Joy

She walks in the room and they all look up and smile. Their focus returns to their former tasks. She returns the smiles a second too late. Looking down at the cold tile, she adjusts the heavy messenger bag over her shoulder and walks slowly. She places her scarred left arm over her stomach and clutches her fist around her tiny waist. She wants to be outgoing, fun, and happy, yet that is a hard place to be for her. She doesn’t open up well to others. She looks in the mirror and sees a fat, ugly and short college freshman. As she sits down in an empty seat, she looks at her phone to see what day it is.
It’s been two months. Two whole months. It feels like it was yesterday. The breathtaking pain and aching throat. The waterfall of tears. The expressions of Holly’s parents. She closes her eyes as she pictures what she had imagined the scene had looked like. Holly flying out of the car, screaming. Her terrified eyes, arms flailing, attempting to catch herself. And then, laying there, still, the blood flowing smoothly like water down a hill. Her breath quickens remembering her classmate. A small tear comes to her eye picturing where Holly would be today: her hometown community college getting ready for school. She opens her eyes solemnly as the professor walks in and begins the lecture.
She just wants to have a close friend in this new town. She’s searching for meaning in this continuous desperate, destructive, vacant life. Fear of rejection is her sole hurdle to redemption. Broken, alone, she begins to take notes.