Making Amends
Note: I don;'t own MMPR.
Prologue
It was September 1993, and for everyone at AGHS, it was time for another year at school. Jason, Zack, Kim, Trini, Billy, Sarah and Sandy were in Grade 11 this year, and today was their first day of classes. Everything they got in each of their classes today was mostly an overview of what they would be learning throughout the year. Before they knew it, the day had flown by, and now it was the last class of the afternoon, and for Billy, it was his Physics class. "Okay everyone," Ms. Appleby said as people came filing into her classroom, "Whoever you sit with, that person will be you lab partner for the rest of the year. So choose carefully." Billy was already seated at one of the desks close to the back, watching as everyone came in and paired off with who they wanted to sit and work with. Sadly, to his disappointment, nobody sat down next him. Just then, Sandy came into the room.
"Salutations Sandy!" Billy greeted.
"Oh, hey Billy. I didn't know this was your class too," Sandy replied.
"Naturally. I am most partial to this area of Science."
"Yeah, I find it easier too." Sandy took the desk behind him, sitting beside Nadya Khamneipur, another one of her friends. Finally, all the seats in the class were filled, except for the empty seat beside Billy. Ms. Appleby was about to begin, when as she closed the door, she heard someone knocking.
"Sorry I'm late." Billy looked up, recognizing the voice immediately and saw that it was Sarah. "My locker chose a really good time to get stuck," Sarah explained to Ms. Appleby sheepishly.
"That's alright. The custodian will have a look at it, and see if he can rectify that problem. In the meantime..." Ms. Appleby looked around the room for an empty seat.
"Looks like all the seats are taken," Sarah remarked.
"Oh. No, there is one left. Over there, next to Billy Cranston," Ms. Appleby replied. Sarah felt her heart jump at the mention of his name. She looked at him and smiled.
"Great." Sarah happily took the seat next to Billy. Well, I'm ecstatic that no one chose the seat next to me then, Billy thought, captivated by how pretty Sarah looked, even though she was only wearing white shorts and a grey Duran Duran "Strange Behavior" tour t-shirt from 1987, along with her black Doc Marten boots. "I guess we get to be lab partners. Cool eh?"
"Affirmative," Billy replied. Ms. Appleby was busy handing out the written overview papers for the course.
"Your hair used to be darker. Did you dye it or something?" Sarah asked.
"Negative. The lighter hue is from the exposure to the sun, having the same effect as if one would apply peroxide to it," Billy explained.
"Oh yeah, I've heard about that. In fact, the same thing happened to my Aunt. She was on vacation in Mexico one year, and when she came back, her hair had turned blonde. Before that, it used to be brown. Her hair is now just starting to change back to it's original colour, but because there's almost as much sunlight here as there is in Mexico, it's taking longer to change back. But anyways, I like your hair this colour, and your new glasses. They look a lot better on you than the dark ones you wore last year."
"Oh. Uh, thanks," Billy replied, feeling his face getting hot. They listened as Ms. Appleby talked to the class a little bit about the overview she had handed out to them earlier. Sarah quickly through the paper with the overview, and saw something that made her eyes light up with excitement.
"Yes!" she exclaimed.
"May I inquire as to what has you in your heightened emotional state?" Billy asked.
"Check this out." She pointed to what she saw on the paper. "There's going to be a field trip to Playland. I'd heard about it before from a few of my older friends who were in the class in Grade 11 last year, but I wasn't sure if they do this with every Physics 11 class."
"Why not? An amusement park is an excellent place to experience what we've learned about, and of course the manufacturers who design and build the rides must have extensive knowledge and understanding of how different physical forces are exerted on the body when people go on the rides," Billy said.
"Well, all I know is that it's better than just doing paperwork," Sarah remarked. She and Billy giggled quietly so that Ms. Appleby couldn't hear them. Little did they know, Billy particularly, that it would be on this trip to Playland, where Billy would meet with someone from his past. Someone who was from a very dark period in Billy's past.
Several months later...
It was now May in 1994, and everyone in all the Physics 11 classes at AGHS were at Playland. Other Physics 11 classes from other schools in Angel Grove, other suburbs of LA, and LA were there too.
Billy and Sarah were paired up and assigned to work at one of the roller-coasters, the Corkscrew, which also happened to be one of Billy's favourite rides. Sarah, because she was better at art, was working on a drawing of the roller-coaster while Billy would work on the calculations and other scientific stuff. Sarah was still finishing up a part of the drawing when Billy came up and checked on how her drawing was coming along. "How's it going with the illustration?"
"Very carefully," Sarah replied, concentrating intently on her work. "I'm working on each section separately. Then tonight I'm going to put each paper together when I pick up a piece of poster-board for them." She continued to draw, not looking up. While she was adding some colour to the picture, Billy noticed someone coming off the roller-coaster who looked very familiar to him. She was someone that Billy attended school with back in Philadelphia, and she was not very nice to him at the time. One of the members of Jarred's gang of bullies was a girl, and this person that Billy now saw, right there at Playland, in Angel Grove, looked very much like her. "Don't worry, I'll make sure to leave room for pasting your calculations and stuff," Sarah continued, not realizing that Billy wasn't listening. "Billy?" She looked up and saw him facing in the other direction. "Billy what's wrong? What are you looking at?"
"That girl over there. See?" Billy nodded his head in the direction for Sarah to look.
"What girl?" Sarah got up.
"She's the one in the maroon-coloured sleeveless top and black shorts." Just then, the girl turned around and caught Billy looking at her. Billy turned away quickly, hoping he didn't catch her eye. Is that Billy Cranston? the girl thought.
"Who is she?" Sarah asked.
"Someone I remember from Philadelphia, who I attended junior high, and my first year at senior high with," Billy replied.
"Was she nice?"
"Are you kidding? She was a member of this group of bullies that made school a living hell for me, day in day out," Billy said with an exasperated sigh. "Now she's here, in Angel Grove and it's just my luck that she's also here at Playland."
"If that group isn't here, and it's just her, maybe she's changed," Sarah told him.
"I doubt it," Billy remarked sarcastically. "Once a bully, always a bully."
"Then what would she be doing in a Physics class?" Sarah asked.
"Well, you do need a Science 11 credit in order to graduate." While Billy and Sarah continued talking, the girl that Billy had recognized was now watching them talk. That is Billy Cranston, she thought to herself. I didn't know he was here. Now I have a chance to tell him how sorry I am for what I did. As Sarah headed off to the bathroom, Billy sat down where she had working and kept an eye on her drawings. He also went over his own work to make sure everything was correct.
"Excuse me?" Billy heard someone say to him. He knew whose voice it was. Billy looked up to see that the girl he had pointed out to Sarah was now standing in front of him. Because of her former affiliation with Jarred and his other friends, Billy began to feel that familiar pang of anxiety he would get whenever they had approached him. "Are you Billy Cranston?" she asked.
"Yeah. What do you want?" Billy asked with a note of suspicion, sneering at her a little.
"It's me, Jade Morrison. You, do remember me, right?"
"Of course I do. You're that bitch who hung around with Jarred and his troglodyte friends," Billy felt his anger start to rise.
"I, guess I should've, expected you to still be angry, about that," Jade stammered, embarrassed.
"Yeah you should have. You and your gang of friends put me through three fucking years of hell, and I ended up in the hospital from wanting to end my life because of you and them," Billy snarled.
"Well, I don't expect you to forgive me for what we did to you. All I want is for you to know how deeply sorry I am for all of it. The pain we caused."
"You don't even know WHY you're apologizing."
"Why I am apologizing is, while Jarred and his buddies would go after you, they got pleasure out of it. With me, even though it looked like I enjoyed it too, on the inside, I felt so horrible. Like, what have I become? Is this how I want to be seen by others?"
"So why didn't you speak up then? Tell them that you didn't want to continue coming after me the way you guys did? Why didn't you tell them ANYTHING! It would've saved me the misery!" Billy snapped.
"Because I was afraid, Billy. I was a coward," Jade said, ashamed, knowing that Billy was right in asking those questions.
"That's it? You were afraid. That's your excuse?" Billy rolled his eyes sarcastically.
"Jarred would've turned against me."
"Right."
"I'm serious. This is a part of Jarred that you don't know about. Or never saw anyway," Jade said.
"Oh? And, what don't I know about Jarred, except that he deserves to rot in hell?" Billy asked, still with his voice full of sarcasm, and disdain.
"He would've killed me if I went against what he said."
"Yeah, sure," Billy still didn't believe her."
"I mean it Billy. You never saw it, but whenever I would try to tell Jarred that we were going to far in coming after you, he would beat me. I was his girlfriend, Billy, and he was the kind of guy who liked his girls to be submissive, never questioning him. If I didn't do as he said, he would beat me up. Sometimes, it was as much as what we did to you."
"I- you're right. I didn't know that," Billy said, his anger starting to subside. "So, what happened after I left Kensington?"
"When Jarred found this other person to harass, I remembered all those horrible things we did to you, and, I don't know how, but I found the courage to say 'No more'. However, when I told Jarred that I wanted nothing to do with hurting others, he, went crazy," Jade replied.
"What happened? What did he do?" Billy asked.
"I ended up in the emergency room. The pummeling he gave me was so bad that he broke my nose and two of my ribs. While I was recovering, I found out that Jarred went after that other person anyway. But this person had friends, which Jarred didn't know about, and when they found out about what Jarred did to him, there was this huge brawl after school one day, involving Jarred, his friends, and that other guy's friends. The police were even involved."
"So, what happened to Jarred then?"
"He and his friends all got expelled, and sent to juvenile detention too," Jade replied.
"What about you then? Where were your parents in all of this?" Billy asked.
"My mom didn't know anything, or care about it, other than where she was going to get her next drink. She was an alcoholic, so I was in foster care."
"What about your father?"
"I don't know who he is. I was born when my mom was seventeen, and he left when he found out about the pregnancy," Jade said.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Maybe I shouldn't have asked that."
"It's okay. Well, maybe. I don't know."
"So, how did you end up in Angel Grove?" Billy asked.
"There was an incident at the latest foster home I was living in at the time, and when my aunt got word of it, she got in contact with me, and petitioned for custody. Of course, it meant having to move away, but because Jarred didn't get a very long sentence at juvey, I knew that when he got out, he'd be looking for me, so I was happy to move, to get away from him," Jade replied.
"What happened at the foster home?" Billy asked.
"I'd rather not talk about it."
"Oh. Sorry."
"Even though I was glad to leave Jarred and his friends, I also felt like I was losing a family. I know, it's the strangest thing. Even though he beat me, all of us, we were very loyal to each other. And because of the bouncing around from foster home to foster home, the alcoholic mother, the non-existent father, Jarred and his group, they felt to me, like a family because of the loyalty for each other," Jade added.
"Okay. I think I understand now," Billy replied. When Sarah came out of the washroom, she was surprised to see Billy talking with Jade. What is she up to? Sarah thought, suspicious.
"Billy? What's going on?" she asked when she approached them.
"Oh. Uh, Jade, this is my girlfriend Sarah."
"Nice to meet you," Jade said to her.
"Jade. That's your name?"
"Yeah. Why?"
"Nothing. No offense, but if you were such a bully, why are you even speaking to Billy?" Sarah asked, scrutinizing Jade.
"I saw him here, and I wanted to make amends for all the misery that I inflicted on Billy when I hung around with this group that bullied him constantly."
"Oh, alright. Sorry. I wasn't sure. I tend to get a little, protective of Billy sometimes," Sarah replied.
"That's understandable," Jade said.
"So, what made you choose Physics as your Grade 11 Science course?" Sarah asked.
"With Jarred and his friends gone, and because other people would stay away from me due the bad rep I received, I had more time to concentrate on my schoolwork. I discovered that I found Physics to be easier for me, than Chemistry or Biology," Jade explained.
"Same as Sarah," Billy said
"Yeah," Sarah added.
"And, I remembered how brilliant you were with Physics, and, um, well, I kinda, secretly admired you for it," Jade told Billy, her face a hint of red.
"Oh, well...," Billy trailed off, embarrassed.
"That, plus I don't think we'd have done a cool field trip like this back in Philadelphia," Jade added. She, Billy and Sarah cracked up laughing at that remark. Just then, the person that Jade was working with was calling her. "Well, I should get back to work. The illustration doesn't draw itself," Jade said. "I don't expect you to be friends with me, Billy. I just hope you'll understand and believe me when I say that my apology is sincere. I'm not proud at all of what I put you through."
"I know. And, I believe you," Billy replied. Jade walked back to meet up with her assignment partner to finish their project, and Billy and Sarah went back to finish working on theirs.
"I guess she really has changed," Sarah commented. "What do you think? Think you'll ever forgive her?" She asked Billy.
"Well, a hard background is still no excuse for her disrespectful behavior back then, so I'm really not sure. Not right now. I think it will be a while before anything like that can happen," Billy said.
The End