The New Girl

The new girl is maniacal they told me. They were bobbing their heads in agreement. She has fuchsia hair. She acts weird. She is off-the-record-books-crazy. Something is definitely different about her. I began to run. She is super sensitive. We didn’t do anything. She is sobbing like a banshee, and ….. No one understands why. Her eyes are pink. She looks like a vampire. I encountered her in the dining hall. Plunked down next to her. I was new too, I tell her. I reach out and touch her hand. They are nut buckets, I say. Pay them no attention. Tell me your story I say. She begins to sob. She does not know me. For all she knows I am just like them. I sit patting her back for a long time, neither of us speaking, both understanding the meanness of this place.