by M Field
The stage manager stood by the side of the stage with a clipboard, headphones and a small light. I walked quietly up to tell him that I was here. He turned and his jaw dropped, his eyes staring at my torn costume. I couldn’t blame him; most of the girls I left behind in the change room, could barely get ready themselves as they froze to watch me leave. The pastel pinks, blues and cream costumes were the polar opposite of what I was wearing. He indicated that I was next, so I braced myself for the cue.
The dancer before me finished her final move and bowed to the audience. Game on. It was my turn to kick it.
The stage manager announced me and I took a deep breath and squared my shoulders. In an instant, I got into character. I visualised all the times I had been hurt at school and how I’d felt. Using that energy, I entered the stage. I walked slowly out under the dimmed lights and took position in the front. I turned my back to the scout and held my arms around myself. I had chosen the song “Colorblind” by the Counting Crows, as the haunting music encapsulated my sense of loneliness. I took a deep breath, and as the song began, I moved to the soulful lyrics.
Every aching lyric, every movement, tore through my fingers and toes. I drew the visuals of the pain I’d experienced at the hands of my bullies while also clutching to the desperation I felt. My need for my freedom spurred me on. Each moment was etched onto my brow until I felt my face could be forever stuck in this emotional tirade. In movements where I flung my torso onto the ground in mercy, I remembered the incidents where I had been beaten, kicked and shamed; I turned and dragged my lifeless body across the stage and felt the pain of isolation and fear. As the song dragged on, its melancholic beat felt in sync with the ache that I felt for being me. As the song drew to an end, I slowly swiped my hand across my heart, gesturing to the ache my chest, and in the last moment of surrender, I made eye contact with the scout, pleading for him to give me a new life and free me of this torment. My soul felt too raw to hope.
As the final chords strummed, my sleeve slid down as I held my left arm up, exposing the bandage. Using my right index finger and looking directly at the scout, I ran it along the seam to plead for my suffering to end before my whole body collapsed down onto my knees in loss. I was resigned to put my soul into his hands as the last beat of the song played, and a single tear flowed down my cheek.
I drew in a deep breath and bowed my thanks before turning and exiting the stage. I didn’t hear the thunderous applause as my tears began to fall, and I ran outside the back door to get some air. An influx of hateful memories infiltrated my mind, where I was slammed into my locker, called names, watched my friends be attacked, felt isolated, alone, used, and afraid … all while the teachers who taught me every day, stood by and did nothing. I closed my eyes and took a deep resounding breath to stop the torrent. I opened my eyes, looked up to the sky, and muttered to myself, “No more. You will torment me no more.”
Still shaken from my performance and slightly shit scared, I put on my game face and spun around to go back inside. Miss Ashton was standing there, looking at me. I couldn’t read her expression, and for a moment, I forgot about being relaxed and felt momentarily afraid. Did I screw it all up? Miss A looked at me and intercepted my thoughts.
“Trice, my dear, I just came out here to find you. I watched your performance and it was …”
I held my breath, waiting for the words “shit” or “ridiculous” to spring from her mouth, but she surprised me by saying, “captivating.”
“Huh?” I shook my head. “I’m sorry, you thought it was captivating? So I didn’t screw up?”
She smiled and tsked. “No, Trice. I can tell you now that Mr Stevenson barely took any notes as he was so enthralled by your performance. We both were.” She stepped in front of me and put her hands on my shoulders.
“Whatever is going through your mind in Negative Nancy territory, I want you to stop. Stop. You are an amazing dancer, and today you just proved it. You danced with your soul and I am truly proud of you.”
I inhaled a large breath and it came out in a huge whoosh. The tears that I’d shed before in melancholy were now replaced with tears of joy.
“Thank you so, so much, Miss,” I spluttered, unable to control the tremor in my voice.
She squeezed my shoulders and looked directly at me, her expression then became serious.
“As wonderful as today was, I didn’t see your parents. Were they not invited? They would have been very proud.”
Before I could respond, she let go and grabbed my wrist, lifting it up to examine the gauze.
“I heard what happened from the other girls in class. I’m presuming you were not suicidal and that those catty bitches are responsible?”
I gasped and nodded.
“Well, my dear, you have done your solo; now it is time to summon that warrior spirit I know you have and to fight back.”
“But I don’t know how to,” my bottom lip trembled.
“Trice, your family and friends will help you. For Christ’s sake, you need to tell them and have those girls dealt with. Enough is enough. It’s time.”
“But Stacey might attack me again,” I sniffed.
“There’s no way in hell that she will touch you ever again, Trice. Mamma and Dad will be pissed that you didn’t tell them, too!” I looked up and saw Robbie storming towards me with Hazel beside him. “But, I can tell you now that shit is gonna hit the fan on Monday when Mamma marches in there. Especially seeing as I’ll be there, too. Those bitches are going down,” he roared.
I winced at his dramatics and then shot a look at Hazel. What the? I mouthed. I’m sorry, she mouthed back. I knew she was just protecting me, but I couldn’t help but feel pissed.
“Robbie! What are you doing here?”
He put his hand up in a silent gesture to shush me.
“Trin gave up her seat, so I was in there— ” he pointed to the theatre, “—watching my sister dance for her life and into destruction. Now you tell me, what the fuck is that on your wrist?” I swallowed and looked down at my arm.
“Please, Robbie,” I begged. “Just let me have today. I will tell Mamma and Dad tomorrow, but please, please let me have today.” He sighed and looked at me; piercing me with his hardened gaze, he barked,
“Okay. You have today. But come breakfast tomorrow, you’ll spill. I don’t know the full story. I’ve only heard bits of shit about some girls annoying you. Tomorrow, I want all the names, Trice. Not just Stacey. I want it all.”
I shuddered at his tone, but realised he was right.
“Okay, you’ll get it all. Just don’t rip into me about it, okay?”
I went back into the theatre to clean up my face, tame my hair, and get ready to go home. Putting my costume into my duffel, I turned and looked at my reflection in the vanity mirror. I felt lighter somehow. Even though I knew that tomorrow would be a complete shit storm, I was actually relieved.
“You can’t hurt me anymore,” I whispered, “it’s time to find a way to keep those demons at bay.”
As promised, Robbie never said a word to my parents about my wrist. They did, however, berate me for not letting them come and support me. I hung my head to avoid seeing their disappointed gazes. Despite the guilt of not telling them, I went to bed feeling lighter in my heart, as tomorrow would bring the change I needed.
I woke to the smell of bacon and eggs wafting through the house. I loved when Mamma did a fry up. It didn’t happen every Sunday, but when it did, it was always good. Despite our Italian heritage, there were many things we enjoyed about being Australian. Eggs and bacon were one, pies—although Nonna thought they were filled with mice mince; who knows where she got that idea from! —Aussie Rules Football and, of course, Pavlova. We were a hybrid of two cultures, and I loved it.
Passing Robbie’s closed bedroom door, I walked downstairs, my stomach rumbling as I got
closer to that delicious smell. As I strolled in, Mamma was by the stove. I squeezed her waist and watched the bacon frying in the pa
n.
“When’s breakfast, Mamma? I am starving.”
“Cara mia, there’s about another ten minutes. Go and have a shower and it will all be done by the time you come back down.”
“Sounds good, Mamma.” I skipped upstairs and grabbed my favourite low-rider jeans and vintage Smashing Pumpkins T-shirt. I loved band T-shirts; the older the better. I jumped into the shower and decided to wash my hair using my good shampoo and conditioner. I had an excellent salon one that I used sparingly as pocket money was sparse and these hair products cost a fortune. I needed to wash away all the grime from this week and start afresh. I showered quickly, changed into my clothes, and decided to make an effort with my hair. My unruly hair was normally put up in a messy bun, but today I decided to just put in some product to tame the curls and let them do their thing.
Once I was ready, I dumped my dirty clothes in the linen basket in the bathroom and strolled out to grab my brush in my bedroom. As I approached, I heard voices, and it wasn’t until I was a foot away that my skin pricked up on edge. I could hear Robbie, but there was another voice that made my skin crawl.
“So, like, this is your sister’s room?” Stacey asked sweetly.
“Um, yeah. Why are you in here? Where’s Alex?”
“Oh!” She giggled. “I’m her friend, silly. Alex brought me over here and then remembered he forgot his wallet. So he told me to come up and find you. I wanted to come and say hi to Beatrice."
The blood between my ears whooshed and I stomped towards my room. No fucking way. Sure enough, there she stood with Robbie, looking at my things. Long gone were the remnants of being a little girl. In contrast to the white walls throughout our house, my walls were painted a cerulean blue. I loved the ocean, the sky and any place that held a sense of peace to it. It also matched my eyes. My mother often told me I had my nonno’s eyes. I never knew him, as he died a few months after I was born, but the stories my nonna told made me feel like I was connected to him. His rocking chair, where he rocked me to sleep a few times, sat in a corner where I now liked to sit and read. I had a large queen-sized bed, a dresser, and a desk that faced the window. I’d spent a lot of time making my room just right—it was the place where I could be myself without distraction, while blocking out any hurt. Now, with Stacey standing in here, my most sacred place felt violated.
“Her room is so lame, though,” she continued. “Look at those posters. Is she an emo or something? Oh, my God! You probably don’t know; apparently on Friday, she was feeling— ”
“What the hell are you doing in here?” I roared. She jolted then quickly plastered a smile on her face. Robbie raised his eyes and a crease between his eyebrows appeared as he studied my entrance.
“Oh Beatrice, I’ve come to see you. I wanted to catch up with you and see if you were feeling better.” She winked. “You know, after your accident …”
I could barely hear the bullshit coming out of her mouth as my mind was pounding with rage. My accident? I looked at my wrist at where the gauze has peeled in the corner. My ‘scratch’ would not become invisible. She had marked me and then turned it around. No more, I reminded myself. For a brief moment, I closed my eyes and inhaled sharply. When I opened my eyes, she was looking at me as though she had told the funniest joke. In my room. While touching my things.
“So, Beatrice, this chair …” Every time she said my name, it was as though she were gurgling shit. She gestured to the rocking chair “… is like, totally ancient and totally ugly. It just adds to the lameness of the rest of your room, actually.” Robbie stiffened as her hand touched the armrest.
“Stacey, as much as you would like to stand here and talk about my room, I’d like to take this opportunity to tell you to GET YOUR SLUTTY FINGERS OFF MY THINGS AND GET THE FUCK OUT!” I roared.
With my fists clenched to my side, I felt a strength I didn’t know I had. For years, bloody years, I had been polite and well mannered. I had ‘dealt’ with the teasing and humiliation and thought that it would eventually go away. I had only started to answer back in this last year, but even then it wasn’t often—it made it worse, so I just chose to ignore them most of the time. My wrist, however, wasn’t something to be ignored. I held my wrist up in front of her face.
“You lying, manipulative, vile bitch. This was you, and you know it. I am sick of all the bullshit you’ve put me through.”
She blinked, but quickly recovered, rolling her eyes and folding her arms.
“Drama much?” she replied. “It’s like a scratch. I barely touched you.”
Robbie watched the exchange between us until her words clicked and his face darkened at Stacey.
“You— ” he pointed at her, “—are the one who’s been bullying my sister?”
He stood closer to her, squaring his shoulders. She rolled her eyes and unfolded her arms to flick her hair over her shoulders.
"But Robbie, she was getting too close to my man. I had to keep her away. Alex doesn’t see it, but I do!" she reasoned. “Anyway, you wouldn’t want your little sister pestering your best friend, would you?”
What? In what screwed up universe did she think it was okay to stab people with compasses?
“Oh, no you don’t!” I barked. “You will not turn this into you being in the right. You have hurt me for years, and in no way will you do it again.”
I marched towards her and stood with my face only a few inches from hers. “I learnt something yesterday. I learnt that despite things being completely shit in your life, you can overcome them. You can let go and be stronger. While I will be pursuing my dreams, you will be stuck in this town fucking guys who’ll pass you around like the village slut you are. So what if you’re dating Alex? Do you think he’ll stay with you forever?” I laughed, shaking my head.
Looking straight into her eyes I said, “Tell me something, Stace, when he fucks you, does he look at you? Or is the brown paper bag supplied?”
She had been staring until then; with those words her eyes became ferocious.
“You bitch!” she screamed. “You stupid, fucking wog!”
“Oi! Watch your fucking mouth,” Robbie stood protectively in front of me.
His eyes lowered to my wrist, shaking his head, he then glanced up into my eyes. I swallowed and nodded. His head turned at her and Robbie whispered, “So, you are the bitch who’s been tormenting my sister.”
“Oh, come on!” she taunted. “It’s not like it was anything serious. Half the time it was just jokes.”
“Oh, like the time you cornered me in the toilets and kicked me in the ribs?” I questioned sarcastically. She glared at me while maintaining a sideways visual of Robbie.
“That was a long time ago.”
“It happened at the end of last year. But maybe the time you slammed my head into a locker is clouding your perspective. Or the time you degraded me and my friends, or just generally bullied me any time you possibly could. That recent enough for you?”
I indicated to my wrist. “What do you call this then, hey? A fairy kiss? Just ‘jokes’?” I mimicked. I could not believe my ears. I always imagined, in the many times I had envisaged this situation, that she would beg. That she would be sorry. But while looking into her eyes, I didn’t see regret. I saw hatred. “What did I ever do to you? You don’t even know me.”
She huffed and tilted her head to the side. “Oh, I know you alright. Coming here and acting like you own the joint,” she sneered. “Winning that scholarship for school when you’re obviously loaded, like all wogs are. Now you tell on me to your brother, like the pathetic trash that you are. Both of you—” she looked back and forth between Robbie and me, “—make me sick. I don’t know why Alex wastes his time with you losers.”
“It’s because they’re my family.”
I gasped as I heard the steel cold voice behind me, as a figure appeared at my door. Alex stood there leaning against the frame, his arms crossed over his chest. His eyes darkened, radiating a look that I had never seen from him before-hatred.
“These ‘wogs’, as you call them, are more family to me than my own.”
He pushed off the frame and moved like a predator towards Stacey, his movements stiff and unyielding. She quickly recovered her shock and beamed a seductive smile towards him. What a mole.
“Babe, I was wondering where you were were— ”
“No. You will shut your fucking mouth, right now,” Alex snarled.
He looked at me. “Bea, did I hear correctly that Stacey, here, hurt you?”
Oh, so now he has clicked. “Yeah, the girl you’ve been shagging has spent the last few years tormenting me. Aren’t I lucky?” I asked sarcastically. “So, you can imagine what I thought about the two of you together.”
He narrowed his eyes and glared at me. “Do I look like a mind reader? You never told me who bugged you at school. You brushed it off, Bea. Like it was nothing.’”
“Yeah, well. Alex, meet Stacey. This is the cock-craving whore who has been attacking me for years. On Friday, she decided it would be a fabulous idea to teach me a lesson for being your friend, and some friendship that turned out to be.”
Alex stood there, glaring at me as I made each accusation.
"You were dating her. The bully who has made my life hell for the past four years. You want to know why my friends and I hate school and want to leave this fucking town? The reason," I said, pointing at Stacey, "is that fucking bitch there."
I knew I was being totally illogical and unreasonable. I knew he didn’t know about her. But I was hurt. Hurt by a friend who had unknowingly betrayed me; called me stupid and immature, whatever. My wounds felt exposed by such a tirade of pain that nothing I could do would be able to shield me from myself. I wanted to hurt everyone so they’d know how much it pained me.
Chapter Eight
“Saturday Night”