Across From Me

Nineteen

Elizabeth didn't think old history would still bother her. But it occupied her mind for the rest of the night. She thought she would have moved past it by now. But it seems that wasn't the case. Truthfully, Beth wasn't as bitter about it now as she was a few years ago. Definitely not. It was just strange to her to look back on times like that and know that was the person she was and the things she used to do.

It's old history, she would tell herself.

So what was she missing?

She felt so stupid at the time. She had never been so humiliated. And it's why she never told anyone, not her mom or her siblings. Beth was almost embarrassed to admit that she had been dumb enough to trust them. But it took years for her to realize she wasn't stupid for having good intentions.

And what about Minnie? She was a part of that sour history. Even though they ended things on a good note, she wasn't quite sure how they would become friends again until Minnie acted like things weren't wrong. Beth was grateful for that because she didn't want to discuss it further. If they were to stay friends, Beth knew that one day they would have to talk about what happened.

Beth never understood why Minnie stood up for her then.

But after all these years she told Clementine. Maybe because she thought Clem would know that Beth understood. She at least hoped it came across that way.

Beth didn't have time to wonder further as she arrived at her first-period class. She didn't mean to be late, her mom was busy this morning and Violet was never in a hurry to get anywhere. But then again, Beth didn't really care much about being late.

But it was definitely strange to walk into her first period and the entire mood changing from before. It was like a slap to the face. And it wasn't like Beth wasn't late before, it just felt different the way her classmates stared at her. Beth gave her teacher her pass before she sat down.

Everyone had gone back to what they were doing. Was Beth imagining things?

She was sure she wasn't when her deskmate glared at her. Something definitely was up but Beth pretended not to notice. She did her work, even though she had to ask the teacher what the hell they were doing.

She wondered what could have possibly spread around now. Beth expected this would happen. People would get bored and make something up again. But Beth wondered what it was this time. It had to include her based on how people were reacting to her.

Or maybe Beth was just imagining things. Maybe she had something on her face and that's why people were giving her strange looks.

Still, though, her deskmate was avoiding her like the plague.

Something was definitely up when her deskmate got up to sharpen a pencil and took her bag with her. Maybe Beth wouldn't have found this out of the ordinary if it weren't for the strange air in the classroom. But she couldn't quite understand why someone would go sharpen a pencil and take their bag?

Beth was achingly curious now.

She was almost excited to find out. It also didn't feel very good to find out people were spreading rumors about you but Beth wasn't any stranger to cruelty from her peers. Rumors were also always batshit crazy insane.

But her class went on as normal. The teacher would talk for five minutes and then fall asleep behind the desk. Then the rest of the class would either do work or do nothing. Beth wanted to go back to bed. But the bell rang and she had to go to her next class.

By now, Beth was almost sure something was happening because people were definitely paying more attention to her than before. Beth kinda wished she was invisible like before, because she didn't brush her hair as best as she could that morning, and if people were going to judge her, might as well look her best.