Gripping the straps of her backpack tight and proud, Karen Beecher stepped off the bus to greet her school with the feeling that she finally knew what was up. She knew what kind of day she was going to have, and she was ready to make it happen.
"Hi, Karen!"
Hearing her name, Karen scanned the front courtyard for its source, eventually setting her eyes on Jessica who was merrily dressed in green as always. Jess was waving at her with a smile, so Karen decided to return the favor.
She held up a friendly finger and greeted her, with a smile:
"FUCK YOU!"
Jess frowned. Her hand froze in mid-air, following suit with her mouth and drooping to her side from the sudden shock to her system.
Karen had just cursed at her. And gave her the bird. And was grinning like a maniac about it while she danced out of view.
Jess couldn't find the words to describe the many emotions she was feeling simultaneously. "Why would she...? No. Karen would never. I'm seeing and hearing things, I'm sure."
"Fuck you! Fuck YOU! FUCK you!" Left and right, her four-fingered fist was raised and aiming itself at everyone in the halls, and everyone who saw or even heard her had a similar reaction: shock. Confusion. Disgust.
"Hey, squirt!" Karen heard from down the hall. Pushing past the crowd with feverish intent, regular bully Doris Zeul came bolting through the sea of half-awake school zombies, shoving passerby in every direction that wasn't her current pathway and creating a tidal wave of human beings on either side of her until she was face-to-face with Karen. She picked the shorter girl up by he collar to eye level.
"Hey there, pipsqueak!" She reeled her arm back with her hand balled into a tight fist ready to be propelled forward. Karen's dopey expression was unmoving. "Ain't it past time for your 7-o'-clock pummeling?"
Karen could have acted out. She could have retaliated, or struggled to fight back, but Momma Beecher always said to turn the other cheek. So she turned hers with a choice finger and two choice words:
"Fuck. You."
Doris was floored. The look in her eyes was like she'd been shot in the chest. Dropping Karen right on her black ass (she was wearing black pants, you see), the more athletic girl looked off into nothingness in hopes of processing what had just happened.
She squinted. She bent over. She scratched her chin. And then she scratched it some more, and all the while Karen watched in anticipation of what was to come.
Finally, Doris shrugged.
"I am thoroughly shocked and appalled by this transgression," she announced calmly, and promptly threw herself into the nearest open locker so hard that it closed itself and locked.
Satisfied, Karen skipped through the halls to her class, humming to herself before returning to the classic line and gesture that rewarded her so.
Doris was never seen again.
It was a Whatever Day out on the field at PE, meaning as long as they were in their uniforms, students could choose to do whatever they wanted regardless of whether they were physically active, and still get a grade. Karen chose to go around giving her fellow classmates the one-finger salute and shouting "fuck you!" and even spinning around in circles to make sure she got everyone.
Everyone involved thought it was rude, abrupt, and confusing; Kara, however, who was sitting in the bleachers in her free period, thought it it was a riot.
"Oh my god, how do I not have my phone on me? This is hilarious!"
"Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!"
"Fuck yeah!" shouted Kara shouted as she pumped her fist into the air.
In return, Karen stopped to give her the double-birdie, the smile on her face borderline hysterical. "And fuck you most of all, Kara! Fuck you and your fucking haircut!"
Kara's smile melted away. Slowly, she lowered her fist and stared at Karen, who simply backed away towards the edge of the field with a double-deuce still in Kara's direction while Kara simply sat there, bewildered.
"Huh."
When Zee sat down for lunch that day, she didn't say a word – no hello's or how-do-you-do's, she just sat down holding her backpack over her shoulder in an unusually stiff manner, eyes pried wide open like she was shell-shocked.
Her friends (all except Karen) looked up from their meals and saw Zee's lipstick had been done only on one lip and had trailed off across her face halfway through.
"Uhhh, Zee?" said Jess. "You got a little..." She scratched the part of her face mirroring where Zee's lipstick had smeared. "...something there."
"Uh, huh?" Zee jumped as if she had just been pulled out of a trance. She pulled a compact mirror out of nowhere (as she was prone to do) and was shocked to see her face.
"Oh my gosh!" She quickly pulled out a handkerchief from the same plane of non-existence and wiped the shmutz off her face before anyone else could see it.
"Had a little make-up trouble, Zee?" Babs asked.
"I did! And you're not gonna believe how: Karen, of all people, just said the most vulgar—"
"We know," said Kara, slightly annoyed. "She's been saying it to everyone! All day, just 'fuck this, fuck that, fuck yadda-yadda, like she's a kid who just found out what it means and wants to try it on everybody!"
Jess gasped and put a hand up to her mouth. "You don't think it's because we hurt her, do you?"
"Don't be ridiculous," Kara said. "She'd have said it ages ago if that was the case."
"Oh, thank God! For a second, I— wait."
Diana stuck her index finger in the air to catch the others' attentions. "This 'fuck' you speak of... is it, perchance, a fruit? Or a furniture of some sort?"
"Diana, how are you the leader of this team, again?" asked Zee.
"Do you also have centuries' worth of training under the greatest military force since Ancient Rome? No? Then shut the fruit-furniture up."
"Oh my god, here she comes!" Jess whispered.
Sure enough, Karen had just skipped into the cafeteria, smiling all the way with her hands tugging on her backpack straps. She looked genuinely happy, which confused the girls greatly. She didn't look malicious or spiteful – but then, this was Karen, she probably couldn't process those emotions physically. But could she? They'd never really seen her act anything like this before now...
It confused them even more that Karen chose to sit down with them, and continued to smile while putting her lunch tray down as if nothing was wrong. Karen barely looked up from her tray as began eating her sandwich.
The girls were all glancing sideways between each other, waiting on someone to to ask her the obvious, but it course, nobody wanted to.
Zee sighed.
"So, uh, Karen... learned any new words, lately?"
"Oh, you noticed!"
"Yeah, I, uh, think the whole school noticed, actually."
"Hm! Well, just been saying what I've been thinking, is all."
She took another bite of her sandwich.
"About that," Zee continued, "do you think you... maybe... got it out of your systems, finally?"
"Oh, never!" Karen said cheerfully. "Fuck you!"
"KAREN!" yelled Jess.
Karen shrank down into her seat with a scared look in her eyes.
"WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM!?"
"W-wh-what!?" Karen looked around frantically. Everyone else began to lean in or stood up. This was beginning to look more and more like an intervention, and she never responded well to those.
"Don't you 'what' us!"
"Yeah," said Kara, "you've been cussing everyone out all day! The least you owe us is an explanation!"
"I... what?" The look on Karen's face spelled genuine confusion, and yet the girls continued.
"What's the big idea?"
"What did we ever do to you, besides everything?"
"Even I don't cuss people out that much, and I hate everyone!"
"Wait a minute, wait a minute!" Karen called out. "You're telling me... THAT'S WHAT IT MEANS?!"
The otherss were all taken aback. They looked at each other with confusion – more so than previously, in fact.
"You mean you didn't know?"
"NO! When I asked my dad what it meant, he said it meant something people did when they really, really love each other! I mean, he did act all funny at first. I tried asking mom before, but then she had that heart attack that I assumed was unrelated... but I... I...!"
She was hyperventilating.
Zee set her hands on Karen's shoulders while the rest bunched up around her hoping she was okay.
"There there, it's alright! It was just a misunderstanding, everyone will— well, no, they probably won't understand... but that's fine, because it's only a matter of time before they— okay, maybe they won't be forgetting this anytime soon..."
"You're right!" Karen ruffled frantically through her backpack. "Oh, where is it?" she whined. "I know I should have it somewhere, I always bring it to school with me... oh, here it is!" Karen yanked her arm out from her unreasonably small backpack holding an AK-47 assault rifle.
"HOLY SHIT!"
"JESUS!"
"OH MY GOD, KAREN! WHAT—? HOW—!?"
"KAREN! WHAT THE FUCK!?"
"I think I'm gonna throw up..."
"Kuh-Karen," Zee stuttered, "wh-where did... you...?"
"Huh, what?" Karen looked at the AK-47, which she was still holding, pointing it up into the air. She looked back at Zee. "Oh, this? I made it!"
"You... made it!?"
"Yup! It was pretty easy, actually – once I mastered quantum physics, putting a gun together out of nothing was like playing with Lincoln Logs!"
"O-okay, fair point, I guess, but... why!? Why would you use that!?"
Karen took another look at it. "What, right now?"
"Ever!"
"Well, y'see, there's this little thing called the Fourth Amendment—"
"I-I think I've heard enough. But just what on Earth are you planning to do with it now?"
"It's simple..."
With the safety off, Karen bolted towards the lunchroom exit, shouting:
"...I can't leave any witnesses!"
Zee clawed at the sides of her face. "Oh god, what have we done!? We've gotta do something!"
"You're right," said Babs. She reached into her and pulled out a startlingly generic handgun painted purple and yellow, the words "BAT GLOCK" marking either side.
"...she's gonna need all the help she can get!" She cocked the gun in her hands and ran off to join Karen as the other girls sat and watched, frozen in total, abstract horror at the tragedy that was about to unfold.
"...fuck."