----------------------------------------
[https://i.imgur.com/0DJJvFS.png]
----------------------------------------
Palmer clutches the handrail and hoists her dread-filled body into the bus, taking oversized steps one at a time. As she enters, she spots Fred, the creepiest bus driver on the face of the planet, his thin greasy lips flapping. She imagines the completely inappropriate comments flowing from the depths of his putrid soul, but luckily her music drowns out his voice. He's like her own freaky ferryman, taking them all down the river. His crooked grin suggests that he feeds off the fear and chaos all around him.
Scanning the long aisle of the bus, she looks for a place to sit, feeling the humiliating burn of Fred's lecherous eyes on her ass. Gross. The stale, unwashed smell of the bus and its passengers punches her square in the face, a twisted mix of B.O. and vinyl. How can it possibly smell this bad so early in the morning? The best thing Fred could do right now is haul this monstrosity through the nearest car wash with all the windows down. It might be the only way some of these gremlins would get a bath this century.
Tommy barges past her, making a beeline for his little tribe, a secretive boy-coven already chittering amongst themselves. He regales them with tales of his latest dice-rolling victory while pulling from the dark depths of his schoolbag a tattered D&D Monster Manual, cradling it reverently in his hands. It's a sure sign it has borne many glorious imaginary adventures
.
"Watch it, ya little toad!" Palmer yells after Tommy, a little pissed that he snagged the last seat, well, the second last seat.
Here's a punch-up and grammar fix for the text:
That's the thing: there's always one available seat. And that's beside Gordie - or Lard-ass, as everyone lovingly refers to him. Gordie's a senior, a lump of a kid who clearly doesn't give a damn. He'd let his hygiene deteriorate to the point where not a single kid would go near him; his own personal shield. Palmer had been stuck beside him from time to time, and despite the smell, if she was being honest with herself, Gordie was a pretty sweet kid.
Palmer started making her way down the aisle, dodging spit balls and projectiles made of scrunched-up homework.
"Jesus," she muttered.
There he was, the ringmaster of this three-ring circus on wheels, Ben-fucking-Trammer, Captain of the football team, and one of the biggest assholes she'd ever had the displeasure of knowing. He'd been a thorn in her side as long as she could remember. They'd all been saved from his daily nonsense… that is until the dipshit went and lost his driver’s license. Ben was currently entertaining some of his cronies with what she could only imagine was a hellishly embellished victory story. So engrossed in his own bullshit he hadn't noticed her yet. She hurriedly slumped down into the open seat, cracked vinyl squeaking in protest.
"Grumpy again this morning, Palmer?" Gordie's nasally voice was barely audible over her music. "Here, have one of my gummies... they're really warm and soft. They've been in my pocket," he offered.
She said coolly, "Nah, I'm good, Gordie... got a headache - that time of the month, you know?"
Gordie quickly turned away, eyes straight forward, clearly uncomfortable with the thought of her private parts bleeding. Gordie was so damn predictable.
And with that, she knew she'd have nothing but peace for the rest of the ride. Gordie clearly hadn't paid attention in health class, considering "it was that time of the month" almost every single day. A wry smile painted her face.
Palmer knew Gordie had a soft spot for her... he always had, always offering up some form of treasure from the bottom of his sweaty pockets. She was the one thing he liked more than whatever he was ferreting away in there. It probably had something to do with the fact that she didn't call him Lard-ass all the time like everyone else.
"Not hard to look like a pearl when you're in an ocean of shit," her thoughts oozed self-deprecation. Her deep-seated fears permeated her being; they always betrayed her, never allowing her to see her true worth.
Out of nowhere, Palmer's headphones were knocked off her head, and she heard his voice... that fucking voice.
"Palmer, there's my favorite girl..." Ben said.
Speaking of shit, she thought to herself…
"If it isn't his highness, Mr. Trammer... tell me, what have I done to earn this honor," disdain dripped like snake venom from her every word.
"Palmer, my girl... don't pretend you don't want it," Ben said, eyeing her up and down.
"What do you want, Ben?" Palmer said curtly.
"Your panties on the floor of the 'Stang," he said confidently.
"Well there's two issues here... A: Your daddy took your ride because he found you and Matty Ryerson drinking topless together…"
With that remark Gordie spit out whatever was currently in his mouth all over the seat in front of him. Half chewed food crawling down the back of the seat.
"And B: We all know you have a two inch dick and that just won't work for me," her words laced with bile. Her confidence grew with every stabbing word.
He and his cro-magnon dickweed cohorts had been spreading rumors that she was a slut, so she thought to herself, may as well own it.
"A two inch dick?... ME?" he questioned awkwardly, voice slightly cracking.
The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
He fought to regain his composure, clearly her words had struck a nerve.. maybe hitting a little too close to home. His retort slithered from his mouth like a snake.
"Even if it was, I can still lick the crumbs outta a Pringle can..." he exclaimed as he licked his thin lips.
Before she could react, he threw himself over the seat, pushing her head forward and dragging his rarely brushed tongue up the length of her neck.
With that, he jumped back up, arms thrust into the air as if he had just scored a touchdown. Palmer's confidence was shattered instantly. He got her... he always did. Desperately wiping at her neck, she could feel his bacteria crawling all over, down into the pores of her skin, deep into her bloodstream. She felt gross. The kinda gross that you can't wipe clean. She fucking hated him.
"Fuck yes… Did you see that shit boys?" Ben shouted triumphantly.
"Where were you on that one Gordie?" Palmer's voice was quiet and hollow.
"I'm… I'm sorry Palmer," Gordie responded meekly. His embracement and shame turned his gaze to the passing houses.
Palmer's eyes fixated on the graffiti-covered seat in front of her. She returned her orange sponge headphones to where they belonged, back to blocking out the madness of the world around her. Palmer's mind was reeling, Iron Maiden's epic instrumental from "Losfer Words" blaring in her ears. Her anger was swelling inside her like a fucking ocean. Tight fists smacking her thighs, the music and her emotions twisting together. Her eyes drifted across the back of the seat in front of her until she found the words TRAMMER RULEZ… "Trammer rules?" she scoffed. Palmer's hatred for Ben flooded her mind. Her anger focused her mind like a laser. She noticed a small rip start to form, the fibers of the vinyl seat slowly coming apart at a molecular level. Thread by thread, the vinyl stretched and cracked under some unseen force, slowly striking out his heinous graffiti tag. When the impossibility of what she was witnessing registered deep in her gray matter, it stopped as quickly as it had begun.
She reached forward, her fingers probing at the edges, studying the small tear. Palmer intended to determine if what she had seen truly just happened or, like so many things in her life, was it just a figment of her imagination. It definitely wasn't the first time she'd hallucinated something like this. Her fingers felt the frayed scar, and she recoiled. It's real... It's really real. Her body reacted to this truth as though she had just laid her hands on a live wire.
"What the fuck?" She muttered to herself.
She shook her head. Unable to process what had just happened. She looked around... no one else had seen it. Maybe it's in her head, just a hallucination. Delusions were nothing new to Palmer. Her dreams and the things that live within filled her world, even her waking world... from time to time.
"Maybe I'm losing it, my marbles are ready to spill out all over the place," she thought to herself. The thought scared her more than anything.
Mental illness was nothing new in her family. Her deepest fear was losing sight of that fine line between her dream world and the really real world that surrounded her.
"But who's to say which one is the real world?" she questioned. Isn't reality based off of perception. What you perceive to be reality, IS your reality. Her mind started to spiral, this was dangerous.
Trying to distance herself, distract herself, dissociate, she started focusing on the other graffiti. The funny jokes, the scathing insults. She even noticed one about herself, she rolled her eyes and kept moving. In big bold jagged letters, the phrase,
"ROONEY EATS IT!!!"
Stood out above all the rest. "Clearly scrawled with passion," She chuckled to herself.
"What exactly does he eat?" She wondered... Clearly the author wasn't a poet. But one thing was certain, the only thing that unified us all... the Losers... the Nerds... the Jocks... the Outcasts... the Rich kids… they all hate the teachers. And Rooney, well, Mr Rooney rules the roost.
And speaking of roosts… the bus screeched and lurched to a stop. Some kids fell out of their seats, while others smashed their heads off the spongy, grimy seats in front of them. Palmer braced herself as Gordie's bag fell to the floor, spilling its contents everywhere. A bottle of YooHoo rolled forward through the bus, clinking off seat posts as it went. Everyone around her scrambled, and she looked up to catch Fred, that fucking prick, smiling his crooked smile. His raspy voice announced to his children:
"We have arrived... please place your trays in the upright position and make your way to the front of the bus in an orderly fashion, if you will. Thank you for flying the not-so-friendly skies with us today, and please enjoy your stay!"
They all got up, like a herd of zombies from a Romero flick, shambling forward bit by bit as they disembarked. The kid in front of Palmer slammed his arms off the seats on both sides as he went, each hit a sticky thwack, thwack, thwack... how she hated this part. The slow inevitable death march. She could hear Ben calling from the back of the bus:
"Move your fucking asses, my people are waiting!"
She shook her head and shuffled onward... thwack, thwack.
Finally, she was beside Fred. She turned to him and said, "Nice driving, Freddy... you should win an award," her words thick with sarcasm.
"Thanks, kiddo. You have a great day now..." every syllable is creepier than the last.
She rushed down the stairs into the brisk, bright morning. The light was so bright and vibrant, the way only morning light can be. Before her was a sea of pubescent chaos. Everyone was fighting and scraping for their slice of this ultimately insignificant pie. Groups huddled together, cheering and greeting one another, gathering their strength to tackle the day ahead. Some were talking about their homework, some about last night's episode of Who's the Boss, and others regaled the events of B.A. Baracus and the rest of the A-Team's latest mission. While others were just trying to figure out how not to get shoved in their lockers for 3rd period.
And there it was, above it all... Pitchford High, her home away from home. A grim red-brick gothic monstrosity, its blank, unseeing windows and limestone pillars a testament to austere times when men who wore suits testified to the stern importance of education with a capital E. A hundred-year-old place where young boys and girls had been disciplined by elders and haunted by tradition.
Palmer moved through the crowd, a solitary being, making eye contact with some and avoiding the judging gaze of most. The stares had become commonplace - some warm, others awkward. She would hear the odd whispered word as she passed, typically things like "weirdo" and "freak." They didn't faze her much now, rolling off her slick back. She just kept moving, her mind wandering, thinking back to the events on the bus.
"What the hell was that?" her thoughts taking her a million miles away.
Bam... books flying through the air. Palmer had walked right into Laurie Strode, one of the Queen Bitches of Pitchford High, sending her books spilling to the ground.
"Oh, fuuuucck…" she thought to herself. This day just keeps on getting better.
Laurie hated Palmer with a passion. She and Ben Trammer were THE couple... who the fuck knows why she puts up with that idiot
Maybe her thoughts on high school mating were formed from movies like "Sixteen Candles," where the cheerleader had to be with the quarterback. An elevated high school status is all she could be getting out of that relationship, especially if she has to deal with Ben's "little" friend. The attention Ben threw Palmer's way drove Laurie absolutely nuts, so, of course, Laurie made it her mission to make Palmer's life as miserable as possible.
"What... the... hell!" Laurie yelled out as she watched her books slide across the ground.
She spun around and saw Palmer standing there.
"Of course, it just had to be you," Laurie's words lashed out like daggers.
"Sorry, Laurie, I didn't see you standing there," Palmer’s sheepish apology seemed to anger Laurie further.
"Didn't see me? Didn't see me? What, I don't exist to you? Everyone else here sees me. They want to see me," confidence pushing her forward.
Turning to her friend Becky, "You see me standing here, don't you?" Becky's laughter emboldened Laurie.
"Get her, Laurie…" Becky chided while blowing a giant Hubba Bubba bubble, popping it as if to add an exclamation mark to her statement.
"Well, what can you expect from a stupid slut," Laurie shot. Her jealousy, barely perceptible but clearly present.
"Not today..." Palmer said defiantly, trying to regain her confidence. A confidence that proved to be a slippery thing. She wants it, craves it, but for her, it was just so damn elusive. At the end of the day, she didn't hate Laurie or the others like her,
Palmer knew they were all just fighting for their place. There was a definite pity there, she empathized with their desire to fit in. But knew it would never happen for her.
BBBBBDDDDDDDDDRRRRRRIIIIINGGGGG
And as if on cue; the the sound of the first period bell erupted, it was a joyless and repulsive sound. The chaos of the crowd halted. The dinner bell had been rung, the doors of the school swung wide, like a giant mouth waiting to swallow them whole.
"Saved by the bell... this isn't over Palmer, not by a long shot," Laurie exclaimed.
"God... I hate this fucking place!" Palmer thought to herself. As she marched up the stairs.