Second Helpings_ A Jessica Darling Novel - Megan McCafferty [3]
And finally, to make matters worse, Miss Hyacinth Anastasia Wallace, the one girl I thought had friend potential, turned out to be a Manhattan celebutante hoping to gain credibility by slumming at Pineville High for a marking period or two, then writing a book about it, which was optioned by Miramax before she completed the spell check on the last draft, and will be available in stores nationwide just in time for Christmas.
Trauma #3: My parents didn’t—and still don’t—get it. As I’ve already mentioned, my parents told me that I was overreacting to the loss of my best friend. My mother thought I should channel all my angsty energy into becoming a boy magnet. My father wanted me to harness it toward becoming a long-distance-running legend. My parents had little experience in dealing with my unique brand of suburban-high-school misanthropy because my older sibling, Bethany, was everything I was not: uncomplicated, popular, and teen-magazine pretty.
Trauma #4: I was unable to sleep. I developed chronic insomnia after Hope moved. (I currently get about four hours of REM every night—a huge improvement.) Bored by tossing and turning, I started to sneak out of the house and go running around my neighborhood. These jaunts had a soothing, cathartic effect. It was the only time my head would clear out the clutter.
On one of those early-morning runs, I tripped over an exposed root and broke my leg. I was never as swift again. My dad was devastated, but secretly I was relieved. I never liked having to win, and was grateful for an excuse to suck.
Trauma #5: My menstrual cycle went MIA. My ovaries shut down in response to the stress, lack of sleep, and overtraining. I was as sexually mature as your average kindergartener.
Trauma #6: I developed a sick obsession with He Who Shall Remain Nameless. He wasn’t my boyfriend, but He was more than just a friend. I was able to tell Him things that I couldn’t share with Hope. When I couldn’t run anymore, His voice soothed me, and I was actually able to fall asleep again. My period even returned, welcoming me back to the world of pubescence.
His motives weren’t as pure as I thought they were. Whatever relationship we had was conceived under false pretenses. I was an experiment. To see what would happen when the male slut/junkie of Pineville High—who just happened to be my best friend’s dead brother’s drug buddy—came on to the virgin Brainiac. He thought that confessing His sinful intentions on that fateful New Year’s Eve would lead to forgiveness, but it just made things worse. I was profoundly disappointed in Him—and myself—for ever thinking that He could’ve replaced Hope.
No one can. Or should. Or will.
the third
When I was in first grade, my teacher wanted to bump me up two years in school. I was already reading, writing, and not wetting my overalls, which apparently put me years ahead of my peers. Miss Moore told my parents that I would be more intellectually stimulated if I was with third graders. I think she just wanted me out of her sight. I was bored out of my mind in Miss Moore’s class and had no problem letting her know it.
“Miss Moore the Bore! Miss Moore the Bore!” I’d sing, over and over again.
My parents negged the skip idea, of course, arguing that speeding up my academic growth would have a negative effect on my social development. They were afraid that if I was two years younger than all the other kids, I would be on the receiving end of countless wedgies. So, with the exception of the two hours I spent with accelerated third-grade reading and math groups, I spent the rest of the schoolday with children my own age, learning how to play nice.
I soon found a way to combat boredom in the middle of B is for Boy and Baby and Bear lessons. I’d clutch my chunky blue pencil like a microphone and walk around the classroom conducting imaginary TV interviews, but not with the classmates I was supposed to be bonding with. No, I’d pose in-depth questions