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31_days2011-04-03 07:01 pm
rosehiptea.livejournal.com) wrote in 31_days2011-04-03 07:01 pm
[April 3] [Original] Ridicule
Title: Ridicule
Day/Theme: April 3, 2011 "shorty's gonna be a thug"
Series: Original
Character/Pairing: "Angie"
Rating: PG for mild cursing
Word Count: 641
Note: The prompt made me think of kids picking on another kid, hence this little story.
Ridicule
They're not laughing at you. They're laughing with you.
Then how come I'm not laughing?
Angie sat at her desk, her head resting on a pile of books. They would find a way to make fun of her for that, too. But they'd find a way anyway, so she might as well close her eyes for a while and pretend she was somewhere else.
Most kids liked to stay home from school but Angie looked forward even to having the flu because that meant she didn't have to come here. Even drinking ginger ale and throwing it up all day was better than this place. Her only friends were in lower grades so she didn't see them much, and the ones in her grade took every chance to hurt her with words.
Just ignore them and they'll stop.
Have you ever tried ignoring someone who's making fun of you all the time? It doesn't work.
Why should she even have to deal with this? She wasn't asking to be best friends with the popular crowd. All she really wanted was for them just to leave her alone. Didn't they have anything better to do? Homework or something?
But they did homework, and they were mostly excellent at it. It seemed like there should be some trade-off, that if you had tons of friends and got to stomp all over the people you didn't like then you had to suck at schoolwork. But it didn't work that way. Teachers loved them, too.
They only do it because it gets a rise out of you.
And that makes it my fault? None of this is my fault!
Teachers, in fact, seemed to think badly of Angie the same way the other girls did. Of course they weren't supposed to play favorites, but you could tell. Anyone could. Teachers didn't like the ones who made trouble, even though Angie thought it was really the other kids making trouble.
Maybe sometimes she got upset on her own, cried in class when nobody had even said anything. But trying to get by all day listening to what they had to say about her was too hard. The girls were -- they were bitches, she could say that inside her own head, and the boys were just jerks. But when Angie called them that, she was the one the teachers heard, even though the rest of them had been saying the same words all day.
Don't use language like that, Angie.
I was only telling you what they called me! Isn't anyone going to yell at them instead of me for once?
Was there some magic that happened when you when you became an adult that made you forget everything bad that kids did to you in school? There had to be, because she couldn't think of any other reason that her parents would tell her to just live with what was going on.
Her parents never said anything that would really help. Only one person did.
Angie, this is just a little whatnot I bought for you when I was out shopping with your mom yesterday. It's a little heart, see, made out of glass. When the kids start up with you in school, just hold this and remember that you're a great girl and I love you.
Thank you, Grandpa.
"Hey, everybody look, dumbass Angie is sleeping in class again!"
As laughter filled the room, Angie's fingers tightened around the little heart until her hand hurt. She pictured her grandfather stomping into the classroom, yelling at all the laughing kids that she was great and he loved her. If he were here to protect her, no one would dare say a word. To her grandpa she wasn't ugly, or stupid, or any of the rest. Angie held on to the piece of glass and remembered.
Day/Theme: April 3, 2011 "shorty's gonna be a thug"
Series: Original
Character/Pairing: "Angie"
Rating: PG for mild cursing
Word Count: 641
Note: The prompt made me think of kids picking on another kid, hence this little story.
Ridicule
They're not laughing at you. They're laughing with you.
Then how come I'm not laughing?
Angie sat at her desk, her head resting on a pile of books. They would find a way to make fun of her for that, too. But they'd find a way anyway, so she might as well close her eyes for a while and pretend she was somewhere else.
Most kids liked to stay home from school but Angie looked forward even to having the flu because that meant she didn't have to come here. Even drinking ginger ale and throwing it up all day was better than this place. Her only friends were in lower grades so she didn't see them much, and the ones in her grade took every chance to hurt her with words.
Just ignore them and they'll stop.
Have you ever tried ignoring someone who's making fun of you all the time? It doesn't work.
Why should she even have to deal with this? She wasn't asking to be best friends with the popular crowd. All she really wanted was for them just to leave her alone. Didn't they have anything better to do? Homework or something?
But they did homework, and they were mostly excellent at it. It seemed like there should be some trade-off, that if you had tons of friends and got to stomp all over the people you didn't like then you had to suck at schoolwork. But it didn't work that way. Teachers loved them, too.
They only do it because it gets a rise out of you.
And that makes it my fault? None of this is my fault!
Teachers, in fact, seemed to think badly of Angie the same way the other girls did. Of course they weren't supposed to play favorites, but you could tell. Anyone could. Teachers didn't like the ones who made trouble, even though Angie thought it was really the other kids making trouble.
Maybe sometimes she got upset on her own, cried in class when nobody had even said anything. But trying to get by all day listening to what they had to say about her was too hard. The girls were -- they were bitches, she could say that inside her own head, and the boys were just jerks. But when Angie called them that, she was the one the teachers heard, even though the rest of them had been saying the same words all day.
Don't use language like that, Angie.
I was only telling you what they called me! Isn't anyone going to yell at them instead of me for once?
Was there some magic that happened when you when you became an adult that made you forget everything bad that kids did to you in school? There had to be, because she couldn't think of any other reason that her parents would tell her to just live with what was going on.
Her parents never said anything that would really help. Only one person did.
Angie, this is just a little whatnot I bought for you when I was out shopping with your mom yesterday. It's a little heart, see, made out of glass. When the kids start up with you in school, just hold this and remember that you're a great girl and I love you.
Thank you, Grandpa.
"Hey, everybody look, dumbass Angie is sleeping in class again!"
As laughter filled the room, Angie's fingers tightened around the little heart until her hand hurt. She pictured her grandfather stomping into the classroom, yelling at all the laughing kids that she was great and he loved her. If he were here to protect her, no one would dare say a word. To her grandpa she wasn't ugly, or stupid, or any of the rest. Angie held on to the piece of glass and remembered.