Chapter 3 – School? Or Prison in disguise?

The Greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge. ~Stephen Hawking~

I sat quietly in the back seat of Maria’s Silver Holden V8 Statesman. I didn’t say anything regarding the first day of school, or how unfair it was that Amy got shotgun. I honestly didn’t care.

It had been three weeks since I accidentally let it slip to my family that I was being ‘abused’. Every night for a week Kya had rang, asking me about my day, if James was home, whether I had any new bruises, etc. I knew that after that she would go on msn and tell the others what I had told her. My heart went out to her and how much they cared about me, but this was exactly why I hardly ever spoke to them.  I knew that if something major had happened, like a mental breakdown or something, and they asked me what had happened, yeah, I would no doubt tell them but I had no idea why it slipped out.

“So, after school, you have to get out as fast as possible because my mum will be waiting for you guys. Okay?” Maria had been saying. I hadn’t been listening, just staring out the window, hoping that today would come and go quickly and easily.

“Lisa?” She half turned in her seat but gave up and instead, moved her rear view mirror. “Did you hear me?” I bobbed my head as we went over a bump, sending Amy’s mobile phone flying down to the floor then the momentum of the car pushed it to my feet. With a sigh, I picked it up and handed it to her. I didn’t read the message or anything, but I saw the name and knew she was texting her boyfriend.

“Okay. Now remember, she drives a white Holden commodore…like that one,” she pointed to a blue Toyota that passed us. She had fixed her mirror and we had stopped at a red light.

“Maria, not only is that car blue, but it’s a Toyota Prius.” I said, reading the logo. “I know what a Holden Commodore looks like. Dad used to drive one, the same one, in fact, that your mum drives. I think I’d recognise our old car.”

Dumbass old hag I thought to myself. Of course, by now, I had learnt to keep my thoughts to myself.

“Don’t talk to me like that.” She snapped.

“Sorry.” I muttered just to please her. I didn’t care. I had had a nightmare the night before I wasn’t in the mood for her crap. All I wanted to do was go to school, spend the day with my family and then go home, eat and go to sleep.

After another fifteen minutes of silence, Maria pulled into the car park out the front of school. I knew why she parked here…..for Amy. I had always had to walk from the main road. Jasmine caught the bus and the other’s walked from their houses.

I was first out of the car and stood waiting impatiently at the boot of the car. I had planned to meet Mikki at the side of the school gym then walk to the bus stop to wait for Jasmine. Then together, we would walk back to the gym and wait for the others and the start of the school day. When Maria popped the boot, I practically threw it up and yanked my heavy bag out. My body swung backward with the weight but I steadied myself before any injuries could occur.

“Bye, Maria; bye, Amy!” I said quickly as I began walking quickly away from them.

“Lisa, wait!” Maria called as she stuck her head out her window. “Could you show Amy around?”

“No, I have to meet Mikki by the gym!” I shouted back without turning around. A few seconds later I heard her car drive off and the huffing and puffing of someone behind me. “Go away Amy.” I said as the footsteps slowed. I quickened my pace and she had to jog to keep up; her sleek straight hair blowing about wildly in the wind.

“But I don’t know where to go!” She replied. “I know I have to meet Kevin at the gym but I don’t know where that is; and you’re meeting Mikki there.”

“No, I’m meeting Mikki near the gym, not at the gym.”

“Could you just please, please, please be a good big sister for once and show me where I can meet Kevin?”

“The boyfriend goes to this school?” I asked, finally realising with shock. “I didn’t know that. What year is he?” my pace slowed because of my curiosity and the weight of my bag and soon, I had to speed up to follow Amy.

“Two years year above me,” her cheeks went pink. “He’s in the year ten drama production this year.”

I stopped in my tracks. “That Kevin? As in Kevin Donahue?” she nodded. “Amy…”

“What?” now she stopped walking, sensing my hesitation. Amy turned back to me and her faded-blue eyes were full of concern and nervousness. As much as I hated and envied her; pretty blue eyes, her flawless tanned skin, curvy figure and bubbly personality; I could not simply, not tell her what I knew.

“Amy, I’m not about to tell you that you can’t see him. That’s your choice.” I began hesitantly. She walked back to me and stood at my side, her attention was focused solely on me. “I’m only going to tell what I know and why I don’t like him. Amy, Kevin stabbed a student last year. Not because of a fight, even though he got involved in plenty of those, but he stabbed his best friend and girlfriend. His best friend was worried about him, because his parents had left him; he was doing drugs, getting involved with gangs and things like that. When his best friend tried to help him, Kevin stabbed him, claiming he was under influence of drugs at the time.”

I saw her gulp and had the urge to hug her. She may not be my sister and her mum will never be my mum, but she was the only member of the Krintah family that I actually cared about. I dropped my bag and hugged her.

“W-what happened to his girlfriend?”

Of course, she wanted to know what happened to his late girlfriend.

“Well,” I began. “No-one knows what was going on exactly, but the paper had said that he had gotten her pregnant and when she refused to have an abortion and told him that she wanted to keep the baby…. Well, let’s just say that things got out of hand. The girl’s best friend said that she had wanted to keep the baby and raise it with her mother who lived in the country.”

Amy’s body was shaking slightly and her breathing was a bit jagged.

“Just promise me, if you’re going to be with him, be careful. Don’t do anything you don’t want to do, and if he really pisses you off or forces you into situations you don’t want to be in, I’ll kick his a*s.” I hugged her tighter and she whispered a ‘thanks’ with a shaky laugh.

“Come on, the gym’s this way.” I said with a small smile.

Together we walked towards the gym and I explained to her which teacher’s to avoid, which were nice and gave extensions, who was just plain creepy, etc. She smiled and laughed and when we got to the gym, a boy with a mop of black hair and a bright blue fringe called out to her.

“Amy!” Kevin shouted. His silver lip ring shone in the early morning sunshine and his brown eyes flickered to me, looking me up and down as I glared at him. I turned to my step-sister and hugged her.

“Be careful, okay? That’s all I ask.” I felt her nod and when we pulled apart; her boyfriend was standing right in front of us. His eyes were squinted as he looked at me.

“What happened to your face, Lisa?” he asked mockingly. “Did you get into a fight with the s***s again?”

“No. Some stupid pig-headed guy thought he could take me. This was all I got.” I smirked. “Don’t be surprised if your buddy, Kellah doesn’t show today.”

“Liss!” Mikki came walking over. I hugged her happily and turned to Amy.

“See ya Amy. Remember what I said, your Grandma is picking us up.” She nodded and in her eyes I could see that she understood my warning. Kevin sent me one last glare before turning with Amy and walking towards the gym. His hand went to her waist and slowly began to lower as they walked. I grimaced and looked away. It was hard enough seeing Amy being able to flaunt the school dress let alone, see her get felt up by her boyfriend.

“Amy’s going out with Kevin?” Mikki asked me. I nodded and began to walk in the direction to the bus stop. “What the hell? By the way Lisa, what did you mean by don’t be surprised if Kellah doesn’t come today?”

“Kevin asked about my face. I said I got into a fight with one of his ‘buddies’.”

“But what about when Kellah gets here?”

“He won’t. Kellah moved out of town with his mum last week.”

“Lisa!” Jasmine shouted happily, cutting off the rest of the conversation. She waved erratically with her free hand. The other was gripping the strap of her Bass guitar bag slung over her shoulders; I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. Next to her, Jamie grinned and pulled his earphones out of his ears.

“Hey guys. How are you?” I asked.

“Tired. I can’t believe I’m here for another year.” Jamie told me as hugged us. As I hugged Jasmine, the bus sped away as if we were a disease.

“I know what you mean. I hated year eight, nine, ten and eleven. Why the hell are we back again?”

“Because we all love each other.” Jasmine said tilting her head to the side like a child.

“Hey, stop with the patronizing. It’s too early for that.” Mikki muttered and Jasmine laughed, turning and hugging her friend. I looked at Mikki and realised that she had modified her school dress. Jasmine had too.

Instead of the usual sleeved, collar, knee-length dress that hung about me like I was a coat hanger, Their dresses were tied at the waist with belts, the sleeves folded up past their elbows and Mikki wore a three-quarter sleeved white top underneath to match her white beret, which was clipped in its rightful place in her hair.

Instead of a white shirt, Jasmine had left the top two buttons of her dress undone and exposed a lacy black singlet top and the skirt was ripped and tattered at the hem. I don’t know how they did it, but they made the girl’s uniform look pretty darn awesome. I bowed and they looked at me weird.

“I bow to your awesomeness and I bask in your better-than-me-ness.” I rose from my bow and smiled at them.

“Huh? Oh!” Mikki chuckled.

“Wow. What the hell are you wearing ‘cause it sure ain’t the school dress. I mean, same pattern and all but…that looks actually cool!” Kya exclaimed as she walked over to meet us.

“Come on,” Jasmine laughed. “We better go to the quad for assembly.” I nodded and followed silently behind. Kya chatted idly with Jasmine and Mikki and Jamie started chatting excitedly about something they had done on the weekend. Sadly, this left me alone with my thoughts. Instead of the dread of school, Amy flitted to my mind. I really hoped she would make the right decisions, but then again, Amy was a smart girl. However, so was Kevin’s last girlfriend... " I shook my head and sped up to walk in pace with the others.

 

“And now you shall go off to your class.” The small dwarf-like woman shouted through the megaphone. I rolled my eyes, every year she shouted the same thing and every year, hardly anyone heard her. I didn’t know why she bothered. I turned and began walking towards my first class, without the others. They weren’t in my SOSE class. Of all the classes, I thought to myself, my first one of the year is without any of them.

When I arrived at the class, the teacher was already there and I pushed open the door and was engulfed by the scent of stale sweat mixed with a terrible air-freshener that obviously didn’t work. I screwed up my face in disgust and went to sit in a seat at the back of the room. I was about the tenth person in the room.

“Name?” The teacher asked in his monotone voice. I looked up from the seat I was about to sit on. It had a picture of a penis drawn on it with permanent black marker. I rolled my eyes briefly at which ever year eight of which ever year had thought it cool to draw it.

“Um, Lisa Wilson.” I said, knowing my name would not be under that.

“Wilson-Krintah?” he asked as he raised a thick black eye brow. At first glance I thought he had caterpillars on his face… the new fashion this season. Goes well with the drab school uniform policy. Get yours today for just three easy payments of $49.99… His hair was thinning at the top of his scalp and his darkish, slightly wrinkly face was the home of two black-brown eyes and a thin layer of stubble.

“I prefer Wilson.” I said through gritted teeth. Why was I always reminded of James Krintah and my relation to him?? I asked silently.

“Oh-kay. Lisa.” He said dismissively after breaking up the syllables in ‘okay’. I ran my hands along the back of my skirt and sat down, flinching slightly at the temperature of the cold plastic chair. I stared out the window and after a few more minutes, no-one else was entering.

“Fifteen? Is that all? Excellent,” the teacher said to no-one in particular. I looked around and saw that the classroom was half full. Few students sat in the opposite corner at the back, talking quietly amongst themselves, and a few girls sat in the middle row gossiping and laughing loudly. I frowned at their fake enthusiasm as one girl recounted her events from the weekend.

The sound of rice falling through a canister made me look out the window and sighed as I saw the world around the school become blurred by thousands of water droplets. I wasn’t a big fan of the rain. I mean, I loved walking through the rain and jumping in puddles occasionally, and the best feeling was having a hot shower and curling up with a hot chocolate and a good book in bed but I just hated the depression it left me feeling.

I shivered and rubbed my hand along my arm as I turned to face the front. When it rained, I never had a good day.

“Okay, guys. So,” the teacher began, clasping his hands for attention and silence. When it fell, he began his speech by introducing himself as Thomas Ketty and saying that we could call him, Tom. He then launched into a detailed but thoroughly interesting speech about what we would be learning and how change has impacted the earth.

Immediately, I tuned out, staring out the window and observing the black school gates and how they stood out against the grey clouds and coloured cars in the car park. I was in the first of the five main buildings; this one was shared with two other rooms upstairs, four rooms downstairs and the school library. The school office was shared with another of the main buildings; where Jasmine would have been for her Math lesson. Poor Jasmine, first day back and her first double was Math. Even though I was alone, I still pitied her. In the science block which was next to the year twelve lockers, would be where Mikki and Jamie were currently studying Psychology. Kya would either be in her accelerated English class or hiding out in the library downstairs. Part of me just wanted to ditch class and go downstairs to hide in the library.

I couldn’t though. Not if I wanted to get good grades, which meant a lot of sucking up and homework either way. I pushed my chair out a little and rested my head on my pencil case, shutting my eyes. It was going to be a long day.

 

*****

 

When the bell went, Lisa left her class silently, swinging her bag over her shoulder as she had done for the past four years and headed out to meet her friends in The Gardens.

The Gardens were a beautiful area for senior school students only. There was a healthy green hedge that lined the winding white and grey pebble path. Each passage led to a quiet area with a table and chairs, or a bench; and if you followed the main path, instead of taking a smaller one, you would find a large grassed area with a fountain in the middle and the edges of this small paradise were lined with flower beds and roses and a few trees were scattered in the area.

She began to follow the main path and just before the final turn, she stopped abruptly and turned around, hearing someone shouting. She began to follow the sound, the shouts becoming screams and pleas. Lisa’s heart began to pound in her chest, becoming more and more anxious as seconds raced by.

And then, just as quickly as they appeared, the screams stopped. Lisa’s heart was hammering in her ears as well as her chest and her breathing came quick.

“Lisa!” A girl with tight brown curls and small beady blue eyes was making her way towards the school; the name made the dark haired girl jump in fright.

“Oh, hey, Malika.” She replied timidly, but her heart was still pounding so loud it hurt her ears.

“Are you alright? You look scared….and pale,” she added as an afterthought.

I’m always pale…. Lisa thought but instead she nodded. “I thought I heard someone scream. Must have been my imagination…” she trailed off.

“Huh. I didn’t hear anything. Oh well, hey, do we have biology together this year?”

“Um, I think so. Who do you have?”

“Mr. Davits, first double tomorrow.”

“Yeah, looks like we’re together.” She forced a smile to hide her still anxious heart. “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”

“Of course,” She smiled. “Take care, Lisa.” Malika called as she walked back the way Lisa had come.

“Yeah bye.” Lisa muttered. With a small shake of the head and dismissing the screams from her already crowded head, Lisa walked further down the main path, away from the school, turning down the smaller path with black and brown pebbles and finding her usual table, surprisingly empty. Her friends weren’t there, leaving her time to think about what had happened.

She had heard screams….but she wasn’t going crazy….was she? Lisa threw her bag into a big brown-grey stone in frustration before picking it up and throwing it under the table. She stomped her foot, still not relieving any anger. She bunched up her fists and screamed until her face went red and she had to gasp for breath.

When she had finished her tantrum, Lisa sat on the cold, wet aluminium bench and table. Ignoring the water that soaked her dress and underwear, she put her arms folded on the table and closed her eyes.

 

*****

 

Just once, I’d like a dream that was normal dream.

 

I was walking through a green maze, knowing my destination and my plan. In my stomach something moved slightly and I put my hand on my belly and prayed that my little one and I would be safe. My purple tank top and black lace camisole made me shiver but the top was all I could wear that wouldn’t show my bump…yet. Below my slowly ballooning stomach I wore jeans and black boots, no heel.

The sun was out but the sky was covered in clouds and my blonde hair flew about in the wind around my face, my purple ear-rings swinging slightly with my steps. I would tell him today and as I turned the corner to see him, I knew it would be harder than I thought.

“Hey,” he said; his voice quiet and soft.

“Hey Kevin,” he walked over and kissed me, wrapping his arms around my waist.

“I have to talk to you…” I moved away and sat on the bench. He followed slowly, and sat across from me. I could tell something was bothering him so I asked. “What’s wrong?”

“Jason’s dead.”

“W-what? How?”

“Stabbed. The ambos were too slow…too late….”

I reached out and touched his hand. Kevin picked it up and held it to his cheek for comfort.

“What did you want to tell me, my love?”

I felt so sad about telling him, so guilty. But I had to tell him; he had to know.

“This isn’t easy… you remember that night when we went to the cabin at the lagoon?”

He smiled slightly, “Best night of my life.”

“Well, about that….I….Kevin, I’m pregnant.”

“What?”

“Neither of us was protected and I now have a child growing inside of me.”

“Are you…?” he asked but I shook my head.

“I’m keeping the baby.”

“Why? How? Do you know what people will say?”

“I know. But I’m going to move and raise the baby somewhere in the countryside.”

Kevin was silent and so was I.

“Kayla knows…” I whispered.

“You told her?”

“How could I not, Kevin? She’s my best friend. My mum knows that I’m keeping it, too. Mum’s going to help me raise the baby.”

“No.”

“What?” I gasped.

“I said, no. Get rid of it! It will ruin our lives!”

“The baby won’t ruin our lives!”

“Yes, it will! Get rid of that stupid thing that’s growing inside of you.”

“No! Mum and I are going to move away and raise him or her.”

He rose angrily and stormed around the table in circles. After a minute, Kevin walked over to me. He got on his knees and looked up at me with pleading eyes, only they were tainted with something dark.

“Please? For me, for you, for us, don’t do this.”

“Kevin….”

“Please?”

“I can’t. It’s part of me. The baby is already alive. I can’t take its life. God wouldn’t give us a child if we weren’t meant to have one.”

“Then I’m sorry.” He rose to his feet and turned around, facing the only exit. When he turned around, there was his pocket knife in his hand. On the blade there was blood, fresh but dried, a day old.

“Kevin…. You killed your best friend?” I assumed.

“It was his fault. I told him to stay out of it, to listen to me, but he didn’t. Just like you. And now, you can’t leave here with that Thing in your belly.”

“Kevin!” I shrieked panicking. My hands flew to protect my stomach, my soon-to-be bump. I was trembling with fear; I had to protect the baby.

“Kevin, DON’T!” I screamed as he sauntered forward. He was muttering ‘sorry’s under his breath. I screamed at the top of my lungs but no-one heard me, no-one came, no-one knew we were here.

“HELP! HELP! SOMEONE PLEASE!” I shouted. I screamed at the top of my lungs but still, no-one heard.

As the knife plunged into my stomach, I let out a small yelp, and a tear streamed down my face. I prayed that god would save my child as I felt my eyes close and the blackness take over.

 

 

 

Author's Note

This is the third Chapter.
I would really, really appreciate any criticism.
Thanks