I lay my head back on his chest, surprised at how natural it feels. His heart thumps against my ear, fast and hard. I want to listen to it, fall asleep to its rhythmic beat, but my stomach has other plans. He holds onto me as I lose it again, heaving into the toilet.
I wipe my mouth and fall back into him. I can’t believe he’s here, holding me, and we’ve only just met. I don’t want to go back to the dorm. I can’t face Olivia like this. I can’t deal with her crap right now.
Jesse kisses the top of my head and puts his arm around me so I can snuggle in more. This feels comfortable, right. I close my eyes, and before I have any chance to throw up again, I fall asleep.
The water pelts my skin, and I wonder how I got here. I awoke alone in the bathroom of a stranger’s house, a bright yellow rug as my bed and a rolled up towel my pillow. I worked my way through a house strewn with passed out college kids, finding Janna and Paul half naked in the living room. They dropped me back off at the dorm, and the first thing I did was race to the shower.
I need this shower.
As I rake my fingers through my wet hair, I replay the evening in my mind, recalling what I can. I threw up at least twice, and Jesse stayed with me all night. Well, at least until I fell asleep. I don’t know when he left, but when I woke I found myself on the bathroom rug, with him nowhere in sight.
Why did he leave? I don’t know if I said anything, or worse. Maybe I threw up on him. Man, I’m sure I swore it last night but I will never pick up another drink in my life. We may have had fun for a little while, but it’s not worth this.
I shut off the shower and grab my towel. Once it’s wrapped safely around me, I exit into the common area of the bathroom where a few girls are gathered around the mirror doing their makeup. I recognize one girl from the party. She does a double take when she sees me.
“You’re the girl from the bathroom.”
“Excuse me?” Water drips from my hair onto my bare shoulder. I didn’t squeeze enough of it out.
“The party last night. You went into the bathroom with Jesse Fisher.” She points at me with her mascara and then touches the cap to her mouth. “Why did he go in there with you?” She eyes me up and down, her nose scrunched up in disgust.
“We had a few drinks and were talking.” Not that it’s any of her business, anyway. I don’t even know her name, and I doubt she knows mine, which is even more of a reason she doesn’t need to know.
“You and Jesse?”
I understand he’s one of the most attractive men anyone has ever laid eyes on but is it so hard to believe he would talk to me? That’s all we were doing. Talking. I may not be a beauty queen but I can still talk to people. Being ugly doesn’t erase my ability to speak. “Yes.”
“I’m not buying it.”
I swallow, thinking through what to say next. Do I want college to be just like high school? I spent four years avoiding everyone when I could and never sticking up for myself. What could I say, though, and what would it even accomplish? I don’t need to prove anything to this woman or her group of friends. I want to make my mark. I want to speak up and not be afraid anymore.
My heart hammering against my chest, I respond. “You said you saw us. Unless you drank so much you imagined it.” I don’t think it’s wrong to assume this, either. The people at that party were so drunk I’m sure some of them barely remember being there.
She looks over at her friends, who stare back at her, half-smiles on their faces as they wait for her, who I assume to be their “leader,” to reply. If she did see me, she has no choice to believe me. If she argues any further, she takes the chance of looking dumb in front of her friends, admitting she was wrong.
“Whatever. I’ve got to get to class.” She tosses her mascara into her make up bag and waves for her friends to follow her. Like lemmings, they do.
The door shuts behind them, and I can breathe again. That didn’t exactly qualify as standing up for myself, but it’s the closest I’ve ever been. I’ll consider it a win.
I take a minute to gather my thoughts before going back to my room. I pull the towel tighter around my body and open the door. When I see Jesse sitting on my bed, I gasp, covering my mouth with my hands. When his eyes widen, I realize if my hands are on my mouth, my towel is on the floor.
“Fuck!” I snatch my towel off the floor and cover my body again, slam the door, and press my backside against it. I don’t often swear, but this situation called for it. “What are you doing here?”
“He’s my brother, genius.” Olivia rolls her eyes as she reapplies her lip gloss.
I didn’t think she was even here. When I came back to the room, she was nowhere in sight. I avoided her for almost an entire week. I suppose it had to come to an end sometime.
“Actually, I came to check in on you. Are you okay?” His eyes soften as he cocks his head to the left. I’m gripping the towel, praying it doesn’t fall off again.
“Wait. You’re here to see her? Why?” Olivia’s voice cracks, the surprise evident in her tone.
I can’t make eye contact with Olivia. I can feel her staring at me, her judgmental eyes bearing down on me. I want to know why he came, though. Had he truly been concerned about me, wouldn’t he have stayed until I woke up? He disappeared in the middle of the night when he could have stuck around to be certain I arrived back to the dorm okay.
“We hung out at Wheezy’s party last night.”
I never caught the name of the party host. I wonder why he’s called Wheezy. I assume Wheezy is a he, anyway. I imagine a slender boy with circle glasses and an inhaler.
“You hung out with her?” She points between the two of us, her face twisted in confusion.
“Yeah, so what?”
“So what? She’s just so…so…blah.”
She’s talking about me as though I’m not even here. I’m this object in the room that doesn’t have any ears or feelings. Olivia isn’t the type of person I ever want to spend time with but that doesn’t make her comments any less hurtful.
“I’ll have you know she’s not blah. We had a good time last night. She had too much to drink, and I only want to check in on her. Is that so wrong?”
I don’t know if I should say something. I should thank him, I should, but Olivia standing between us, forgetting I’m a human being, causes my words to catch in my throat.
“You got drunk? I find that hard to believe.”
Here I am proving two people wrong in a matter of minutes. First that lady in the bathroom and now Olivia. I’m kind of proud of myself, as though I’m becoming the opposite of who everyone expects me to be. Still, I’m an outsider.
I shrug, not sure what to say at this point. Are they even aware I’m still standing here in only a towel?
“Well, believe it.” Jesse comes to my rescue, and I’m thankful for his words. “Violet, are you okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” I clear my throat, the gratefulness still lost in there somewhere. I can’t focus while being half naked in front of them. “I’d like to get dressed, though.”
“Oh! I’m sorry.” Jesse sneaks past me to the door. “I’m glad you’re good. My friend needed a ride, and you were sound asleep. I didn’t want to wake you, so I snuck out.”
That makes sense. And it’s not like we went to the party together. He didn’t have an obligation to me in the least. Still, I like knowing what happened. If I did throw up on him, he certainly wasn’t going to tell me. Thank God because I couldn’t live with myself if I had. “Okay. No big deal.”
“See, no big deal. Now get out.” Olivia throws her pillow at him before he walks out the door. She must be an Olympic champion in pillow throwing.
“What the hell are you doing with my brother?” She slams the door shut and pushes her lips together as she stands straight as a stick in front of the door. Her arms are crossed and her eyes are squinting.
My body shakes. I’m floating outside of myself, scared in this moment. I want to call for Jesse, yell for him to come bac
k. What’s Olivia going to do? “I…”
“I….I…I…” She mocks me. “I nothing. You stay away from him. He doesn’t need any more people in his life, and he certainly doesn’t need you.”
Her finger is in my face, and I’m not sure why. All I did was talk to him and have a few drinks. It’s not as though we’re together together. I’m not looking to hook up with him, or anyone for that matter. Even if I were, like Janna said, he’s out of my league. Way out of my league. He’s the exact type of guy that wouldn’t even acknowledge me in high school, not even to borrow a pencil or hand a napkin to in the cafeteria.
“Fine.” I mean, it’s not as though he and I are even really friends. I met him once, he took me on a tour of the campus, watched a movie, and we drank a little together. I hardly can refer to us as friends. Janna is the only real friend I’ve made and who I care to spend any time with. Besides, I’m in college now. I can’t worry about this stuff anymore. “Can I get dressed now?”
“You better watch out, Violet. You don’t want to mess with me.”
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this. I’ve never tried to “mess with” anyone, but somehow my sheer existence qualifies as doing this. I don’t plan on getting in Olivia’s face or trying to do anything against her. It’s clear she has it out for me.
Chapter Five
Social Media
A like or comment
A reaction good or bad
The whole world judges
^^^
It’s a wonder I can keep my head up in class. I didn’t feel too tired after my shower but now that I’m sitting in a stuffy classroom my eyes might as well be lead. My lids keep pulling down and I can barely stay awake. I guess sleeping on a bathroom floor can do that to you. Not to mention my pounding headache, a hammer slamming against my head reminding me why I hate alcohol so much. I only have myself to blame.
My professor is going on and on about something. I pick up bits and pieces as my brain allows. Psychology at nine in the morning is not the best cure for a hangover. This is a subject I excel in, having passed my AP class in high school with an A, but today I can’t do it. I try my best to pay attention though. The curriculum is two inches thick, and the course is already proving to be much more difficult than in high school.
My mom and dad believe in me. I think because they have to. I’m here on a lot of scholarships and partial financial aid. I can’t fail my courses, and I can’t allow the prospect of a social life stand in my way. I’m here to learn, not play. And I’m not necessarily welcome back home. My parents have already informed me they plan on turning my bedroom into a playroom for Rose. That’s when I realized I was definitely out on my own.
My teacher dims the lights to show us something on the screen. I both welcome and reject the darkness. My tired eyes will want to force me to sleep, but the light is causing more discomfort. I force myself to keep my eyes open while a male voice comes over the speaker to talk about Freud.
I yawn, careful to not do it too loud so I don’t disturb those around me. Another forty minutes of this before I can go back to my dorm and relax for an hour. I start doodling in my notebook when I catch two girls looking in my direction. I don’t know either of them, though I’m sure we’ll talk at some point in class. The one in the pink shirt is pointing at me and then to her phone. She keeps doing this until I pick up my phone.
I make sure my professor isn’t paying attention before looking back over at this woman. She mouths something, but I can’t make it out. I shrug and she writes something down on a piece of paper. A phone number. I text her with a question mark. She texts me back a link.
I click on the hyperlink, and I’m taken to a website, College Slam. There, on the top post, is a photo of me, in my dorm, only my backside visible. There are marks all over the picture, from my ass being circled with a donkey’s face next to it, to marks pinpointing every bit of cellulite on my body. The comments are anything from pleasant, pointing out the fat spilling from the sides to someone begging not to see the front.
What the hell is this? Didn’t I leave all this behind in high school? Coming to college was supposed to be a new life for me. A way to start over and not have to worry about things like this. I went through enough of it for the past twelve years of my life. I haven’t even been here a month and my naked body is already plastered on the internet. My social media game is minimal as I try to stay away from that as much as possible. How did this happen?
I scroll through the page trying to find a contact button. Whoever is responsible for this site can take it down. I don’t know how this picture was taken, but I am one hundred percent Olivia is behind it. No one else has access to our room. She must have taken it this morning while I changed. I’m mad, I’m scared, I’m ready to throw my phone across the room. I feel so violated, my body on display for the entire campus to see. Not only my campus but anyone. And once a picture is online, it’s there to stay. Something like this can affect everything in my future. Everything.
I can’t find a contact person or a form to fill out. My thumb can’t slide through my phone fast enough, my heart pounding harder with every unsuccessful swipe. It’s as though in order to post here you must have a secret email address or dashboard or something. I forward the text to Janna. I don’t want her to see my picture, but maybe she can help.
No reply. I set my phone down, picking it up every minute or so to check if she’s responded. Nothing. What is taking her so long to reply?
“Excuse me, Ms. Duncan?” My professor turns the lights back on and stares at me. “This is not the time to play on your phone. Please put it away.”
I gaze back at her, so many thoughts parading through my mind. I want to cry. I want to find a blanket and cover my entire body. How many people have seen this? What if she asks me to show the class what I’m looking at like any of my high school teachers would do? I can’t show them this. “I’m sorry, Ms. Scott.” I quickly darken my phone and turn it around, and within seconds it’s shaking. Janna is texting me back. I want to see what she has to say, but my professor is staring me down. I hold down the button to turn the phone off. I’m walking a fine line.
“I don’t like my class being interrupted. Don’t waste my time.” She scans the room of thirty students. “This goes for all of you. I don’t know what it was like in your high school, but this isn’t your senior year and you’re not partying through it until you reach the end. You chose to be here. Whether you’re on scholarship, student loans, or mommy and daddy paid your tuition, you’re here by choice. If you choose not to come, no one will call the police and report you for truancy. But when you’re in my class, I expect you to pay attention. I want your phones off.” She glares at me. “And I want your ears open and your minds on one hundred percent.”
My phone taunts me, but the thought of my parents hearing about this horrifies me even more. I can’t be kicked out of a class. My parents would be so disappointed in me, not to mention humiliated. They would ask what happened, and I’d be forced to fess up about the picture. I cringe at the thought of my father seeing the photo.
With my phone off I’m able to avoid temptation the rest of class. I’m able to focus enough to take down a few notes, but my mind is racing thinking about who else has seen this. The second class is over I dart out the door before either of those girls or my teacher can say anything to me. I race to the nearest restroom and lock myself in a stall as I turn on my phone.
Damn. I only just woke up. I hadn’t seen this. You okay?
No, I’m not okay. This is humiliating. I text Janna back that I’ll survive, though I’m questioning that now. If my entire year will be like this, I’m not so sure I want to be here. I can’t deal with this every single day.
Let’s drink tonight.
I sigh. Is that all Janna wants to do? Drink? My schoolwork is already piling up and we’ve barely started school. I spend most of my time right now avoiding Olivia, and now I’ll have to do so even more.
I
should confront her. I know I should. I don’t deserve this. No one does.
I bring up the site again and my photo is already replaced with some other girl out of Tampa, Florida. She’s gorgeous if you ask me, but the comments are rating her from a one to a ten, some listing negative numbers based on her smaller chest. This isn’t fair. I have all I can do to not throw my phone into the toilet and flush it.
What is it with social media? Why do people post such things? Yes, I’d much rather look at someone’s dinner than deal with this crap. I touch my hand to my stomach. Am I gaining weight? Am I heavier than I was a week ago? Am I putting on the, what do they call it, Freshman Fifteen? Or is it fifty? So help me, God, it’s fifty. I’m going to be even more overweight by the end of this year, and I’m going to break out like I did two years ago and be a walking zit. This can’t be happening.
No. I can’t let this get to me. I can’t allow a stranger’s perception—anyone’s perception—of me alter my own opinion of myself. I am not my body. I am not the size of my ass or the dimples in my legs. I am me, I define me, and no one can take that away.
Can they?
I can’t sit and feel sorry for myself. Who knows, maybe my whole class has seen the picture. So what if they did? That’s on them if they judge me. On them.
I click the stall door open and step out, clutching my phone in my hand. I’m still alone in the bathroom. No one can see me if I cry.
Nope. Not going to do it.
I look in the mirror, unsure of who is staring back at me. I’m not a bad person. I’m a nice girl. But no one sees that. No one takes the time to see past the big nose, the pimple on my forehead, or the way my one tooth juts out further than the rest. All they allow themselves to see are those things, and they base their entire opinion of me on it.
Ugly Beautiful Girl Page 4