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Everyone said she was better. She had been “better” since the first day of Sophomore year.
They said: “Janis went to therapy! Of course she’s better now.”
And they said: “Oh I know Janis. She’s weird. But she’s better now. She’s normal.”
September was never a good month at school. The change, the adjustments, the quiet contemplation Janis always considered of who the hell she was going to be this year if being herself was too much.
But she was normal now. She was stable. She was better.
French had never been a particularly engaging class for the years Janis had taken it, but it was rare that she ever minded how dull it was. She was good at French, and Madame knew that, so she had the privilege to do as little as possible and still pass with a solid A. This year, Janis sat towards the back of the classroom, although it was further from the corner than she would have preferred, a hiding spot she often took in classrooms – if she was in the corner, she could see everyone before they saw her, assess who was in the classroom, assess how they felt towards her. Janis had done this for years.
In her seat, Janis watched the class with wary eyes, with something curled in her chest, explosive and pounding. Something deep and something old, like a wound that will simply not close no matter how many times it scabs over; something that has already left a permanent scar for existing.
Junior year was supposed to be a fresh start.
Years had passed since Janis was twelve at Regina’s birthday party; now she had Damian, and now, she even had Cady. This all signified she was so much better.
Cady was sat closer to the front, listening intently to their teacher. Janis always admired that about Cady, the subtle facial expressions she pulled when someone spoke, like the whole world was new and exciting, everything an opportunity to explore and sink her teeth into. Perhaps Janis was once like that, she thought.
Now ignoring her teacher, carefully, Janis pulled the thread through one of her drawings, sewing the lines with precision across a multitude of flowers. This always calmed her and would always stop the horrible swirling feeling in her chest when things began to get too much, calmed the way she felt like everything might just combust. She was quick with the threads, her hands moving over and over themselves as she zoned out the sound of Madame droning on and on about the past participle – maybe this would be on tomorrow’s pop quiz, but she didn’t much care. Not for the moment.
The uncomfortable feeling of burning pressure still rested inside her chest, still as deep as when she began to sew, her hands worked even quicker, faster than she had ever seen them work, an unconscious and desperate attempt to stop the way she felt. This would be fine. It was fine.
“Janice?” Her “French name”.
Janis blinked.
“Janice? Ça va? What did I just say?”
They weren’t supposed to do that. They weren’t supposed to imply she wasn’t listening when she was drawing or sewing. They weren’t supposed to do that.
“Bien,” Janis spat, her hands still pulling the thread around and around, the feeling in her chest slowing rising to a peak as she glared daggers at her teacher. It was small, but it felt like the whole world to Janis, constricting her chest and dulling her breathing.
Janis had mastered the look of anger that seemed to penetrate her constant gaze. When she was younger, her stare was something numb, as dull and as muted as she felt for years. But with a blank stare came more comments, more hurtful words thrown at her – for as small and as quiet as she tried to make herself for some time, no one once relented with their harm. So, her solution had quickly become give them the same back. The same anger and spite, something strong and powerful. Janis refused to keep being a victim in her story, but for the strong façade she kept up, the something underneath was still difficult to hide. The something that every single person seemed to think no longer existed.
There was a quiet beat before her teacher narrowed her eyes and replied, “D’accord… Cady?”
Janis watched as Cady perked up, her head bobbing up and down as she gleefully replied to whatever stupid question she was being asked.
It was all stupid Janis thought suddenly.
This class. The way she felt. Her haphazardly sewn piece of artwork. The way people expected her to be better.
It was all so stupid.
She left.
She would have had more rage to it if she wasn’t acutely aware that she was being glared at by everyone as she tossed her drawing onto the table, leaving it aside, as she grabbed her bag and walked with as much confidence as she could out of her French class.
It was worse. The feeling in her chest was worse. The pressure hurt and her bones felt as though they wanted to escape, something just so deep she wasn’t sure she would ever get rid of it.
There was a bathroom at the very end of the third-floor language hallway, something tiny and only ever used by students to smoke - Janis knew it was often unoccupied. It had become her favourite “get away” spot for the past two years and, even thought she had told herself over and over again before the beginning of the year that she wouldn’t ever need a “get away” spot again, she still found herself flinging her backpack to the ground and clutching the sink like her life depended on it after slamming the heavy, blue door shut.
Telling Cady about her want for revenge at Regina seemed like an excellent idea at the time, bringing Cady into it was perfect. Janis knew she would end up on top by the end, but God, if seeing and worse, studying, Regina every single day didn’t make her want to start crying. Or start yelling. Or both at the same time.
In front of the mirror, Janis couldn’t help but stare at herself, half expecting the twelve-year-old girl she once was to stare back too. Instead, her hair was just above her shoulders, half tied up at the back with blue-green ends, her face covered in the most creative make up she could think of. Janis was so unique.
Unique.
A sob rose in her throat.
She never wanted to be like this, to be so different, so unique. Her style was a permanent reminder of what could have been, something that made her ache for a past that didn’t really exist because, and she desperately tried to reason with herself about because… Regina was never her friend. Not really. And… even if she had liked Gretchen and Karen and they were sweet and fun and… it was nothing. It was never real.
It was never real.
The sob broke free from her throat and Janis’ hands trembled as she pushed away from the sink and, shakily, opened the zipper of her black backpack and pulled out the first notebook and pen she could find.
With her eyes wet with tears, Janis sank to the floor and uncapped the pen lid and began to scrawl, her letters looped over each other and merged into the next, crossing over and under and all across the page she had open. It was a mess – she meant it to be messy, it was supposed to stop the tears and quell the infernal rage that began to fill her chest, replacing the heavy, swirling pressure.
DO YOU MISS ME? The page said all over, indented in five or six pages past the one that Janis had inked.
Her letters screamed, large and loud, bold and brash, her pen gripped with fiery intent as she turned the page and kept writing. In a moment, her denim jacket felt far too suffocating, so she tore it off and it landed half way across the bathroom as another sob tore through her chest.
“Fuck,” she growled to herself as, after the jacket, went the notebook, the pages lying crumpled in a pile near the door. That had barely done anything more than add fuel to the fire.
Suddenly, Janis stood up on trembling legs and turned to the nearest wall as a blind rage pushed past anything else. She could remember every fucking detail of being twelve.
Before she could consider anything else, her fist found the linoleum wall and she couldn’t stop herself. Over and over and over, her fist pounded the white linoleum as she continued to sob, everything coming down on her all at once. It was everything all at once and her hand was throbbing, but she did not care. She could not care. Not anymore. She had to get rid of the feeling.
“Janis?”
If Janis had processed the voice correctly, she would have felt an immediate relief of safety, but rather, it sounded distorted, wrong, close to Regina if she listened hard enough.
“Fuck off!” she cried out, still hitting the wall as crimson began to bloom in the new cracks on her knuckles.
“Jesus Christ, Janis!” The voice was Damian, she recognised all at once, who ran over to pull her into a hug, something tight and warm and reassuring.
“Fuck- “she hiccupped, face blotchy and damp. “Fuck…” she repeated, slower, suddenly melting into the hug of her best friend. “Damian.”
“Come here, you,” Damian spoke, slow, as he cradled Janis in his arms, lowering them both to sitting on the floor.
It didn’t matter that this was an unused girl’s bathroom, all that mattered to Janis was that she was suddenly safe and enveloped in warmth.
“I’m sorry,” she croaked, her voice weak against Damian’s arm where she lay her head.
“Don’t you apologise to me, Sarkisian,” Damian replied holding her tighter. “When I got the text from Cady saying you’d just walked out of French class I knew something was wrong but fuck, you don’t make it easy to find you,” he laughed weakly, deciding to not yet look at the damage Janis had done to her hand.
“It – was too much.” Janis replied breathlessly.
“What was?”
“Everything.”
She sounded so weak in the moment, so incredibly defeated. Her chest didn’t swirl with anger anymore, there was no pent-up rage or distress, and memories were no longer littering the back of her eyelids when she closed them tight. Tears were still flowing, but they were silent and choked – she was so tired.
“I don’t think I’m better.” Janis paused, prying her face away from Damian’s arm to look him in the eyes. “I don’t… know. I don’t know.” She had never known.
“You’re not expected to be better, sweetie. Who told you that?”
“I – It…” she took a deep breath. “It was supposed to be a fresh start this year… like every year. I wasn’t going to let… her… hurt me anymore. Not let – myself remember.” Tears began to flow down Janis’ cheeks a little quicker as she spoke and Damian gently wiped them with his free hand.
“You say this every year,” he hummed, like he was musing it over.
“It’s worse.”
“Is it Cady?”
Janis tensed in his arms; her eyes suddenly guarded.
“She likes her, Dame. I can see it. I can see it in her eyes when she spends time with us; she – she likes spending time with Regina and… Regina will hurt her. Or –“she took a shuddering breath, “Or Cady will hurt us.”
“The little slice wouldn’t do that, you’ve seen Cady.”
Janis felt so stupid. She always felt so stupid after she panicked, the raw vulnerability cloying. Why would Cady ever hurt them?
“I know.” She didn’t know.
“Can I see your hand?” Damian then asked as Janis offered her bloodied knuckles to him, wincing as he took her hand softly. “Up we get.”
Standing, blood rushed to Janis’ head, and she was unsteady on her feet as Damian guided her over to the sink, turning the tap onto cold and lifting her hand underneath. It looked terrible, possibly one of the worst he had ever seen Janis hurt her hand before. Blue and purple began to blossom underneath the crimson red of the blood and angry looking swelling.
Underneath the sink, Janis’ hand trembled, both from the pain and the residual emotion that still coursed through her body. Carefully, Damian grabbed a blue paper towel and began to dab at her knuckles and wipe away the dried blood, although it seemed to do very little in making it seem less painful.
“Can I just take you to the nurse?”
“And what? You’ll tell her I went insane and punched a wall?” There was a familiar sarcasm about Janis’ tone that almost made Damian sigh with relief.
“Yeah probably.” He smiled. They could discuss this more later, there was so much more to discuss. “Grab your bag!”
The silent something between Damian and Janis as they left the bathroom together was barely silent, screaming to be discussed at length, but it would do for another day. Another discussion. Perhaps if Janis ever decided to tell Cady the full story.
It was only September after all.