Isabela

Before


I try to focus on the lesson, but it's been a real battle to keep my mind in the present. On top of all the chaos that's been clouding my thoughts and affecting my performance in class, there’s the noise in the room. My class this year is incredibly chaotic and loud.
Finally, the bell rings, loud and shrill through the school’s speakers. I should be excited like all the other students around me, happy to finally end the class and go home. Do they get home and play video games, watch shows, read books? Or does someone else here also walk through hell every day after school?
I throw my backpack over one shoulder, feeling like I’m moving slowly lately, dragging my feet across the floor. It’s as if my body is becoming heavier over time, a dead weight I’m forced to carry around.
“Look at how she looks like a little creature when we touch her!” Caíque mocks, but I’m not quick enough to escape his body.
I know he’s going to repeat the damn torture. When his huge arms grab me in a tight hug, a silent scream escapes my throat. Instant flashbacks of all the times my body wasn’t respected flood my mind. I can smell the cigar and alcohol on his breath, feel the rough, dirty hands touching me, as if it’s happening right now, as if it’s surpassing the memory and becoming real.
“Let me go!” I whisper, feeling like my heart is going to explode. “Please…”
The words barely come out.
I try to breathe, but I forget how to.
I gasp for air, squeezing my eyes shut to try not to see anything, feeling my legs tremble and struggling to make my body react, but I can’t. All my body produces are murmurs for help and tears. I have no idea how long it takes before someone pulls this boy off me.
I don’t know who helps me escape Caíque, who the students are whispering as I finally manage to run away towards what I hope is a refuge. I just guide my body to the girls’ locker room and collapse onto the floor.
It takes countless minutes to collect myself. To piece myself back together. To realize that at this moment I am safe, that there’s no one around to hurt me. Still trembling, I open my backpack and grab a pack of grape candies. I take one after another and shove them into my mouth, barely managing to close it to chew.
Pathetic. That’s what I am, with my mouth wide open and roaring with frustration. I break down in tears. I hurt myself. I give in to the new habit that helps me relieve the pain people cause me.
I spit a few of the candies onto my hand, until I manage to chew the ones still on my tongue, then I pick them up again and swallow them too. And I do this ritual countless times, while sobbing and scratching my own face, feeling the relief that the nails cutting into my skin bring. My body trembles and I feel weak. That’s what I am! Weak! And everyone seems to know it. Because people only come near to hurt me.
So that’s what I learn.
I’m meant to feel pain.
I’m perfect for being torn apart.
When the nausea from the excess sugar hits, all I do is take a pill to ease the discomfort, swallowing it with the help of my pink water bottle. I lean against a yellow wall in the locker room. My legs are stretched out in front of me as I glance at my wristwatch and see that I still have a few minutes before I have to run to the car and return to the purgatory I call home. I won’t have a chance to shower today… Thanks to that jerk Caíque.
Sometimes, it seems like life can always get worse. I’m in a class where a jerk has noticed my trauma with touch and uses it to torment me. I’ve become addicted to sweets, and now pimples are popping up on my face from the excess, in addition to stomach pains. But I can’t stop this addiction. Every time I hear my mom talk about how sweets are bad, I want to eat more and more. And my body reacts terribly to the excess, but this is the way I’ve found to vent the uncontrollable anger I feel about my life, the hatred I have for my mom and her devilish husband.
Countless tears trail down my cheeks as I think about how much I want to disappear, find a hole that leads me to a world far from all this pain that devastates my heart.
I raise my arms and look at my wrists, the blue veins intact on my pale skin, tempting me to use them. I have a razor in the front pocket of my jeans, which I’ve started carrying as a talisman. I can almost hear it whispering that it’s an escape. A way to end everything. If I use this razor on my veins, I can escape my mom’s resentful gaze, my stepdad’s disgusting scrutiny of my body. I can escape the beatings, the abuse, the neglect, the next holiday at the country house and everything it means...
Through a layer of tears, I see a boy appearing out of nowhere, spraying a can of black paint on the white wall in front of me. The impact of what he’s doing shocks me. He’s a tall, skinny guy, wearing a dark denim jacket, black pants, and matching Converse. I watch him as he moves his body while committing his crime. The boy doesn’t seem to have noticed me as he scribbles the word “destruction.” My eyes widen as I see him vandalizing the wall right in front of me. My heart starts to beat frantically, and all I can think about is that I’m alone with this boy who has just committed an expellable act. If I get caught here with the vandal, they might blame me too… I don’t even want to imagine the kind of punishment Marcos would give me if I were expelled from school.
I gather the shards of courage within me and stand up quickly, throwing my backpack over my shoulder, grabbing the candy bag, and running away. I catch a glimpse of the boy turning around, but I’m already out of the locker room and running across the schoolyard. I don’t intend to tell anyone, but I also don’t want to be an accomplice to this.
“Hey!” I hear a deep voice behind me.
I try to keep running, but I’m caught off guard by two firm hands grabbing my forearms. I blink, in shock, as I’m spun around and the candy bag slips from my fingers, scattering on the ground and spilling around my feet. I’m panicked… because he’s touching me… because I’m afraid this vandal will hurt me since I just witnessed his crime.