Not My Problem

by Ciara Smyth

  “I know you don’t,” she said. She was being infuriatingly smug too. She had that stupid smug face that she always got when she was right and everyone else was wrong. “That’s kind of the problem.”

  “I hate that face,” I said, feeling a surge of anger. Where did she get off being mad at me? “All I’ve ever done is try and help you.”

  “Oh really?” she said loftily. “See, I think I’ve been helping you all this time. I’ve helped you with Maths. I’ve helped you carry your groceries home. I’ve helped you with your stupid favors. You couldn’t even be there for me on the worst week of my life.”

  Each sentence was like another sucker punch. She thought I was a burden. She thought I was stupid and I needed her help. She thought I was some kind of charity case. She didn’t even like me. I stood up and curtsied to her.

  “Well, thank you, Queen Meabh. All the poor, stupid people are supposed to be grateful for your kind assistance, right?”

  She looked shocked. She hadn’t expected me to stick up for myself. No one ever did. I didn’t expect it. The words just sort of burst out of me and they didn’t stop.

  “You think that you help me with my Maths homework a few times and that means you’re saving me, right? And you can put it on a transcript or you can talk about your good deeds in an interview someday. Fuck. You. Your dad is disappointed with you and that’s your biggest problem? You have no fucking idea what the worst week of my life would look like.”

  She looked stupid, sitting on the floor with her ridiculous manifesto, and I walked away from her, down the stairs, and out into the brisk breeze. As I watched the class doing ladder runs on the field, I replayed the look on her face and took a moment of pleasure from the vicious feeling I’d had. Now, in the cold morning air, I felt empty, but in a good way, like I’d finally released something toxic that had been building up inside me.

  I didn’t think about whether it had been aimed at the right person.

  When the bell rang at eleven for our quick break, I went to find Kavi, hoping he’d know what specific stick was up Meabh’s ass. I thought I remembered him having geography at this time so I headed in that direction. Usually when I wanted Kavi he simply appeared. Often when I didn’t want him, too, so looking for him was a weird sensation. I stopped a few people who had the same geography class but they couldn’t remember if he’d been in or not. I found him, though, walking toward the café with a reusable cup in hand. When he caught sight of me, a weird expression took over his face. I jostled against the crowd until I reached him, then pulled him into an empty classroom.

  Of course, when I look back on the conversation that happened next I want to burn it from my memory. But the technology does not yet exist. It’s one of those conversations you replay for a long time after and you still feel as terrible as you did when it happened.

  “What’s going on? Meabh’s mad at me. And I can tell there’s something wrong with you too and you haven’t even said anything.”

  “I’m angry too,” he said evenly.

  I waited a beat for the long story about another time when he was angry. It didn’t come. Apparently angry Kavi didn’t ramble.

  I racked my brain. Okay, I knew he’d sent me a message and I hadn’t read it or replied. But I had a good excuse. “Why though?”

  His eyes bugged. “You have been MIA for seven days! You haven’t answered a single text. They haven’t even delivered since Wednesday.”

  “Okay,” I said. So maybe I’d missed an opportunity for a favor but as far as he knew, I was sick all week so he could hardly be mad about that. “I’m sorry. My phone died. I was sick.”

  “I thought something really bad had happened to you.”

  He seemed really upset and I started to feel the familiar tug of guilt. I didn’t like it.

  “I was sick. That’s all. It’s not a big deal.” I heard the words come out irritably and I knew Kavi didn’t deserve that, but he shouldn’t push me on this. I was entitled to privacy. And all I’d done was ignore my phone for a few days.

  “I don’t believe you. Sick people can text. And yeah, Meabh’s mad too. Something really bad did happen to her and you weren’t here.”

  “What, so you two were just sitting around all week talking about me behind my back?” I was getting angry now. It was a good thing I hadn’t told them what was actually going on; that would really give them something to gossip about.

  “Yes! Obviously we were talking about you! You come up from time to time. Especially when you disappear. That’s what happens when you have friends who actually like you.”

  It took a second for that to hit me because I wasn’t expecting it from him, but when it did, it stung.

  “What happened to Meabh?” I asked.

  “Someone uploaded a video of Meabh chasing after a first year with a reusable cup that he’d thrown in the bin. She threw it at his head and gave him a lecture. You know how she is . . .”

  I tried to withhold a smile. I could fully envision that scenario.

  “But they sent it round to half the school and the comments got nasty. There were so many of them.”

  Ouch. I thought about Meabh on her phone reading through pages and pages of people hating her. Kavi wasn’t done though.

  “It’s all anyone was talking about last week. Meabh was devastated,” Kavi continued. “I know people call her annoying all the time. They make fun of her for being the way she is, but it is who she is and seeing everyone hate for it like that, it was too much. She missed school over it.”

  Meabh’s never taken a day off school. Nothing could have told me how bad it was more than this. A hot flush of shame burned inside me.

  “I had to go around to her house and talk her into coming back. And she’s so amazing she just decided to try harder. She said she still wants to make things better for everyone. Even if they hate her for it.”

  Kavi was silent for a few minutes. I felt like there was something else he was trying to say. He didn’t quite look at me when he asked.

  “Who do you think posted it?” he asked, clearly attempting an even tone.

  No. I couldn’t even think that. It was too cruel, even for her.

  Was it?

  Besides if she was going to try and take down Meabh, wouldn’t she use the paper to do it?

  That would be too obvious. She’d need more than a stupid video for an article. She’d need a real story.

  “You don’t know it was her,” I said.

  He looked disgusted. “I don’t know why you can’t break away from her. Especially now. After this.”

  “Jesus, Kavi, give me a fucking break. I have stuff going on too.”

  He had no idea how I’d spent my week.

  “So tell me what’s going on,” he said, frustrated. “I’ve been here. I’ve reached out to you. You’d see that if you turned on your damn phone. I would have gone to see you, too, but I don’t know where you live.”

  “It’s none of your business. Where I live or what’s going on.”

  He eyed me steadily and gave me a minute to change my mind. I stared back. Finally he gave up.

  “I don’t know what’s going on with you. I wish you would tell me, but I respect that maybe you have a good reason not to. But I am not disposable. I’m not a toy you can play with when it suits you and then ignore when you have other stuff to do. If you want to be my friend, you have to stop treating me like I don’t exist if you’re not looking directly at me.”

  I was stunned. I didn’t do that. What the fuck? Just because I didn’t text him back for a few days? Just because I didn’t tell him all the details of my shitty life? Who the hell was he to demand I tell him everything?

  “I never said I wanted to be your friend,” I said snidely, feeling the hot flush turn to anger. “You didn’t really give me any choice.”

  Kavi didn’t react. His face was blank.

  I left him there like that.

  Too far, dickhead.

  Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. You�
��re the stupid voice in my head that thinks all these mean things and now that I actually say them it’s wrong?

  It’s not Kavi you’re mad at. It’s not Meabh.

  Yes it was. He was being intrusive and demanding and he had no idea what was going on in my life and if he was going to have a hissy fit every time I didn’t answer a message, then he was too high-maintenance for me. And Meabh. Well, if the comments on Meabh’s video didn’t include the words high-maintenance I’d eat my face.

  You sound just like Holly.

  I muddled through Maths, completely lost. We’d moved on to a new topic and my brain hurt. I should give up. I’d just got my head around trigonometry and now we were on something totally different. How was I supposed to keep up?

  By going to school maybe?

  It felt like it was too late. My brain flooded with all the things I didn’t understand. Eight subjects and I was drowning in all of them. How was I ever going to get back on track when I couldn’t even remember the last time I was on track? How could I keep social services off my back, the teachers off my back? What was I going to do about my best friend, who was horrible to the girl I maybe kind of liked? Meabh didn’t deserve any of this. Even if she didn’t like me back anymore. And Kavi. I’d hurt Kavi because I was too afraid to tell anyone about Mam and because I’d let myself take out my shame and frustration and anger on the sweetest person I knew. How would I stop Mam from drinking? She could be drinking right now. She could be hurtling us both toward disaster in spite of everything I’d done to stop her.

  My heart was beating so fast I thought I was going to throw up. My chest was too tight to let air in. I was suffocating in this room. The windows were closed. They were painted shut. How the hell was anyone supposed to breathe like that? We were all stuck breathing each other’s air. It was making me sick. I could practically feel that the air I was taking in was used and grimy and secondhand. I scrambled back from my desk and ran out of the room, not stopping to hear if Miss Hennessy called my name. I ran the length of the hall and down the stairs so no one could follow me.

  For some reason I found myself at the sick bay door, and for some reason I knocked.

  Sister D answered.

  “I don’t feel right,” I said, breathless.

  She ushered me in with a comforting hand on my back. Something about the softness of her touch made me want to hug her.

  “Lie down, dear.”

  I got into the sick bay bed, with its flat pillows and thin mattress you could feel the springs through.

  Sister D shoved a thermometer into my mouth.

  “Your eyes are hanging out of your head. Were you up all night playing computer games?” she asked, mild chastisement in her voice.

  I shook my head.

  “Is it your period, dear?” She nodded knowingly.

  I shook my head.

  She took the thermometer from my mouth and inspected it. I highly doubted her eyesight was good enough to read it.

  “Stomach bug?”

  I shook my head. Then I remembered I could talk.

  “I feel— My chest feels tight, like I can’t breathe.”

  She drew a stethoscope from her pocket and put it to my chest. She motioned for me to sit up and I did.

  “Turn around and lift up your jumper.”

  I did as she said and she pressed the stethoscope to my back as well. When she was done she gestured to me to lie back down.

  “I have just the thing for you,” she said, and she opened the cupboard, popped a pill from a foil pack, and poured me a glass of water.

  “Diazepam?” I asked hopefully.

  “Benadryl,” she replied.

  “I don’t have allergies. I don’t need an antihistamine.”

  “You need to sleep. Look at the bags under your eyes. Goodness gracious.”

  Skeptically, I swallowed.

  I remembered thinking an antihistamine wasn’t going to do much for me.

  I remembered that when I woke up and saw from the clock on the wall that it was after one.

  Holly was sitting in the seat beside my bed. She had a coffee from the café and a pain au chocolat, which she handed to me. She felt my forehead with the back of her hand like she was a human thermometer.

  “You are having the worst luck,” she said, sipping from her own coffee cup.

  “You know you get ten cents off if you bring a reusable cup in.”

  “Yeah, I know, but I always forget.”

  “I’m fine, anyway,” I said. “Just tired.”

  I didn’t know what else to say. I also knew I wasn’t looking her in the eye but I couldn’t bring myself to. I didn’t want to look at her. I wasn’t sure what I’d see. Would I see my life-long best friend? Would I melt? Would I see someone who was cruel and horrible and mean and I’d explode in anger?

  “I’ve been worried about you,” she said, and she patted me on the thigh.

  “Have you?”

  I wasn’t sure if I wanted that to be sarcastic or not. It came out with a softness I didn’t like the sound of. It reminded me of Dad telling Mam he loved her. She would always say Do you? in a way that made me feel sorry for her. Like she wanted it to be true more than anything, but she couldn’t quite believe it.

  “Of course I have, silly.”

  You could have come around to check on me. You know where I live.

  She had come to see me now, in the sick bay, though.

  “How’s business?” she said then, changing the subject. “You must have loads of things backed up since you’ve been off.”

  “It’s not a business.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I really need to get up,” I said. “Lunch is nearly done and I can’t miss the whole day. Ms. Devlin will go apeshit.”

  “I’ll walk with you,” Holly offered. “I can read you bits from my debate speech. See what you think?”

  “I have to go to my locker first.” I grimaced. “Besides, I wouldn’t understand your speech.”

  Holly laughed. “I know, but it’ll help me get it into my head.”

  I caught her eye for the first time since she had walked into the room. She didn’t blink. She didn’t think there was anything wrong.

  I know. I know. I know.

  26.

  When I got home, Mam wasn’t there. Monday was her day off so immediately I was stressed. I charged my phone to call her and sat beside it for the longest few minutes, waiting for it to have enough charge to turn on again. My stomach twisted and my head pounded. She could not do this to me again.

  When the phone finally came to life, I went straight to my call list. But a flurry of messages came through. Missed calls and texts from Kavi and Meabh. I hesitated. Then I opened them. It would only take a second. Mam would still be doing whatever she was doing in a second. Even though I’d already fought with Kavi and Meabh, I felt growing dread as I began to read. They started off jokey and telling me to come back to school, and then got increasingly worried. I cringed thinking of how I’d let these messages pile up like they meant nothing. Meabh had even messaged me about what happened with the video. She’d sent me a link to it. I pictured her upset and vulnerable and hoping I’d respond. I clicked through to the page but it had been taken down already. I wondered if that was because the person who put it up felt guilty or if it was because they didn’t want to get in trouble. I didn’t like that I didn’t know the answer to that.

  A hard knot formed in my chest. It hurt and I wanted to cry. I knew Meabh was right and I hadn’t been there for her. It didn’t matter why. It only mattered that when things were bad I had been too wrapped up in my own problems. And Kavi was right too. If I didn’t ever tell them what my problems were, then how could I expect them to understand? But the thought of telling them everything was too awful. Right now everything was in my control. What happened with Mam, who knew, where I lived, how we managed it. I was managing it. I had so far. I couldn’t be friends with people who would take that away from me. And the
y would. They would want to “help.” The road to social workers was paved with good intentions.

  “Are you home?” I heard Mam’s voice as she came in the door. Relief and fear mingled. She was home. But had she been drinking? I almost tripped in my haste to get to the hall before she could hide anything she’d bought.

  She was taking her coat off when I reached her and was hanging it up on the hook.

  “See, I remembered,” she said, expecting praise for not leaving it at her arse. I followed her into the kitchen, where she flipped the switch on the kettle and sighed. She flinched when she turned and saw I was standing right behind her.

  “What the fuck, love?” She laughed. “You scared the bejesus out of me.”

  “Where were you?” I asked, aware that I sounded angry even though I hadn’t planned to. I felt like a bottle of Coke all shook up, ready to explode, and I couldn’t pretend to be calm.

  “I’ve been at work,” she replied slowly, either not getting why I was annoyed or pretending not to. She loved to do that.

  “It’s Monday. The salon is closed on Monday. That’s not even a good lie.”

  “Excuse me?” she said, affronted. “We were doing a stock take.”

  Mam poured boiling water into her mug and added milk.

  Suddenly adrenaline flooded through me, making me shaky and reckless.

  “Have you been drinking?” I asked. I hadn’t in my whole life ever asked her that question directly. We tiptoed round it. But I couldn’t do that anymore. If she was going to lie I wanted her to do it right to my face.

  Mam was surprised. For a long moment she searched for a way to answer me. That’s how I knew she was searching for a lie. You don’t need to come up with a good truth.

  I opened the cupboard nearest to me. Then the one below. The fridge. The one under the sink. When I didn’t find anything I moved to the living room.

  “What are you doing?” Mam followed me, hands on hips.

  I looked behind the TV. Got down on my hands and knees and looked under the sofa. I upturned a vase, letting a bunch of dusty plastic flowers fall to the ground.