||Jamilla Tate|| First Person ||

         With a shuddering breath, I clutch the thick material of my favourite blanket around my body and bury my face further into my pillow. The fluffy material is propped up in a way that tilts my head at an awkward angle, but I fight back against it and press my face further into the cushioning, forcing it down. Despite the fact that my earphones are tucked into my ears with the volume as loud as I could stand it, and the heavy bass of a rock song floods through my system infectiously, I can still hear their animated yelling. I inhale sharply.

        "She's your daughter!" I hear my father scream angrily, and then there's the sound of something shattering and I'm flinching under the covers of my blanket. My father always has had a temper, and despite the fact that he's always in a foul enough mood to shout about the littlest of things, it never gets any easier to listen to his bellowing.

       "She's half of you, you lousy f*ck!" My mother shouts in rebuttal, and then there's another loud crash and I'm biting on my knuckles because my entire body is shaking. "Anxiety meds? I don't have money for that bullshit!"

       "And you think I do?" My dad roars, and in that moment, I can't help but let out a tiny sob into my hands that drowns pitifully underneath the sound of their shouting.

        I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I didn't want anyone to see me that way.

       It was an accident. I didn't want to have an anxiety attack in school. I didn't want to be that girl who burst out in tears at the back of the class. I didn't want to be that girl that had to have the Vice Principal and the guidance counselor lead me out of class. I didn't want to be that girl who had her back turned to the sound of people whispering about how she was insane. I didn't want to be that girl.

      But I was that girl. I was that girl that sat, crying in the arms of my guidance counselor because I couldn't breathe and everything was just too much for me. I was that girl who got sent to a walk-in clinic rather than going to class. I was that girl that felt her mother's painful grip on her arm as she led her into a doctor's office, a warning pinch because she was mad at her for acting like that girl. I was that girl that watched her mother grip the prescription for Xanax while she yelled in the car. I was that girl who was 'acting.'

         Now I didn't even know if I was their daughter anymore.

         "What about you, Jamilla?"

         I look up from the book in my lap to see the girls all looking up at me expectantly. Becca is lounging on her bed with her brown hair tied up into a messy bun, a comic book discarded beside her as she stares at her phone intently. Scarlet is sitting on one of Becca's bean bag chairs lazily with her phone in her lap while Tara is lying on the floor with her hands clasped over her stomach. A laptop-- I think it's Tara's-- sits on the floor idly closest to Scarlet, the lid half-closed and forgotten about in lieu of the conversation at hand.

        "What about me?" I ask, clearing my throat because my voice had shaken uncomfortably when I spoke. I didn't hear a word of their conversation, and I felt incredibly guilt about it. I can't seem to stop zoning out around them. I hate having them repeat themselves.

        "Are you going back to Cleveland for Christmas?" Scarlet asks, and before my brain could even react and register the words that she's just said, Tara is interjecting.

        "Cleveland?" Tara scoffs in disbelief, turning her head to look at me. "You said you were from Cincinnati." Scarlet raises her eyebrows at Tara, shaking her head objectionably.

        "I met her first-- she said Cleveland." Scarlet says clearly, narrowing her eyes at her friend, who scoffs in disbelief at her words.

        "Wow," I laugh nervously, shrugging my shoulders to give off a nonchalant vibe. Inside though, my stomach felt like it was about to empty its contents all over the floor and my heart seems to be running a marathon. "Must have been nervous." 

        "You sure about that?" Tara says, and something about the way she says it makes me feel like a child again. Her head is tilted to the side as she looks at me, her eyes studying me as if I needed to be figured out; like I was a jigsaw puzzle that she still couldn't seem to solve. It makes me feel belittled, the same way that I was belittled the day I came back to school after having a mental breakdown in class. They look at you like you're mental, like you don't even know what you're doing with yourself anymore. They treat you like a wounded animal if you're lucky-- if not, they mock you in the halls.

        "I think I'd know where I was born, Tara." I hiss, glaring at her without necessarily meaning to. The anger that I'm feeling though is more so directed at myself rather than Tara for catching me in my lie. I don't necessarily remember telling Scarlet that I was from Cleveland-- I'm sure that I told everyone I came from Cincinnati on that first day. Had I been so nervous that I let my real hometown slip?

        "Calm down, Jamilla, I was just saying that you don't seem so sure." Tara says, sitting up as she looks at me carefully. My hands feel cold and clammy, and for some reason they can't seem to stop shaking. I slowly close the novel I had been previously reading and lean over to my nightstand, setting it down. Any object in my hand would tremor with the constant pulses running through my fingers-- I'd give myself away if I kept holding that book.

        "I'm sure I know where I came from." I tell her, gulping nervously as I avert my gaze. The door is open just a crack revealing the hallway of our dorm's floor. Everyone left their doors open during the daytime, but something about it being open made me feel a million times more uncomfortable.

        "So is it Cincinnati or Cleveland?" Tara asks calmly, but it has the exact opposite effect on me. I rush to my feet, angrily yanking my coat off of the foot of my bed, tugging the warm article of clothing over my shoulders. "Jamilla, sit down--" Tara is rising to her feet, an apologetic look on her face for prying so much, but I don't respond and instead tear open my dorm's door, stepping out furiously. "Jamilla, get back here!" She shouts after me, but I keep walking and jam my hands into the pockets of my coat, huffing and puffing as I stormed towards the elevators. "Jamilla, calm down and get back here!" Tara calls out to me, her voice carrying gracefully through the hall as she makes to follow after me. "Ja--"

        "Just f*ck off, okay?" I scream suddenly, turning on my heel with my eyes squeezed shut and my fists clenched tightly in my jacket pockets. The moment that the words escape my mouth, I regret them because I know that Tara cares about me and just wants to know who the hell I am. I'm not making a new start any easier for myself by lying. But for some reason, some sort of rage that I've been keeping pent up deep within my chest consumes me, and my mouth won't stop running and my heart can't stop beating. "You psychoanalyze everybody like you know everything, like you don't have shit that you want to hide too!" I yell. "Just leave me the f*ck alone, Tara!"

        Before I can spew anything else that I'm going to regret, a door is opening and a boy is stepping out, his eyes narrowing in on the scene in front of him just as Tara starts to speak. I know who it is almost immediately, and something about the fact that he's heard all of this makes Tara's next words the most painful thing I've heard since I last spoke with my parents. "We care about you Jamilla, and I'm sorry if I pressured you into anything, but how long are you going to hide from us? There is something wrong, Jami, and we're all worried--"

        "Don't be." I state.

        "That's awfully selfish of you." Tara says, and instead of apologizing for being too harsh, she only crosses her arms over her chest.

        "They're my skeletons and I think I'm perfectly fine without your help, Tara." I say dryly, turning away from her and the observing eyes of Josh Dun as I jam the elevator door buttons. "Stop pushing me for f*ck's sake!" I say, running a trembling hand through my hair.

        "I'm not pushing anybody--!"

        "Guys!" Tyler's voice breaks through our argument, and he's stepping out of his room now and claiming a spot next to Josh. "Let's go sit down and fig--"

        "I'm out," I say as the elevator door parts for me with a welcoming ding, and before Tyler can say anything else, I'm stepping into the metal encasement.

        "Jamilla!" I hear Josh shout, and I'm jabbing at the button to shut the door, wanting to escape the madness of all of this bickering over a stupid mistake I made back in August. "Jamilla, hold the door--!" Josh is yelling after me, and I'm just about ready to kick the damn buttons just so it could close and I wouldn't have to deal with the very real possibility that Josh Dun is going to see me breakdown. The doors finally start to close, but as if some superhuman speed has possessed him, Josh slips through the sliver of the elevator doors just before it closes, breathing heavily.

        I don't say anything to him at first, my gaze only lingering for a short moment on the boy with the large smile and the squinty eyes. He stares at me intensely, his eyes searching my carefully constructed mask thoroughly, as if he could discover the truth about me with a simple soul search. I'm not sure if he comes up with anything, but if he does, he doesn't let on.

        "How's ice cream sound?" He asks me.

_____

        Josh Dun sits in the driver's seat of his Jeep Wrangler with his own mini-tub of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream held casually in his lap, seemingly oblivious to the piles of snow building up around the parking lot of the nearby convenience store he had driven me to. I focus my eyes on my own tub of ice cream, shifting in my seat with my legs crossed beneath me, shame settling into my core as I eat a hesitant spoon of ice cream.

       Josh didn't have enough time to grab a jacket when he had run after me, and he was adamant on not leaving me along to go back and grab one on the off chance that I could disappear and get up to something. I pretended that I didn't know that he wasn't worried I'd get up to trouble-- he was just worried I'd go and seek out Garrett.

       "There's something about ice cream in the winter," Josh says quietly, and I nod my head silently as my gaze wanders out the window, my heartbeat thudding loudly in my ears. Normally, I was fine sitting in Josh's car, but something about him knowing that there's so much that I'm hiding from everyone makes the space seem smaller. I feel like I could suffocate from the tension hanging thick in the air.

       "I don't know who I am." I blurt out, but Josh doesn't seem all that surprised by my outburst as he shifts in his seat so that he can look at me better. I stare at the dashboard and grip my tub of Ben&Jerry's tightly in my hands, but they're shaking and I'm terrified that I'm going to drop it in his car. "I'm so scared that I'm not what everyone wants me to be."

       "And what does everyone want you to be?" Josh says calmly, and I'm not sure if how easy it comes out for him makes me feel better or worse.

"I feel like Garrett deserves better." I tell him honestly. "He's nice and I like him--" Josh winces at this, and I pretend not to notice to keep my guilt at bay, "--but I'm too screwed up."

"You're not screwed up," Josh tells me, and I don't go to argue with him because it's imperative to me that I don't mess anymore of my relationships up.

"I wish my parents weren't disappointed with me," I say, and it dawns on me that Josh is the only person I've ever even mentioned the idea of my parents around. "Because if I wasn't born, I think they'd have been happy. If they had waited a few more years, they'd be okay and their kid would be okay."

"Because you're not okay," Josh fills in the blanks, and I nod my head in agreement. Josh doesn't say anything for a moment, his eyes flitting towards the windshield, where a happy couple dressed in full winter gear passes by despite it only being late November.

"And the girls, bless their hearts, they want to know stuff about me that I just can't tell them." I jab my spoon into the ice cream and set it down into the cup holder, running my cold, shaking hands through my hair nervously. "And I can't tell you either, and I can tell that it's bothering you that I know all this stuff about you and I'm just this... This girl that's showed up in Columbus and ruined everything--"

"I'm glad you're here, Jami." He tells me, but I shake my head stubbornly, my heart practically bursting with all of this emotion that I want out of me.

"I'm a wreck, Josh!" I tell him, my voice pitching an octave or two higher and my eyes blurring with tears. "And I can't do this anymore-- I can't act like I'm normal because I can't ever be after what my parents--" a sob stops me in my tracks before I can say anything else, and in an instant Josh is setting his own ice cream down and shoving his car door open. He gets out of the car in his jeans and a hoodie that can't be doing him any favours in the warmth department, but he at least has a beanie tugged securely over his ears. He closes the door and walks around the car, tugging my door open before crouching in front of me.

"Jamilla," Josh says in a low tone, but I'm burying my face in my hands and refusing to look at him. "Look at me, Jam,"

"I'm toxic." I tell him. "I'm not healthy for anyone and--"

"Jamilla--"

Another sob.

"If you're a wreck," he says, his hands finding my own in which he gently pries away from my face. "If you're a wreck, Jami, you're my wreck." Josh smiles a small one, the little twitch at the corner of his lips that he normally gets right before he goes for the big one. "You're beautiful, Jami, you're perfect." He continues, and something about it all makes me want to cry because this is so unfair to Josh and to Garrett.

"Don't, please," I beg him.

"I won't," he agrees, his eyes flickering to the ground. "But I hate seeing you cry."

"I'm sorry," I tell him. He smiles sadly.

"It's okay, Jami." He mumbles, squeezing my hands tightly in his. After another moment, he lets go of me and stands up, closing the passenger's side door to his car so that I wouldn't be exposed to the cold any longer. He stays outside though, pacing in front of the car while I bury my face into the hood of my winter jacket with and audible sigh.

He comes back soon, opening the door and slipping into his seat with a huff of cold air escaping from the part between his lips. I watch him from my peripherals as he rubs his hands together for warmth, turning the heater on a little bit. "Jamilla?"

"Hm?" I say tiredly.

"Are you going home for the holidays?" He asks me curiously, glancing over at me.

"No," I tell him honestly. I'm staying on campus during a time where everyone else gets to spend time with their own dysfunctionally loving families-- mine had just the dysfunctional.

"How about you come home with me?"