Okay, I want to thank everybody who replied, and please continue to read. Constructive critisicm is always welcomed.
PART TWO
Things hadn't really gotten bad for Resa until two months into the year, when Jack decided that it was time to show her who was boss, and time to show Carrie that she wouldn't always be there to protect her. Yes, this hadn't only started because none of us liked Resa, it also had to do with Carrie and how Jack didn't think she had the right to speak to him the she had. Of course, he'd never admit that she had gotten the better of him, he would simply say that he didn't like her confidence, but if you were to take away one's confidence, what would they really have left? Of course, I didn't say anything about it. I was actually all for it at the time. Then again, I knew it wasn't going to be an easy task trying to waver Carrie's confidence, for no matter what you said to her, she didn't care. She didn't let words affect her, she figured that words really couldn't hurt her, which was probably why Jack had decided we should use Resa to get to Carrie, as he said, we'd be killing two birds with one stone. So, to begin, we started numerous rumors.
One day, Resa and Carrie walked into the cafeteria, like they would every day, and they knew something was up when all eyes fell on Resa. She stared around the room, hoping to find a pair of supportive eyes, but the only eyes that seemed even a little sympathetic were those of Carrie's. When Carrie placed a hand on Resa's shoulder, I got the feeling she was trying to convince her to got elsewhere for lunch. However, Resa wasn't budging. Now, almost everybody in the large cafeteria was laughing and pointing at Theresa Lopez-Fitzgerald, which brought tears to her eyes. Even from where I had been standing, at the very back of the large room, I could tell she wanted to cry, but she didn't. Surprisingly, she held her head up high, and took a seat with Carrie beside her. Then, I knew that Carrie had seen the piece of paper when her eyes began to blaze. And I mean they literally turned red, that's how angry she looked. At that moment I regretted the action I had taken, not because I felt guilty, no, that feeling didn't come until later, only because I would have to eventually face the wrath of Caroline Hailey, and that was the last thing that I had wanted to do. I watched as she grabbed the piece of paper that had already been passed around the cafeteria, therefore everybody in the room had read it.
"What is this?" She had asked, turning toward Jack, myself, and the other guys that we had considered our friends. On the paper were all of the rumors that we had thought up about Resa, listed from one to fifteen, and what a mistake it was. Not only were we about to be butchered, but we were now the center of attention, not Resa, and that was not how we had planned it to go. We hadn't even planned on Carrie seeing the piece of paper. Then, to all of our surprise, she started reading the piece of paper aloud, evidently very disgusted with each of us. "Pregnant four times, had two miscarriages, slept around with all of the guys in her old school," she paused, glancing at us, waiting for our reactions. Back then, we were pretty good actors, therefore we hadn't shown any reaction to the list that we had made up, and to be honest, it was mostly me, since I was the one who had printed it out. "Please, whatever happened to the other two babies, I mean, she only had two miscarriages?" She asked, her voice was as cold as ice, and right then we knew that we didn't want her to finish the list. Yet, she did. Not aloud, but she looked at the other rumors that we had started, and stopped at one in particular, well, at least she had gotten her answer. "Had two abortions?" She asked, yet to me, it hadn't sounded much like a question. Instead of questioning us anymore, she then turned her attention to the rest of the people and I was surprised that most of them were sitting stunned and awestruck. "And you people," she had begun, her voice no sweeter than she had been toward us. "You people actually bought into this crap, you actually believed what these fools were feeding you, how gullible are you?" Though, she knew that it hadn't been believable, she knew that the only reason they had been acting the way they had was because they hadn't liked Resa from the beginning, and to Carrie, that was no excuse for being so heartless.
"Gullible, us?" It was now Patricia Corry who spoke. She, too, was among the popular girls, and like Marcy, was never able to keep her mouth shut, but I was surprised that she was willing to talk back to Carrie. "The only gullible one here is you, in case you haven't noticed. You think she's this sweet little angel, but she's really not, and I wouldn't be surprised if she did get pregnant four times, and I wouldn't put it passed her to abort two of her babies. And being as crazy as she is, she probably threw herself down the stairs or something just so she would miscarry the other two babies," she said, and at first I wasn't sure that Carrie had even heard her. I hadn't seen a reaction from her, nothing. Her face wasn't bright red like it got when she was really angry, she hadn't slapped Patricia yet, she wasn't yelling, or saying anything for that matter. For a good couple of minutes, she just stood there, doing nothing. And then I had come to the conclusion that maybe she believed it, maybe she had listened to Patricia, and believed the rumors we started, maybe she wouldn't stick up for Resa anymore. But, as it would seem, neither were correct. She had heard Patricia loud and clear, and it was pretty obvious that she didn't believe a thing that paper had said. I noticed her take an intake of breath, and that was when I realized that she was simply trying to calm herself, she was too angry to speak, so she'd let it slide until she didn't feel like strangling Patricia.
"I don't think you know what you're talking about," she finally said, her voice quiet but menacing at the same time. "And when you don't know what you're talking about, it's usually best not to talk at all, don't you agree?"
At that point, Patricia recoiled. Carrie had been standing dangerously close, and her words had been dangerously quiet, I think most of the room was afraid of her at that moment. I know I was, knowing how she can get and all. Patricia didn't seem to know what to say, how to act, she didn't even seem to know where to go. Honestly, she had looked like she wanted to run and hide, never to come face to face with Caroline Hailey again. However, there really wasn't anywhere to run, nowhere that was safe, anyway.
"That's what I thought," Carrie had stated, turning away from Patricia. She had turned toward Resa, who still didn't seem to know how to react. I didn't think that she had ever been disrespected as she had while being in this school, and it had showed on her face. "Lets go, Resa. We don't have to stay here with these idiots," she said, although Resa hadn't moved. "Resa?"
"No, Carrie, it's alright. We'll stay," as she said the words, I could tell that she really hadn't wanted to. She had just wanted to prove that she wasn't about to run away. She had wanted us to know that she wasn't backing down, and that would only make Jack and myself work twice as hard to make her life miserable, and I know it sounds mean, but I really hadn't felt bad for her. How could I? I didn't even know her, and it would take a lot of getting to know her to make me realize what a mistake I had made, and at the time, I hadn't planned on getting to know her at all. She was just a toy, we'd just play around a little, but we had never really gotten sick of it. We would never feel bad for what we'd done, and maybe Jack had influenced my decision most of the time, but in the end, it was I who chose to go through with the torture, and yes, I would later regret it.
"What do you mean? Are you sure that you want to stay? I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to ditch…" Resa's words cut her off in mid sentence.
It had seemed as if she was going to relent for a moment, but I realized I was wrong when I saw her shake her head. "No, no, we can stay," and that was all she said. Nothing about how wrong we were, nothing about how cruel some of us were, if not all of us, nothing about any of it. The only thing she had to say was that they didn't have to leave, they could stay, and although she had she had tried to hide it, the look of hurt flashed across her eyes before she covered it with an almost real smile. I was almost certain that Carrie would push it, that she wouldn't accept staying, but she must have realized that Resa wasn't budging, because she just nodded and sat back down, giving Jack and myself a glare that told us to back off, and it probably would have been smart had we listened, but in case I didn't mention it, we were quite hard headed back then as well.
Just as everything had seemed normal again, Jack had to open his big mouth, and believe me, I have never forgiven him for that, I mean, I really don't think he knew when enough was enough. I knew he was asking for trouble the minute he started to walk up to Carrie, and I tried to stop him, I really did, but he was stubborn, just not as stubborn as Carrie Hailey, and never had we really seen that until that very day. I don't think anybody could be as stubborn as Carrie, but I knew Jack would try, and I knew he would expect me to back him up, and I knew that not only would he be in big trouble, but I knew that I would too. "You must really have faith in this poor soul, right?" The poor soul that he had been referring to was Resa, and for a moment, I thought Carrie might lash out at him, maybe even rip him to pieces. Yet, she did no such thing. She didn't seem to care about the words he had spoken.
"Must I?" She challenged him, and by the way he looked, he hadn't liked it. "In case you haven't noticed, Jack, I seem to believe that out of everybody in this school, she is the purest. Have you an objection?" Wow, this girl was good. And true. I knew that Resa wasn't evil, such as all of the other people in our school, and I believe that Jack had known that, too.
"Maybe she's so pure because nobody wants her. Most guys just look at her and that's all it takes, they stay as far away as they can," he had replied, gaining many laughs from many different girls in the room. As if they were any better looking, I think not. Don't get me wrong, they weren't ugly or anything, at least not all of them, but neither was Resa, and she could probably have beaten almost every girl there with her looks.
"A lot of sense you make," she said sarcastically, probably getting ready to argue her case, or rather, Resa's case. "If nobody wants her, then how is it she was pregnant four times, oh, and if I read number nine correctly, by four different guys? Hmm, how is that, Jack?" I could see Jack's mind working, trying to figure a way out of the lie he'd gotten himself into. I knew that note of rumors was trouble, okay, so I helped out a little, or a little more than a little, I still knew it would lead to trouble, although the problem may have lied with the fact that I never told any of the guys it was trouble. Maybe I should have, not that they would have listened. Jack had turned to me for assistance, like I was supposed to get him out of the trouble he'd gotten himself into, and when I looked back at him, I knew that was exactly what he had wanted me to do. Okay, so I wasn't very good at lying or making fun of people, I didn't say I didn't do it, I just said I wasn't any good at it. Jack wanted me, of all people, he wanted me to get him out of trouble. Not likely. Of course, I hadn't said that, I had to try to make up something.
So, there I was, bailing my friend out of trouble while making Carrie a bigger enemy than she had already been. "Who said it had been consensual on their part?" I had asked. Okay, I know it sounds ridiculous now, but it was all I could think to say, and I had obviously done a pretty good job, since Jack had started smiling and I heard more laughs than I had before. However, Carrie hadn't laughed, and neither had Resa. In fact, Resa had looked disappointed in me, I don't think she knew I had it in me, being so cruel, I mean. Yet, I felt proud. I had said something that had gotten a few good laughs, I had put down the person that most of the school disliked, things couldn't be better. But then, I had to remember that it was Carrie I was about to face, and as I had realized that, my smile was no more.
Carrie had nodded her head, a sardonic smile playing on her lips. "I'm sorry, Crane, I don't think I heard you right," she said, and as soon as she had referred to me by my last name, I knew I was in for it. Why had I said what I said? I mean, did I want to die a slow, painful, agonizing death? Of course I hadn't wanted my life to end that way, but I had little choice in the position I was in. "Do you think you could repeat those words?" Carrie had asked, breaking through my thoughts of the death that was sure to come.
"Umm, I'd rather not, if you don't mind," I had actually been about to stutter, yet I couldn't let my fans down that easily. As I stared at the duet, I watched Carrie turn to Resa, probably about to ask her if they should hang me or shoot me between the eyes. If Resa was as nice as she came off to be, she would hopefully decide to just shoot me and be done with it. If you had ask me, it would have been a quicker death. Yet, neither Carrie nor Resa spoke. As far as I knew, they couldn't read each other's minds, so maybe, just maybe I was safe. And maybe my relief had come too soon, for I was far from safe.
"What do you think?" Carrie had asked Resa. I had tried to read Resa's mind, but came up blank. I had no clue what she was thinking, what she was about to say, I didn't even know if she'd at least pity me. I mean, it's not my fault who I am, is it? I know I can decide who I want to be, but we were only fourteen, they really couldn't expect that much back then, could they have?
"They're just words, Carrie, they can't hurt me. They could hurt my feelings, if I let them, but I'm not. I say we just forget about this whole incident." Okay, so after she had said that, I was feeling slightly guilty, but who wouldn't be. She had sounded so small, innocent, as if she could do no wrong, to be honest, she had sounded like a little girl with a little voice. If I had looked at Jack, I'm sure I would have seen guilt written on his face too, but I wasn't willing to hold my breath on that. He did seem to have a black whole where his heart supposedly was. I mean, there have been times I thought I'd seen it, and that's bad. Well, maybe I'm exaggerating a little, but I'm pretty sure it's there anyway.
"You're really lucky, Crane, because if those words have been meant for myself, you wouldn't be standing there right now, I'll tell you that. Why Resa would just let it slide is beyond me, but the point is, she is letting it slide, and I can't do anything about that," she had said, turning away from me, with the intention of not looking at me again. Okay, so Resa had pretty much saved me that day, and yes, I had been feeling quite guilty, but it hadn't mattered. I got over the feeling, yet I knew that it wasn't over, far from over, actually. I knew that Jack wouldn't stop at this, he'd just find something else, and put us all in the same predicament, one that I didn't want to be in.
I hope that you all enjoyed this, and please reply. Thanks.
Denise
