Foreward from Nine:

The third part of the “Nelson’s Sick Day” trilogy! If you missed them, you can check out the first two parts here and here! With everything going on with me lately, and still kinda-sorta recovering from my own sickness, I hope this makes sense! Woo!

January 5th, 2021 Edit: I’ve changed Jordi to her full name – Jordanna – so that she wouldn’t get confused with Jodi (Ky’s cousin).

“Nelson’s Sick Day”

“The concept of the ‘unreliable narrator’ is done wonderfully in the 1950 Kurosawa film ‘Rashamon.’ Has anybody in here seen it?”

I was barely paying attention, by that point in my English Lit class. It wasn’t like I was trying to block Mrs. Shipley out or anything — I had to keep my grades up to stay on the squad, after all! — but there was just something wrong with my stomach. It couldn’t have been cramps, not yet anyway. I thought that maybe I just hadn’t eaten enough; the only thing I even had by then was the smoothie Jordanna gave me. Jordanna was the head cheerleader, a Senior (of course), and everyone warned me that she was like… a total bitchface. But ever since I made the squad last week she’d actually been super nice to me. At least it seemed like I finally found somewhere to fit in, after the hell that was middle school.

Doing my best to be subtle about it, I let one of my arms fall under the desk so I could clutch my stomach. It wasn’t really a pain, so much as it just felt like a low, constant gurgling. I didn’t want to draw any attention to myself by asking to go to the bathroom, and the end of the period was close. I had lunch next, so I could take that time to go to the bathroom and hopefully get it, um… sorted out. I kept self-consciously glancing around the room, feeling like everyone must have been staring at me. It didn’t seem like anybody was, though — not that I could tell, at least. Though I did notice Tara and Lisa staring daggers at each other across Nelson’s empty desk. That… that was a situation.

Like, basically… Tara’s had a crush on Ky Nelson since we were all kids in elementary school together. I remember wanting to play with them, but Tara played pretty rough. One time she was stomping around shoving anybody she came close to, growling and shouting “I’m not Tara! I’m TERROR!” and I thought it was funny. Not funny enough to get close, though! I was a kid, not suicidal. Later on I tried to approach them, and I thought it’d be fun to call Tara by the nickname she gave herself… and… she apparently didn’t like it when someone else said it. I kept my distance after that, but I always was kinda jealous of how Tara and Ky got along and I was sorta the outcast of the group. “Becky Davenport — she had to stay home from school with head lice! She’s dirty! She’s poor!” It really, really sucked.

Well, anyway, in high school Nelson got into theatre, and met Lisa when the drama club and dance troup did a choreography thing for one of the musicals. Those two hit it off and start dating, and Tara loses her shot — you know, the one she had like a million years to try for. Lisa, on the other hand, didn’t seem super comfortable with Ky having a cute, female best friend. Well, Ky wanted to join the drama club, so there’s the drama! Since a lot of the sins of elementary school got lost in the middle school transition, when a bunch of kids from different areas got mixed together, I kinda got to rebuild myself. When high school came around, I tried out for cheerleading… and miraculously got in! Finally, I could be one of the accepted kids!

My dwelling on the past was cut off when I heard the end-of-class bell ring. Finally! I could get to the potty. Without even thinking about it, I jumped out of my seat and grabbed my bag.

“Miss Davenport! The bell does not dismiss you — I do!”

Mrs. Shipley’s words snapped me back to the reality of the situation; I’d forgotten how big she was on us not rushing out as soon as the bell rang. I sat back down way too quickly in my seat, which made my guts feel all kinds of wonky. “Yes, Mrs. Shipley,” I managed to say, though my voice was strained as I was trying to keep my churning tummy under control.

It was dead silent. Mrs. Shipley kept looking around at us, making sure nobody else was trying to take off too quickly. It felt like I was clenching for hours, and I was worried that people would notice me practically sweating. I needed to get out! I had to!

“Alright, you can go, now” said the teacher, at long last.

I couldn’t hold back — I had to run out of that room. I needed to get into a bathroom stall and hope that nobody would be able to hear whatever ungodly thing was about to happen next.

I don’t know if it was luck or good timing on my part, but I found a bathroom that had nobody in it. I dashed into a stall and barely got myself down before… okay, you don’t need to know the details. It wasn’t good. But at least it was fast. 

A buzzing noise came from my purse, so I pulled out my phone to check my notifications. There was a new text from Jordanna.

“i hope u liked that smoothie… i put something extra in it 4 u lol ♥”

My heart dropped into my still-unsettled stomach. The stories about Jordanna were true, I guess. We had our first team practice after school that day, and she was trying to make me suffer for it. But why me? I didn’t do anything to her! I thought I’d finally have a group of friends…

I could feel myself starting to cry, but I clenched my jaw and clutched my phone hard. The screen looked a little blurrier, but I wasn’t going to let her win. I couldn’t suffer through high school the way I had through elementary school. 

“Fuck you. Fuck you. Ugh,” I muttered at my phone, as if I could channel my hate right through the device and into Jordanna’s stupid smirking face. 

I took a deep breath, making sure I was composed before I sent a reply text.

“it was soooooo good! ♥ thank u so much. see you at practice! xoxo”

I’d find a way to keep my spot on the squad. I wasn’t gonna miss my first practice because of this fuckface. But first, I had to make sure I didn’t look like I’d just been through toilet hell before going to the cafeteria. 

But when I stepped out of the stall, I was mortified. Lisa Harrison was standing right there. Had she been there the whole time? Did she hear? She was looking in the mirror, but in her reflection she was staring at me. I froze for a sec — I didn’t know what to do. Then, with this shitty, fake concern in her voice, she was like “um… are you okay?”

I knew that the dancers and the cheerleaders had some stupid rivalry in this school, but I was hoping since Lisa and I were both new to the squads that she wouldn’t start in on me like that. I guess I had to be a hardass with everybody if I wanted to make it. 

“Psh. Whatever,” I said, trying to brush it off. I couldn’t let her see she was bothering me. 

Holding my head high, I walked to the door and opened the door, just in time for Tara to enter, apparently. I definitely couldn’t handle a third metaphorical slap in the face. I was barely holding it together as it was. I acted like I just didn’t see her and made my way right to the cafeteria. 

rOnce I got to the cafeteria, I went to sit with some of the other cheerleaders, like I’d been doing since I made it onto the squad. Thankfully Jordanna didn’t have lunch the same period, so I didn’t have to deal with her. A few of the other new girls looked a little worse for wear, though. I figured that I wasn’t the only one that got hit by the “gift of smoothie”. 

Bea, another senior on the squad, seemed more sympathetic than Jordanna (not like that’s saying much). “I told her not to do it,” she sighed, rolling her blue eyes. She still looked kinda amused by it, but she seemed kinda amused by everything. “Did anybody like… hear any of you?”

The other girls shook their head, but I cringed. “Yeah, I think so, actually…”

I saw Lisa and Tara both heading for the lunch table they usually shared with Ky, but both of them looked super awkward about sitting there together. I nodded my head toward them, to Bea. “I think they did.”

True masters of subtlety, the other freshmen cheerleaders looked toward Lisa and Tara as well. When the two noticed, the other girls couldn’t help but giggle and turn their heads back to our conversation in a huddle, like a bunch of kids. 

“Real mature, guys,” Bea snickered.

Thankfully, lunch was pretty much uneventful after that. Most of the other freshmen girls seemed doubtful about going to practice that afternoon; later it would turn out that all but three of us would quit the squad. I have no idea what Jordanna would gain from having less girls on the team, but I didn’t give her the satisfaction of forcing me out. 

As the lunch period wound down, I stood up so I could hit the bathroom one more time before my next class — I didn’t want a repeat gastrointestinal performance during Algebra. I was stopped when I heard a voice over my shoulder.

“Hey… Becky, right? Aren’t you friends with Ky and Tara?”

I thought that was… a pretty odd thing to ask, so I turned to see who was talking to me. I was pretty surprised to see Ky’s cousin Jodi looking at me over her glasses. She wasn’t anybody I really knew, I just knew of her. She was apparently super smart and got some kind of internship lined up after she graduated, even before her first college semester. 

Jodi stepped up to me, talking in a low voice. “Did Jordanna pull that stupid laxative trick on you?’ 

So it seemed that wasn’t even the first time Jordanna had done this. Her reputation was well-earned. I just nodded, looking down at the floor. Jodi sighed, digging in her bag before handing me a little packet of Pepto pills. “This should help out a little. Sorry she did that to you.”

Smiling graciously, I took the medicine from Jodi. It felt so relieving to see someone actually looking out for me — especially Ky’s cousin. “Oh… wow, thanks. I don’t know why she’s like this, though. I was never rude to her or anything.”

“It’s high school,” she replied, straightening her glasses and giving a sad smile, “I’m so glad I’m out of here next year.”