Teenage Spit

It's June 27th.

Another late night spend under sweaty sheets as I count the bubbles in my wallpaper. The sun took off like five hours ago. And I'll never make a early start on summer homework. N-E-V-E-R. English can kiss my ass. My mind's thinking too hard. The air conditioner crammed into my window broke last week. It's hot and I'm swimming in the pool of my sweat. What a night.

It's humid and horrible this time of the year and the souring sewage that is my room is just that stinky.

The smells of the carpet comes drifting up like a fart; rusty, foul and full of stank foot stench. I can smell the platter of food that I haven't moved from under the bed. The plastic and soy sauce blend into something that taps on my stomach and encourages me to feel nauseous. I can smell the over-powering odor of the bottle of sparkling perfume I spilled on my bed an hour ago. It was such a fucking impulse buy. Couple dollars there and now a couple of dollars soaking my bed.

I can't show it to anybody even if I wanted to now. The bottle is purple and sparkly and it comes from Canterlot Central from a little boutique crawling out of a alleyway. Cheaply bought, the bottle still had style and whimsy lines and prettiness that makes me feel in comparison... What am I thinking? Am I really going to start comparing my female charm to a plastic bottle? That's stupid. Crazy. The bottle might look better than me but it is...

God, whatever.

I don't want to explain why I was hanging or entering such a frou-frou shop. Not to anybody. Which is dumb to think because I wasn't going to tell anyone, anyways. Why am I even explaining this? Who am I explaining this for? I'm a girl if that means anything. I can do stuff like that. If I want to waltz into a shop, buy perfume, spill perfume and feel bad about the bottle looking better than me... I can do that!

What am I even saying? The heat's gone to my head. My brain must be frying seven ways to Sunday.

And that fan, Mom insisted that I used instead, isn't doing it for me. Imagine someone dumping their hot, nasty breath into your ear while you're taking a long ride on a bus somewhere. Imagine that person having breathing problems -a shuddering cough there, snot spewing over there, spit flying- and every time they took that inhale, their whole gross body would shake and wheeze... The person is obviously sick and evil and you hope to god that they aren't trying to give you an ear infection.

Multiply that feeling times 'accidentally going to the bathroom in a show toilet' by ten and you have this fan.

It tilts and turns and just like a dog, I crane my neck to follow it. I'm mostly too lazy to get off the bed to turn off the moving motion or whatever. It's the little gray switch, right? I don't care enough right now but I will tomorrow. If I don't dry out and become a corpse, that is.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow, I plan to learn how to fix an air conditioner. Wish me luck!

I wish the girls were here but you know, they had plans. I don't even know why I'm wishing. I knew they had plans and I let them go off with saying anything. Apple Bloom's gone for most of the summer. She's visiting family out there in the desert. Sweetie Belle is at a drama camp or something. I stopped paying attention when it became obvious that I would be spending this summer alone.

God, I'm such a loser. Why didn't I say anything? I could have tagged along with either of them. Not be here, in this stench with that stupid bottle and sweating out every drop in my soul.

I paused, dragging a hand through my hair and twisting on a curl. I breathe in and out.

I am alone. I shouldn't lie. I don't regret saying nothing that badly. Time alone is time alone.

If there's a moment that I actually regretted this year, it's when I punched Diamond Tiara in the face and broke her nose. Possibly. I don't actually know if it 'cracked' cracked but it sure sounded like it. Ain't that idea a jaw-dropper? I punched little Miss Diamond 'I'm so full of myself' Tiara in the face. Her nose snapped like a peanut smashed open. She needed to get stitches.

Oh ho, you should have seen her face when I did it. The way her eyes widened right when my fist was making an incoming. She cashed a check her face couldn't take!

Oh god. Oh god, it was great and I didn't even get in trouble. Nobody was out there when she went out of her way to talk shit at me in the gym. There I was, minding my business while practicing my hits for the volleyball team try-outs. All I heard was smack, tizz and whoosh. The sound and smells and the feels of the ball bouncing, colliding and flying under my hands. It was a cheap one I bought, the ball, because the manager of the team has it out for me.

“Nobody wants another Rainbow Dash,” he said, sage words indeed. “This team doesn't need another glory hound to bring it down.”

I would like to say I told him to take his stick out of his rear but he was nice enough to leave the gym open for an extra hour so I didn't. But still... FYI: Rainbow Dash was into soccer, not volleyball and why couldn't he shut up with his big mouth. Why bring her up if he couldn't get his facts right? Asshole.

So anyways, Diamond Tiara came out of nowhere and I punched her in the face.

What? Was anyone expecting a why? Does there need to be a why? Somebody, somewhere was going to punch her in the face and I'm glad that I was the first one. But then there is something I regret so maybe something more did happened.

You seem, Diamond is prone to saying things like: “I don't exactly hate you but if you were on fire and I had water, I'd drink the water.” And: “There's only one problem with your face, I can see it.” And: “Oh my god, look at you. Was there anyone else hurt in the accident?”

Then I punched her in the face. I think I did the world a service. Please hold your applause. Huh. Okay, okay, she didn't say any of that at the time. She didn't need to. You know what she said to me while I was practicing my heart out. Doing something. Doing something important that didn't need little lady Diamond 'walking bitch' Tiara to do her backseat bitchery.

You know what she said?

She said I looked like a damned man, heaving and hollering about swinging a shot past the net. That's it. That's all. Fuck her. I punched her in the face cause I didn't need to hear that from her. I heard it plenty from myself and I was caught up in the moment... Treated her the same way I treat myself...

And I did something about it.

I punched her in the face. She took the hit. Laughed at me. Said, “Way to go, slut.” And took off, nose bleeding, tears watering with the same kind of smug in her step like it was all whatever. Hilarious. Didn't I punch her? Shouldn't she be pitching a bitch fit. Calling her daddy and her people to make mince-meat out of me? Fuck, I don't even...

I punched Diamond Tiara in the face and it didn't mean a damn thing to her. It didn't mean a damn thing to anyone else when they saw her at school the next day either. What did I punch her for? Shouldn't it mean something? What did I punch her for? Because I was mad? Because just because I'm not girly like Sweetie Belle or Apple Bloom?

I can change that. I can do something about that if I really wanted to. What Diamond said doesn't matter but it did. It did... And punched her in the face about it. I'd choke her if she said it to me again. I'd do something painful and brutal and ridiculous and why did she say I looked like a man. I don't look like a man. I can't and I don't. Why did she have to be such a...

I'm thinking too hard.

Rainbow Dash has long, pretty hair, you know. All the colors in the wide world and because why the hell not, let's be assholes, people called her a 'lesbian' as if they couldn't see what she was. That's not fair. They talk shit about her behind her back. But she's really awesome and she can be cool sometimes when she remembers to call from college but they don't care about that.

“Lesbian.” They whisper and go about their business. And you know what Rainbow did about it? All she did was laugh and laugh like it was nothing. They still call her a 'lesbian' but she says it over and over, “Why does it have to be an insult?”

I should think like her but I can't. I don't want to. I want people to be scared when I put up my fists. I want people to think twice when they say things regardless if I'm around. They don't respect me like Rainbow Dash. They don't say these things behind my back. They say it to my face.

It just hurts sometimes.

What if I'm a man? That's why I'm shooting up like a weed with no hips and bits to go along with it. What would a guy do? He'd punch somebody in the face. I punched someone in the face. Is that what a man is? It's not really an insult. Maybe, I'm trying to hard. It's my second year of high school and I have time to decide if I want to be that.

I dunno. I rather be called a 'lesbian' because it doesn't deny the fact that I'm a girl.

Rainbow Dash had that at least.

And I punched Diamond Tiara in the face because I guess I don't know myself. The moment Diamond tried to label me, I don't know, I just had to stop her. She couldn't be able to say that stuff unchallenged because it would be true since I don't have anyone here to tell me otherwise. I do have... But it's not...

I don't know what I am. Or that's what a quack would say if I said this to a professional.

Thinking hard.

Thinking fast.

All it's doing is giving me a headache. I don't care if hurting Diamond was wrong or right. I don't care why I did it. But I do care why I don't feel anything about it.

It's June 28th.

The clock on my stand beeps and my hand wanders the end table, looking to smack it sideways. 12:01. 12:02. 12:03. The numbers in bright neon red jump at me. 12:04. 12:05.

The clock must be busted. Minutes don't go by that fast.

Or maybe, I'm just that slow because I don't have that Rainbow Dash-ness to do anything about it.

I'd like to think that me releasing my fists means something. I'd like to think all my woes, sads and bundles of feels if piled up could fill a warehouse. But in the darkness, in my room of all places, I know better. It doesn't and that this meaninglessness goes all across the board. Maybe, there's some part of me that wants whatever Diamond says about people to be true. Because if that the case, then I could do something about it whether by punching her or sucking up to her. But it's not.

And cause I couldn't handle it, I attacked her.

I don't think just being violent makes someone a 'man' whatever the heck that is. I'm too busy trying to be a girl. Not a tomboy. Not a wannabe dyke. Not a Rainbow Dash Twp. I mean look at me. I'm just some stupid girl having her stupid summer break without her stupid friends.

And eventually, I'm going to be doing that for the rest of my life. This summer break, alone and desperate, will become my life. I have my girls but they can't make up for this space in here. Right there in my heart or guts or soul. This need to fight and to prove and to do something. I'm crazy about doing something.

Even if Rainbow Dash gave me her praise.

Even if Diamond Tiara took back her words, it could never be enough.

12:08.

I close my eyes.

Maybe I should get a tattoo to remind myself of this. This moment. This something. A tattoo so I can't forget who I am. A tattoo to reel all of these bad feelings, thoughts, hurts, stupidity, worries, grievances, sadness, annoyances, troubles, loneliness, long summer nights, desperate heat rising, the color purple, the wings I don't have, my weakness, my strengths, tomorrows and yesterdays.

If I could stamp all of that into my body, instead of letting others do it for me, maybe, just maybe everything could be alright.