Part 5: Bye, Bonnie

 High school seniors, getting lost, and having no friends in my classes. Those were my three biggest concerns going into grade nine. I pictured the senior students pushing me up into lockers, tripping me in the halls, yelling in my face, etc. Manda was a grade above me at Yale Secondary and she was able to kind of show me around if I needed it. But she had classes to get to as well. 

I had joined the musical theatre program at Yale because I had gone to all of their productions since I was quite young and the school had a really good reputation for their theatre program. I wanted to be a part of something like that so badly. I knew a few people from Seussical that had also joined YMT (Yale Musical Theatre) so I wasn't completely alone, but I was very shy and insecure. 

I was in my first drama class and Bonnie was in my class with me. It's the only class we had together, but at least it was a fun one. I didn't have any classes with anyone else from my middle school group of friends. I only saw Ed in passing and John was in a bunch of honours classes because he was really smart. Jess moved to the island, far away from me and Mary had gone to a different school. I felt at peace with all of this. Bonnie quickly took to another girl in our class (Fake name is Kate) because they both rode horses. They started to go riding together and I was fine with it. I liked Kate too. I just wished that I had a horse to ride with them as well. Kate got a boyfriend a few months into grade nine. I heard all about how they were grinding on each other at the Halloween dance. I had heard about these high school dances. I had never been to one but I imagined horrible things happened there, like grinding. 

Kate and Bonnie became increasingly closer. Bonnie started to swear a lot, which she didn't do before. I was not allowed to swear at all and had never been around it much. I think I swore for the first time with Bonnie and Kate. I just really wanted them to like me. One day, I asked Bonnie if I could come hang out at her house like we used to do. We could go to Starbucks and lay on the trampoline. She said yes, but I could tell she didn't really want to. We went to her house, she sat on her phone and ignored me pretty much the whole time. It was different, and it was sad. Bonnie was supposed to be my best friend for life, nobody thought we would ever part ways. Why didn't she like me anymore? I remember that was the last day we ever hung out or really spoke. She asked me if I would ever vape, I was appalled and I think that's when I knew it was really over. 

One day, something upset me in class and I called my mom saying that I had to go home right away. I said that I was really sick and couldn't be there for one more second. My parents rarely let us leave school and never believed me when I said I was sick. It was usually not true so they were on to something for sure, but it always felt like the end of the world to me. To my surprise, my mom texts me back and says that my dad was on his way to the school. When I made my way to the school office to sign out, I look in the window and see my dad sitting in the office waiting for me. I go in to see him, expecting him to sign me out and go. Instead, we sit together and talk. I wish that I could remember more details of what was said but I just remember how I felt. He explained to me that anxiety can make you feel sick sometimes. He told me that sometimes he gets anxious about things and his stomach hurt too. I knew the feeling well and I wish that I could have confided in him about what was really going on. But I felt very loved and cared about in that moment. In a family with five kids, it felt hard to get attention from mom and dad sometimes. 

So what was I supposed to do with myself at lunch now? Bonnie and Kate were off vaping somewhere with Kate's boyfriend and I didn't really have any other close friends. I wandered the halls and ended up in the room where my theatre class would take place. Commonly known as the "old drama room", it's where people from musical theatre would have lunch together. I walked in the door and was greeted by a student in grade twelve. She asked me if I wanted to come in and hang out with everyone in there. I agreed. I sat there, in utter disbelief that I was eating lunch with a bunch of the grads in the theatre department that I dreamed of being a part of. They told me how amazing I was at theatre and how they were so happy I was there. I had just been ditched by my best friend and taken in by my role models. I was very satisfied by how things were going. Little did I know the toll that some of these people would take on my life that year, and they didn't know that they would feel the same about me. 

Grade nine (2015)