She took a deep breath and assumed a cool confident smirk. It was her warface in her battle with Karyn, and she was actually looking forward to it. Things still felt bristly, but it was clear that the sharper edge of their bickering was blunted, and the banter that morning had felt much more good natured. Of course, she still had a bet to win, and looking weak wasn't part of the...
Zoe spied Karyn with puffy red eyes walking out of the locker room. She had been crying, and one arm of her glasses was now wrapped in a bulky bundle of masking tape. Mina's arm was around her comforting her as they walked towards the exit.
Zoe rushed over to her friend, and gently grabbed her arm. "Karyn!" She huffed. "What... What's wrong, what happened?"
Mina glanced to Zoe and just shook her head.
"It's fine." Karyn snapped. "I don't know why anyone is making a big deal out of it." She snorts messily, and then sighs. "I'm just getting used to this life, is all." The furrow in her brow betrays her pain.
Mina spoke up, "Karyn jumped in the middle of things in volleyball, like she used to. But she kept fumbling and some of the other girls started to berate her when the ball..."
"What other girls?" Zoe seethed.
Karyn and Mina both glanced to a tittering pair that had taken seat on the bleachers.
Zoe's eyes narrowed, but Mina grabbed her arm. "Zoe..." She took a breath and said more evenly. "Jon. It's your goth Zoe temper acting up. Don't let it get you in trouble."
"It's fine, really." Karyn smiled. "This is what I asked for, right? The good and bad. I just need to..."
Zoe had already turned towards the girls. Zoe found herself grumbling to no one in particular. "Plastic bitches. Just fake superficial assholes. Putting on this performance, pretending they're so perfect? insulting people for their own self esteem?" the energy coursing through her was white hot. It burned her, and so she was going to burn the people responsible. She didn't feel the hurt from the snide comments she had faced just that morning. She didn't feel the frustration from being the odd one out since her childhood. She didn't know about the emotional walls and spikes Zoe had erected in this life to be strong... But they were there nonetheless.
She reached the girls, and stood in front of them with her arms crossed. They glanced at her, but ignored her, one staring at her phone, the other sharing some inane anecdote.
"Apologize." Zoe insisted.
"Who are you?" the one telling the story paused and asked.
"Apologize to Karyn." Zoe stated again.
"Uhhh No."
"Whatever you said, go apologize." Zoe repeated.
"I told you no, now go away." The story girl retorted
The girl looking in her phone glanced up and sighed flippantly, "She's not going to. Look at her, she's got to make us the bad guys because she's fat too."
Zoe balked. "W-What? Karyn's my friend. I don't care about..." Zoe gesticulated useless, suddenly at a loss of words.
"Sure ok." The phone girl interrupted. "Say what you want, but we're not going to apologize for telling her the truth."
"And what 'truth' is that?" Zoe snapped snidely.
"That she's fat, or big boned, or whatever she calls it, and she can't play volleyball. She should just stay in the back out of everyone's way, so that people who actually care about PE can play." Story girl said.
"She got hit in the face with the ball right after." Phone girl mewed. "Broke her glasses."
Story girl spoke up again. "We tried to warn her."
Phone girl glanced up and down Zoe with an impassive sneer, and spat. "You should take that advice too."
Zoe flushed red. It was like talking to some two headed hydra, each carrying the thought of the other to it's scathing conclusion. It was almost impressive, like a scripted scene out of Mean Girls. Zoe stood there for a moment, but didn't know what to say. So she walked away.
The one girl returned to her phone, and the other continued her story without missing a beat.
A few moments later Zoe was in front of them again.
Story girl rolled her eyes, and looked up, surprised to find Zoe hefting a massive orange water cooler in a bear hug, The sort that sits on the side of the field when athletes are practicing or playing a game. The next thing she saw was the cooler clumsily hefted over their heads, and emptied of its icy cold contents.
They both screamed as the slush water shocked their senses, and drenched their clothes. They both froze, mouth open, unable to think of any retort, or think of much at all except for how cold it had suddenly gotten.
Zoe dropped the empty cooler with a hollow bouncing thump, and assumed a cocky smirk as she put a hand on her hip. She glanced behind her, and saw Mina with her face in her hand, but Karyn doubled over in laughter. A few people in the gym laughed, others just looked on in surprise. She didn't have much time to see what others reactions might be, as the piercing cry of the girls PE coach cut through the growing noise, bringing the gym to silence.
"ZOE." The coach cried. "Office. NOW" She pointed with her full body, rigid, intense but not fully angry, not really anyway... Zoe realized that demeanor was familiar to her new life. It was the sort of attitude adults take when they aren't particularly invested in the discipline, but they have to make a big deal to get the student to respond.
Zoe just smiled, and walked to the office. The coach scurried over to the drenched girls, directing them back to the locker room to dry off, Zoe couldn't care less. She'd won, even if it were a pyrrhic victory, and it felt good.
