didn’t know when he saw me in the mini-mart that I was the butt of all jokes in this class, the least likely to be intimate with anyone, but he knew now and when that truth was made abundantly clear, he took off. I’ll never see him again. Fine. I don’t want to.
The game got broken up at that point because a lady from the hotel came in and said we were making too much noise. You couldn’t break up the party five minutes before, lady?
Some people have so much. Some have so little. That game encapsulated both truths for me. The kiss from Brian was so much, my cup runneth over. Getting felt up by Jacob and having everyone giggle at the absurdity was throwing that full cup against the wall.
My mom had called and left a message while we were playing truth or dare. She and Dad were worried about me since they heard from the school that the plane had to land. They wanted me to call.
I love my parents, and I super hate that I need to write this here, but it is so hard to have parents that are so perfect. I feel like I throw what could have been a great life for them way off balance. It just sucks that the kid they have doesn’t match the people they are.
I wanted to call them and say, “Hey, nothing much but the usual going on. We landed the plane in Canada because Sara got sick. The boy I’m hopelessly in love with felt me up in front of most of the class on a dare. Don’t worry, it wasn’t sexy. It won’t be a notch on my lipstick case or anything. He pretty much had to do it or else he’d have to drink toilet water. Oh, I did kiss a boy I picked up in the mini-mart. How’s it all with you?” But then they would want me to “talk through it all” and “be honest” with them, and that was just too impossible. I needed to be a private mess for the moment, a secret stain on the carpet. I couldn’t handle them trying to clean me up. I ignored the call.
*CANADA JOURNAL* 3/4
#4 Entry: Response to terrible truth-or-dare experience
I left the hotel room to get away from everyone and because I just couldn’t write in my journal in front of Keira.
I started thinking about the book A Separate Peace. In it, Gene jostles the branch of a tree that his friend Phinney was standing on. Phinney falls off and, after a time, he actually dies from complications of that fall. It took place during World War II when some countries decided to find a separate peace from all the fighting. Gene, who was battling a different kind of war, a private psychological one because of his guilt, had to learn how to find a separate peace, too.
I am just like Gene.
The problem is that I like the idea of a separate peace, that it could exist and all, but I don’t know how you get there. How do you get that peace when you just don’t feel one ounce of peace at all?
I wish there was a pill I could take to keep me on life’s straight path or a rope that could fall from the sky and once I grabbed it, I could be pulled to safety.
*JOURNAL FROM A PLANE* 3/4
#2 Airborne journal
Have no idea what landmass we are currently flying over
Completely emotionally spent
(Need to hate Jacob)
Eventually, Ms. Harrison came back and told us that Sara’s mom arrived and is staying with her in the hospital while she recovers. She’s going to be fine! Thank God my toxic cloud of hate didn’t do permanent damage to her.
What kind of person believes she emanates toxic vibes? A weird one.
I want to be normal. I want that thing to have never happened. I want Emily to come back. Stop writing on this topic, Danielle.
Instead, I am going to focus this journal on a way to hate Jacob Kingston, which is clearly what I need to do as a rational, functional human being. I must get practical about this. No person should love a boy who feels her up outside her shirt in front of her entire class on a stupid dare. No one should, but right now I still do. For some reason, right now, I still like him, even though he made me sad beyond words, and I snuck off several