and then, inevitably, unavoidably, she thought about Valentineâs Day.
This time the black hole was filled with voices.
The 911 operator pleading with her to calm down.
The EMT saying he wasnât getting any vital signs.
The police officer looking down at her, telling her she had better call her parents.
And playing under it all, like a movie soundtrack, the long, horrible scream, then the longer, more horrible silence.
The bus jerked forward, and her brain let her go.
Shelly breathed in deep and slow through her nose, holding her breath till her lungs burned, letting it out in little bursts the way Father Caudillo had shown her. Heâd also shown her how breathing into a paper lunch bag would take the knot out of her stomach and keep her from panicking, but Shelly thought it made her look like she was huffing paint, so she stuck with the other technique, even though it didnât always work.
âOnce you get your breathing back to normal,â Father Caudillo had told her, âtake control of your thoughts. Donât let your thoughts control you. You canât change the past, so donât waste time dwelling on it. Think about today, the things you have to do right now. Every journey begins with a single step in the right direction.â
Head clearing, she thought about the next steps she had to take.
First, she had to finish the program. The whole thing was too nice to everybody, even the assholes. While most of the video screen time went to the victimsâthe old âbuilding empathyâ approachâthey also showed life from the bulliesâ point of view, and what do you know, all the bullies, even Chip, turned out to be sensitive souls, fighting their own inner demons and lashing out at others as a coping mechanism. They didnât use those exact words, but Shelly could imagine thatâs what the script had called for. The problem wasnât that they were simply demented or cruel or violentâthe problem was the issues that made them act that way.
Okay, that sort of explained
her
situation, but Shelly didnât think it held for the rest of them. Maybe that little boy. And the Muslim girl who wrote all those notes to herself. And maybe that cute guy, Greg. But the jerk with the stupid haircut who got locked out, or that jock who kept looking at her, or that scary girl with the neck tattoo, or the rest of them? They didnât need issues.
So, anyway, finish the program.
Then she had to write up a reaction paper for school, a ten-page essay that was supposed to show how much she had learned from the weekend session and how sorry she was for the things she had done to Heather, who she wasnât allowed to name in the paper or to ever speak to again. The paper would be easy. She could write ten pages in her sleep, especially when she didnât have to back any of it up with facts. As long as she kept her real emotions out and kept away from the truth, sheâd be all right. As for inner demons, she had plenty, but sheâd probably go with a combination new-girl-in-school/devastated-by-parentsâ-breakup. They werenât
her
inner demons, but she knew it would be the kind of thing that would click with the counselors.
Next sheâd have to catch up on her schoolwork.
The suspension would keep her home all week, so her teachers were supposed to send her the work she had to do, and her father was supposed to pick it up in the main office, but she knew how that would play out. Between her father not remembering to swing by the school and her teachers sending cryptic assignments or forgetting to send anything at all, sheâd be behind in every class when they let her back a week from Monday.
The math she could do on her own, and she could keep up with the reading for history. English was something different every day, but her teacher said that the reaction paper would go toward her first-quarter grade. They were going to be doing pottery in art class,
This time the black hole was filled with voices.
The 911 operator pleading with her to calm down.
The EMT saying he wasnât getting any vital signs.
The police officer looking down at her, telling her she had better call her parents.
And playing under it all, like a movie soundtrack, the long, horrible scream, then the longer, more horrible silence.
The bus jerked forward, and her brain let her go.
Shelly breathed in deep and slow through her nose, holding her breath till her lungs burned, letting it out in little bursts the way Father Caudillo had shown her. Heâd also shown her how breathing into a paper lunch bag would take the knot out of her stomach and keep her from panicking, but Shelly thought it made her look like she was huffing paint, so she stuck with the other technique, even though it didnât always work.
âOnce you get your breathing back to normal,â Father Caudillo had told her, âtake control of your thoughts. Donât let your thoughts control you. You canât change the past, so donât waste time dwelling on it. Think about today, the things you have to do right now. Every journey begins with a single step in the right direction.â
Head clearing, she thought about the next steps she had to take.
First, she had to finish the program. The whole thing was too nice to everybody, even the assholes. While most of the video screen time went to the victimsâthe old âbuilding empathyâ approachâthey also showed life from the bulliesâ point of view, and what do you know, all the bullies, even Chip, turned out to be sensitive souls, fighting their own inner demons and lashing out at others as a coping mechanism. They didnât use those exact words, but Shelly could imagine thatâs what the script had called for. The problem wasnât that they were simply demented or cruel or violentâthe problem was the issues that made them act that way.
Okay, that sort of explained
her
situation, but Shelly didnât think it held for the rest of them. Maybe that little boy. And the Muslim girl who wrote all those notes to herself. And maybe that cute guy, Greg. But the jerk with the stupid haircut who got locked out, or that jock who kept looking at her, or that scary girl with the neck tattoo, or the rest of them? They didnât need issues.
So, anyway, finish the program.
Then she had to write up a reaction paper for school, a ten-page essay that was supposed to show how much she had learned from the weekend session and how sorry she was for the things she had done to Heather, who she wasnât allowed to name in the paper or to ever speak to again. The paper would be easy. She could write ten pages in her sleep, especially when she didnât have to back any of it up with facts. As long as she kept her real emotions out and kept away from the truth, sheâd be all right. As for inner demons, she had plenty, but sheâd probably go with a combination new-girl-in-school/devastated-by-parentsâ-breakup. They werenât
her
inner demons, but she knew it would be the kind of thing that would click with the counselors.
Next sheâd have to catch up on her schoolwork.
The suspension would keep her home all week, so her teachers were supposed to send her the work she had to do, and her father was supposed to pick it up in the main office, but she knew how that would play out. Between her father not remembering to swing by the school and her teachers sending cryptic assignments or forgetting to send anything at all, sheâd be behind in every class when they let her back a week from Monday.
The math she could do on her own, and she could keep up with the reading for history. English was something different every day, but her teacher said that the reaction paper would go toward her first-quarter grade. They were going to be doing pottery in art class,
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