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The injustice of the world was overbearing and splintering my spine.

Of course school was a piece of shit and everyday was the Clorox drenched breakfasts in the cafeteria that gave the foreboding of the same routine.

Of course I militantly awoke half an hour before riding the bus to school.

Of course I didn’t smile in the mornings while greeting my friends.

What was there to smile to?

And, of course, I never actually paid attention to gossip that wore heavy with cynicism.

I merely drifted.

Out of a student body in which the class photo looked like an overflowing pile of ants, I was barely another dot in the crowded halls.

Yet again, I am affirming, not complaining.

Being invisible is as much a tactic as popularity.

I choose my invisibility to be on at 99 of the time due to my uncaring nature.

They were the ants, and I spent all day longing for a magnifying glass.

I didn’t want their attention.

They were disgusting with their obsessions and greedy need; their music and tall told politics, their ordinary individuality.

So perhaps I’m not so uncaring as I am…annoyed?

Ticked?

A miracle?

Either way, I play my roles correctly in their timing and place and amuse every one, believing I walked on the same ground they did.

But while their fiberglass painted gold yellow brick road is held together by crazy glue, I stand on dirt with moss and the small seedlings of future crops. It’s a treaded road, but used well.

My locker is on the first floor, like every year.

It’s in the Senior section, Known as such by underclassmen who like to get extra’s to look like their ‘in’, the third in the top row at the far end where the stairs leading to the boys locker, architecture, woodshop and JROTC rooms are located.

It has a message from several years back reading, “I LOVE BRUNO” Easy to spot from far away as our school mandates to have a uniform lock.

Meaning 4 from every student for the school treasurer to suck on. This year, they are all red knobs.

I have second lunch after art and therefore see a large portion of my friends who seem to have enough money to buy pizza every day.

Although ‘friends’ isn’t a correct way to categorize but has commonly deteriorated to the meaning, ‘Someone I hang out with; doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll enjoy talking to you, but I don’t want to hurt your feelings so you don’t leave me alone.’

So I tolerate people closer to my likings and often find myself daydreaming or sinking into a conversation I’m afraid to answer in the case I might be too rash.

I dislike school.

And not just High School, which it seems, would make sense to my parents or even a therapist. No, I hated kindergarten till now.

My childhood seems to have loop holes, so I thankfully can’t remember every reason I hated school. But the few that still run deep as scars are white and the contrast is clearly visible from a number of feet away.

One of them, being Jorge.

His name in my mouth is like gnashing sand.

A coincidence, that Jorge was a cousin too many times removed to technically still share any blood with me, had moved into the vicinity of my elementary school when I was four.

We never had the same teacher, but we often shared music, P.E. and lunch sitting parallel to each other as each class took their table. We were friends. But he was never around for the bad stuff.

In second grade, during an afternoon at my house, we came to the agreement that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. Our two little pecks made us blush furiously and you can imagine my father’s shock as he was leaving with his parents, Jorge telling him in a serious tone, “When I turn thirteen, I want to marry Abril.”

I was partly shocked, but not because the squirt had proposed, but that he had done so when I was the one who put the kissing moves on him.

But, just as well, you know how little kids are, your gone for too long and your forgotten.

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Because of whatever his parents worked in, he moved away. Close enough to visit, but not enough to stay at my elementary. I didn’t see him as frequently.

Once, maybe twice a year until we began middle school. He was close enough to at least attend the same on as me. By then, we had forgotten all about the whole girlfriend and boyfriend thing and the whole marriage proposal. I assumed our parents didn’t want to remind us either for the sake of our embarrassment or theirs.

He was different, liking sports and stylizing his hair. I kept on with my mushroom hair cut all throughout elementary and as a womanly change, I let it grow since my mom wasn’t allowing me to shave yet.

But Jorge was way different.

I’ve known about sex since the age of five thanks to my mom who was the daughter of the first female gynecologist in the state they lived. In fifth grade girls in my class were being told about periods and sexual harassment.

But I don’t think I could have seen it coming from Jorge, no, not him.

After his grandfather died, my family went to go visit his, basically mourning a whole afternoon.

I can’t recall what we were playing when he suddenly looks up at me. “Hey, you wanna see something I got from a friend?”

Interested I nodded and followed him to his drawer where he pulled out a video cassette.

He popped it into his VCR and locked the door of his room.

He pressed play.

I gasped and watched, mesmerized at the fornicating couple.

I had heard of the basics of sex, but had never seen it before. I wasn’t repulsed but shocked, gaping at the TV.

After a couple of minutes, he turned it off and I wanted to complain, I wanted to see what happened in the end as if it were a horror film, but I kept my mouth shut so he wouldn’t think badly of me.

We hid in the bathroom and made a game. We would turn off the lights and remove our clothing, then turn it back on to study each other.

Remembering, I find it funny. We didn’t want to touch each other, the idea was almost repulsive, but he knew more than me and when he told me to touch him, I did, but quickly and flinching away.

He didn’t complain, probably happy a girl had for once touched Mr.Happy other than him. It was the first time I saw a fully erected penis up close. I didn’t know yet that boys liked to be touched there. I understood but didn’t really.

And that was it.

We got dressed, sneaked out of the bathroom and pretended to play an antique version of scrabble we found in his closet.

Two days later, my mom told me they were moving away again.

It was cool. I’d still see him, and it would be a new house to discover like Indiana Jones.

After he moved was when I was informed he moved not just to another house, but to an entirely different state.

And I haven’t seen him since.

These scars are ugly and no amount of lemon juice will be able to blur them away.

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First days of school were always hectic with lost freshman. A pity, but I had trouble finding my fifth period in the new building as it was. English IV with Mr.Branstetter.

I found the room just as the bell rung and wiggled between the tight rows of seats.

I sat in the smack dab middle of the room and was scowling at my luck.

In the middle you couldn’t hear what the teacher was saying half of the time, but you could always hear the pupil’s comments and conversations.

I cringed at my deceitful fate.

Mr. Branstetter was probably Irish due to his reddish hair and light eyes but no freckles, his stomach jutting out in greeting as he began a lecture on Shakespeare.

For the record, I also, do not like Shakespeare’s works.

And Mr. Branstetter was promising a full year of Shakespeare.

He made roll call. The class had gone silent to mark themselves present when called and when I heard my name, I merely lifted my hand within visibility above heads.

I had no need for drawing attention to myself.

“Jorge Schumann?”

I stiffened, gripping my chair tightly. I darted my eyes everywhere for his face. I couldn’t find it but had to comply to the guy at the corner of the room with white chopped hair and a nose piercing in shape of a four leaf clover in a metallic blue. He was sprawled on his chair with long limbs and a lifted arm tucking his head with annoyance.

“Here.” An unfamiliar voice replied, emitting from his lips.

I realized I was gaping when the girl next to him gave me a dirty look.

I turned away with horror.

That was Jorge?

The rest of class and sixth blew as quickly and unnoticing as a high breeze.

The bus was easy to find and once home my mom yelled her hello from the kitchen.

I came in and found her brewing stew or something, watching her chop onions.

“So how was school? Good classes?”

I shrugged, uncertain what I should respond.

“Oh, that reminds me, we’re having guests over tonight, so I need help setting up the table.”

I watched, waiting, I was praying she wouldn’t say it and I could turn away with at least a little less stress for the day. How typically wrong of me.

“And you’ll never guess who it is?” She chirped shoving a basted turkey into the oven.

“Who?” I whispered in disbelief.

“Jorge! His parents let him move back for his last year here because he likes the universities in the area. He’s staying with his grandma, isn’t that incredible?”

My gaze fell heavily to the dirt kitchen tile I assumed she’d make me mop soon.

“Yeah, incredible.”

Her admiration rant continued, but I was busy stomping on my dirt road.