gran looks up from her laptop keno game long enough to see me toting the laundry hamper back to my room. “What in the world? You feeling all right?” Her tone is dry and sarcastic.

  “Yeah, no thanks to you,” I mumble under my breath as I skulk up the stairs.

  I did feel all right—I felt a little better because, for the first time in middle school, possibly for the first time in my school career since grade two, I could say that I had made friends.

  Chapter 11

  Next day, I had friends to sit with in the cafeteria. In order to prove that they had come to the defense of a deserving human being, I had showered, washed and combed my hair, and put on my freshly laundered jeans and sweatshirt. People did double takes on the bus, but thankfully didn’t comment beyond a roll of the eye and whispers.

  ...

  My shoulders are back, my eyes are focused straight ahead, not at the floor, as I walk into English class that morning. If I deserve Norma’s and Ishaan’s support, maybe I’m not a total piece of wasted space after all.

  I sit upright at my desk, not making eye contact with any of the students who are already there. A few seconds later, Ishaan and Norma enter, look at me, and smile. I smile back, able to breathe again. But the relief doesn’t last long. Soon Jack strolls in; his face sports a mix of disdain and disgust clearly aimed at Ishaan. He swaggers toward his desk, but not before intentionally shoving himself against Ishaan’s shoulder and bumping his books against Norma.

  “Watch what you’re doing!” Norma calls out.

  “Oh! Sorry. I didn’t realize my own strength.” Jack snickers at his own lame comment. “Hey, you.” He motions to me with his head. “Why aren’t you sitting up here with your freaky friends?” Some of the kids laugh, but not as many as yesterday. I feel a little hopeful that Jack may be losing some of his audience, yet I’m angry that I’m subjected to constant ridicule because I don’t fit their idea of acceptable or normal or fashionable…or clean.