Kate

I bent over the toilet, hacking up great chunks of clear, semi-solid material. I felt the vest constricting me, rhythmically pushing, shoving, and forcing the life threatening particles out of my lungs. It was a full ten minutes before I straightened, popping a mint into my mouth to freshen my breath. I pulled my coat on over my vest, hiding my secret from the world. I walked out of the stall and towards the sink, bending to wash my hands at the dirty public sink. I ignored the stares of the other girls for I was so used to them that they no longer made me cringe inside. I knew they had heard my coughing. I walked out of the restroom.

My book bag seemed extra heavy this morning. I pulled another breath into my traitorous lungs and pushed forward. No way was I going to admit that I needed help, a fact that not even the administrators knew. Slowly, I made my way down the crowded high school hall, debating whether or not to stop at my locker. It would look silly dropping off such a large stack of books and leaving my backpack hanging half-empty. I decided to do it.

I swung my book bag to the floor and began sifting my textbooks out of it. I straightened slowly with an armful of tomes stacked on my arm. Suddenly, I felt hit from behind. Someone had just knocked into me, and my books were on the floor. They scattered over the old dingy carpet of the school. I held my breath and squatted, piling them up as quickly as possible. I was too irate to notice that my assailant continued onward. Then a pair of shoed appeared directly in my line of vision, causing me to look up.

“Hey Kate.”

“Oh, hey Josh,” I answered uncertainly. I hadn’t known that he knew my name.
“Having a little trouble with your books?” He laughed a little, something that immediately put my back up.

“Thank you Captain Obvious,” I replied, a little too acidicly than the situation required.

He looked surprised, but didn’t say anything, just bent to start helping me. I felt bad that I’d already picked up the last folder, because he looked uncertain, rising just a moment after he’d sank. I followed him, my breathing coming in short gasps.

“Are you alright?”

“Of course I am alright!” I snapped, ready to end what little conversation existed.

“Did you just come from PE?” He cocked his head to the side like a little puppy.
Stupid question. I didn’t even have a PE class. That would require me to be healthy, which I definitely was not.

I just stared at him, one eyebrow raised, probably making him feel like an idiot. But I didn’t care. Did I?

“Well, I’ll see yah.” And he was gone. Two seconds later the class bell rang.
Dang. I was late again.

Mr. Michaels did not ask for an excuse and I did not volunteer one. He knew that I was frequently late for reasons that I could not avoid nor explain, and he never marked me tardy. If only the other teachers were so understanding. They said I needed a medical note to be excused so often. They didn’t know that I could get enough notes to fill their room from bottom to top. There is so much that no one knows, and I wish that I could tell someone, but there is no one here that understands, no one I trust with my life. I don’t want everyone knowing my problems.

After all, I looked healthy from the outside. Normal weight, normal height, average brown hair and hazel eyes. Nothing special that marks me as different from other students.

Later that day I walked down the hall, running my fingers along the lockers that lined it. I couldn’t remember which locker was mine, but I didn’t care. Apathy was taking over my life, or at least I had deluded myself into thinking that it was.
I dug my fingers into my purse, sifting through the contents to find my keys. There were only two keys on the ring, one for my car and one for the house. The larger key clanked against the lighter one, giving a couple of pretty little notes. I began to hum along as I walked toward the parking lot.

There it sat. My beat up little red pick up truck, with Kate written in scrawling white letters across that back window. I smiled seeing it sitting there, all alone in the parking lot. We had so many things in common. I slid into the seat, pushing the key into the ignition. Switching the gear into reverse, I backed up without even bothering to turn around. It was completely deserted.

I drove straight home from the school to drop of the vest. I slipped into my waitress uniform and went to McDonalds where I had gotten a job against my parent’s wishes. They believed that the allergens that I was exposed to were too dangerous, and they were probably right, but I felt that I had to have a job to pull off the average teenager charade. It was so difficult to do, but I continued.

During work, I had to avoid suffering any coughing fits to keep from getting fired or sent home. I had to pretend that I was not the unfair victim of a genetic disease, but that is getting off the point. I went home that night and my family had dinner. We studiously avoided talking about my disease or any reference to it. I knew that they disapproved of how I was living my life, but I no longer cared.

The next day I prepared to follow the exact same schedule as the day before, but this time, things didn’t go the way that I had planned. This would turn out to be the most beneficial thing that ever happened to me. But then, it was also a living nightmare…

I bent over the toilet, hacking up great chunks of clear, semi-solid material. I felt the vest constricting me, rhythmically pushing, shoving, and forcing the life threatening particles out of my lungs. It was a full ten minutes before I straightened, popping a mint into my mouth to freshen my breath. I pulled my coat on over my vest, hiding my secret from the world. I walked out of the stall and towards the sink, bending to wash my hands at the dirty public sink. This time, I tried to ignore the people that stood staring at me, but I could feel their stares burning holes in the back of my neck. Angrily, I swung around to face my spectators.

“What are you doing here?” burst from my mouth. They all looked up at me, surprised by my outburst. Not everyone had been staring at me, or so it seemed now. I felt sheepish for screaming out, but then I noticed that they were being a little too preoccupied with various things. I saw in the same moment that they were not all high school girls.

Mrs. Shellie was staring at me, shock written over her face. “Kate. Jamison. What. Are. You. Do-o-o-oing?”

“Mrs. Shellie, relax. I am fine, and I am doing nothing wrong.” I heard giggling voices in the background. I ignored them though; I had to focus of calming my teacher down so that she did not suffer a severe case of apoplexy.

“Yes, you are young lady,” she had apparently recovered, “and you are coming with me!” The last part was definitely a threat.

I followed her dutifully down the hallway and into the b wing, in which the health classes were located. She turned directly into Ms. Karen’s room, stomping up to her and whispering to her in a low, urgent voice. I could only imagine what she was saying to her. After a few minutes, Ms. Karen came up to me and began quizzing me in a soft, I-won’t-hurt-you-but-I-want-to-know-what-you-are-thinking type of way. I answered her questions firmly and with a touch of hysteria. She was intent on asking me if I was a bulimic, and refusing to take no for an answer. It took me a full half hour to get out of the classroom, with Mrs. Shellie throwing after me an, “I’ll have several students come around and ask you how your feeling during lunch today.” She really needed a lesson in subtlety and gentleness. She sounded like she was constantly giving threats.

Nevertheless, she did send a few students around at lunch to see how I was doing. One of them happened to be Josh. I looked slightly annoyed to see him again, but I really could not avoid it.

"Hey Kate."

"Hey Josh."

"So, Mrs. Sherrie said that she thought you were feeling a little down today. She thought that I could help sorta cheer yah up."

"What exactly did she say, Josh?" I sigh, resigned to the fact that he probably would try to to avoid the question completely, but I was suprised when he immeadiatly volunteered the answer.

"Just that she wanted to make sure that you weren't going to do throw up your lunch."

"Really? That is completely disgusting."

"So you're not bulimic?"

"No, of cource not."

"Then why was she worried about you?"

"Josh, you must have some clue as to who she is, and what she does? She reads stuff into everything." I gave him a stare that dared him to disagree with me. He didn't move. "Now really, you didn't go and believe her, did you?"

"No, I thought that it was a little far fetched, but still. She had to have had some reason for believeing it."

"She heard me coughing in the bathroom." I could tell that he was somewhat realived by the normality of the answer. "Why did she ask you to come find me?"

"Well, I sort of voluteared for the job." He stared at the wall behind my head. I was suprised to find out that Josh was such a straightforward person. I was still deciding whether or not this was something to admire.

"That's sweet." As soon as I said it, I wished that I could take it back. Now I was embaressing both of us. I didn't want him to take it the wrong way, but now that it was out I didn't have a choice. Ahh!!! I didn't even mean it.

At that moment, Karrissa came over and slid onto the seat next to me, squezzing my arm. Karrissa was a girl in all of my classes, but it also suprised me that she knew my name.

"Hey. What's up?"

"Do you care?"

"Of course." She said, taken aback.

"Why? You've never before spoken to me, so why now? Is it because Mrs. Shellie believe's that I need a friend? That I have health issues that you need to know about?"

Josh piped in with, "Hey, I thought you said that you were not bulimic."

"That wasn't the health problem that I was referring to." just then, my mind caught up with my mouth. "Sorry, didn't mean to say that."

"But you do have health problems?"

"Doesn't everyone?"

"Well, everyone has has health experiances, yes. Problems, not everyone."

"Well, mine are not serious, so you can leave me alone." I turned around and left the cafeteria, stomping my feet and trying to ignore them as they followed me to the library, and then to my math class. They watched me do everything, and I felt like I was a goldfish in a bowl. Annoyed, I did nothing to stop them, hopeing that if I ignored them they would forget this very funny game. No luck. They continued this for weeks.

Not to get my wrong or anything, they were very nice. Constantly looking out for me, they helped me with everything that I needed. Karrissa followed me into the restroom though, and even if she was a girl, it was still ackward. She would stand outside my stall and listen to me hack phelegm out of my lungs, probably mistaking it for the reason that she was following me in the first place. I began to get used to them, even become friends. I never got the nerve to explain to them why I had to make those trips to the bathroom, why I was constanly making those deep coughing sounds. We began to do things together, going to movies and out to lunch. Karrissa and Josh were great to me, and for the first time I began to feel that I was not alone. I am sure that was how they meant for me to feel, by even with that added superficilousness, it still meant a lot to me.

And then it happened. We had gone to the water park, and were playing around, dousing each other in water and having a great time. I sucked some water and began to coughing, coughing so hard that I couldn't stop. They rushed me to the hospital, where they discovered that I had contracted pnemonia. I was glad then that I'd had freinds for at least a breif chapter of my life, because pnemonia for someone with cystic fibrosis is fatal.