Double Jinx (Wattys2017)

Chapter 3

I was going to die.

That was the only thought running through my mind when Grandma dropped me off at the school on Monday morning. There were so many kids, so much noise.

My heart thumped louder, then louder still. My quickening pulse triggered rapid breathing, followed by stress sweating, all tied together by my shaking hands. These were the signs of my panic attacks, I should know, I had one almost every day. Since Saturday, my life has been pretty stress free. Grandma treated me wonderfully and no one else bothered me.

But today was Monday and school was a necessity.

No, a requirement.

I remained right where grandma had dropped me off, near the far edge of the parking lot, hidden behind a tree. From here, I needn't worry about students interacting with me because almost all of them were slowly trudging into the high school. Or in my words, hell.

With my back pressed against the tree, letting the bark bite at my back, I forced myself to breathe. I had to take deep, slow breaths or else I'd lose all control. My speech therapist always told me the first thing to do was calm down, the second was to evaluate the situation. So after another ten minutes of strategic breathing exercises I learned from Dr. Young, I decided to evaluate the situation.

Was I in any immediate or rational danger? No.

Were any of the students here pointing or laughing at me? Not yet.

Did it matter whether these people thought I was mute or deaf due to my inability to speak? Well it shouldn't, but it did. After all these years, one might think I'd grown immune to the name calling and the hurtful words but in actuality, I hadn't. Some nights I had cried myself to sleep, wondering what I had done to deserve such a life.

But now wasn't the time to fret over past issues. I'm sure the kids at BVHS, Barren Valley High School, were wonderful people. And I only had to suffer through a few short months, then I was free to do whatever I wanted. Maybe I would go to college and just sit in the back of the lecture hall, or maybe I'd go right into the workforce and just get a job at the Barren Valley library. Hardly anyone went there, and there wasn't much talking involved anyways.

Still, the future would have to wait. The present was at hand and currently, it was going downhill fast.

I took another deep breath then took one step. Yes, good start. Now another, and another. Great job Genevieve, you're walking. Now all you have to do is get to the main office, ask politely for your schedule, then get to class without having a mental break down. I could do that, no sweat.

I got this in the bag.

Someone bumped into my shoulder, "Oh sorry, didn't see you there."

Panic, shit, panic! I don't got this in the bag, repeat, I don't got this in the bag! What should I do? Should I apologize too, I mean technically I should have been paying attention as well. Or maybe I should just assure the person that it was no big deal. That would probably be a better route right? Sure, why not. Okay, deep breath, now speak.

But by the time I made up my mind, the person was long gone. Damn it, no damn me. These people were definitely going to think I was strange. They were going to whisper mean things about me in the hallway and purposefully leave me out of activities and every other rude thing I had seen in high school drama shows.

This was a bad idea, I should just go home. I could probably convince grandma that I got sick, she probably wouldn't even question it.Well, it wasn't a great plan but it was a plan nonetheless. Okay, so fake sickness and start school tomorrow.