RE: Trailer Trash 59, 59 pt 4

    “Tabitha—are you going to be running early in the morning?” Elena asked. “I wanted us to run together. Especially if you’re still serious about trying for cheer with me.”

    “Yeah. I mean—I’d like to, at least,” Tabitha gave them her most eloquent shrug. “We can run together. Will just have to figure out how far away from each other we live, now?”

    “Yeah,” Elena said.

    Tabitha didn’t remember to tell Alicia that she’d brought her Game Boy today until after the bell for class resounded throughout the intercom and the friends dispersed. As she walked with Bobby towards the football field, she told herself she would definitely remember it for lunch, and again cursed herself for being so out of sorts today. Too many things here at high school could go wrong if she wasn’t paying enough attention, and Tabitha took the time now to sober herself up and put her game face on for first period.

    First of all… Tabitha unzipped Bobby’s borrowed sports jacket and slipped out of it. “Bobby—here.”

    “Naw, you wear it,” Bobby tried to refuse.

    “Bobby… I can’t,” Tabitha gave him an apologetic look. “Thank you, really. But, I can’t.”

    EVERYONE will talk if I’m wearing his jacket to class. It’s one thing just messing around in the quad, because Alicia offered me hers too, for a bit. Actually wearing Bobby’s stuff throughout the day though would have IMPLICATIONS. I maybe like Bobby, and he seems interested, too, but. No, not ready for THAT level of attention and gossip, right now. Not today.

    “Alright,” Bobby said with an exasperated sigh.

    “Sorry,” Tabitha genuinely felt guilty.

    He was either difficult for her to read, or she just wasn’t on the top of her game this morning, because she couldn’t tell if he really understood what her wearing his jacket might imply. Or, perhaps he did understand, and was reluctant to take the jacket back because her passing it back was like shooting him down—or, then on the other hand maybe he was just totally indifferent to worrying about what everyone might think. Possibly, Bobby wasn’t concerned with any of these social minutia and was just hurt that his gesture of goodwill was being rejected.

    Tabitha cast several discreet glances his way as he put his jacket back on, but she couldn’t get a grasp on his attitude about it.

    Damnit. I’m all like, OKAY, GAME FACE TIME, PAY ATTENTION TO EVERYTHING—and then I immediately just start overthinking EVERY LITTLE THING. Just… just be cool, Tabitha. Don’t overthink it. Also don’t just go through today without paying attention to things. Just moderately think it. Pay a reasonable amount of attention to things.

    Like yesterday, Coach Baylor was scanning through a roll call sheet on a clipboard and marking students off when they arrived, and then immediately sending them out to jog around the track. Something was off, however, because the moment Coach Baylor looked up and saw Tabitha arriving, a look of unguarded irritation flashed across the woman’s features.

    Are we… late? Tabitha wondered, her step almost faltering. No, we shouldn’t be. There’s a whole bunch of other kids just getting here. What did I—

    “Tabitha Moore,” Coach Baylor called over—skipping over Bobby. “Where’s your jacket? You were wearing one yesterday.”

    “Oh, I—uhh,” Tabitha flushed again. “I forgot it.”

    “You forgot it?” Coach Baylor stared at her, and she seemed angry. “Where did you forget it?”

    “Um, I guess just…” Tabitha floundered at the unexpected hostility. “At home?”

    “You forgot it at home,” Coach Baylor said.

    “Yeah,” Tabitha admitted, incredibly embarrassed.

    The situation seemed strange, and the unexpected spotlight on her drew a look from one of the other girls who was just getting here. Coach Baylor searched Tabitha’s expression as though she was about to give her stern words or reprimand her—but eventually just pursed her lips and looked off into the distance. She looked angry, and Tabitha had no idea that forgetting her coat this morning would evoke this much of a response.

    “Bobby Anderson,” Coach Baylor eventually acknowledged his arrival. “Set your things there, go run. Tabitha Moore—present today. Wait right there. Mackenzie Brown—here, take my keys. I’d like you to go unlock the classroom for Tabitha, then head back here. Thank you. Tabitha? Head on over and sit inside. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

    “Um. Okay?” The other girl just arriving—Mackenzie, apparently—accepted the lanyard of keys from Coach Baylor, and then looked towards Tabitha.

    “Am I… in trouble?” Tabitha blurted out.

    “Not exactly,” Coach Baylor frowned. “Head on inside and wait for me there. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

    “Okay,” Tabitha said.

    Then, she turned and walked with Mackenzie over to the double doors leading beneath the stadium seating. As Tabitha cast a last guilty glance back, Bobby was dragging his feet setting down his backpack and coat, lingering about and obviously curious as to what was going on—but, the last thing Tabitha saw there was Coach Baylor shooing him on with a gesture of her clipboard. Grace and Tiffany were also just showing up as Tabitha was leaving and they noticed her, but were too far away to say anything.

    Tabitha followed Mackenzie through the double doors, feeling like this whole day had started on the wrong foot… and each step afterwards had carried it further in that wrong direction. 

    “What did you do?” Mackenzie asked in an incredulous whisper.

    “I don’t know!” Tabitha gave the girl a stiff laugh. “I, uh. I just forgot my jacket.”

    “Is it like a rule that we have to bundle up?” Mackenzie asked. “Not everyone had a coat yesterday.”

    “I dunno,” Tabitha shook her head. “Not that I’d heard of? Just. Maybe, since I’m not allowed to run, yet. Doctor’s note; no physical activity. Then, I guess she doesn’t want me sitting outside in the cold if I don’t have a jacket? I don’t know.”

    “I guess?” Mackenzie shrugged.

    Tabitha didn’t remember Mackenzie as one of the possibly antagonistic girls that stood around with Amanda, but Mackenzie also hadn’t warmed up to the little clique of Vanessa, Tabitha, Marisa, Grace, and Tiffany. She was just one of the other girls in class whose face Tabitha recognized, but hadn’t started to put a name to just yet. She had dark hair in a ponytail and didn’t seem friendly or unfriendly—Mackenzie figured out which key opened the classroom on the second try, and then swung the door open for Tabitha.

    “Thanks.”

    “No problem.”

    Then Mackenzie headed back, leaving Tabitha to turn on the lights and wander down the row of empty desks to grab a seat near the heater. The space heater had been turned on already but hadn’t been running for very long, and the cinderblock room felt especially cold and eerie now that she was in here alone. Tabitha wasn’t really sure what to think, and after sitting and looking around the furnishings of the classroom for a few minutes she finally noticed.

    Her Coca Cola Polar Bear towel was neatly folded on Coach Baylor’s desk.

    * * *

    It was a long, tense twenty minutes before Coach Baylor arrived alone, closing the door behind her and striding across the classroom with a look of annoyance. Tabitha found herself anxious and flustered, and despite trying to reason with herself and run through all the possibilities in her head, it seemed like a sure bet that for some reason or another she was being removed from the course. While it was only the third day of the new semester and she’d barely dipped a single toe into this class or its coursework, Tabitha still felt a little devastated. She’d made friends here, she was part of a little impromptu posse of girls, and she would feel very aggrieved to have to leave them behind for any reason.

    “Okay,” Coach Baylor paced over to her desk and put a hand on the folded towel for emphasis. “You forgot your jacket. At home?”

    “Y-yes,” Tabitha swallowed. “I just… I wasn’t really thinking this morning. I guess. I, uh, I felt like I maybe wouldn’t really need it, or… I didn’t want to deal with hauling it around or having it be a hassle?”

    “Okay,” Coach Baylor searched Tabitha’s expression for a long moment before continuing.

    So…? Tabitha felt bewildered. 

    “Yesterday, during fifth period, a girl took your towel from the line in the girl’s locker room, and put it into her bag,” Coach Baylor revealed. “Another student informed me, and I was able to track this girl down,  pull her out of sixth period, and immediately get the towel back. She claimed that this was her friend’s towel, and that this friend asked her to grab it for her. Did you ask anyone to remove this towel here on your behalf yesterday?”

    For several excruciating seconds, Tabitha was too stunned to even answer.

    “No,” Tabitha said, feeling a cold, sinking feeling deaden itself in the pit of her stomach. “No. I didn’t.”

    “I suspected as much,” Coach Baylor tapped the cloth for emphasis and slid it towards Tabitha. “Just in case anything was done to it, I took it home and laundered it. It’s clean. I’m going to suggest you keep it in your locker for the time being, while I sort things out. I have not had a chance yet to track down this other girl who supposedly said it was hers, but I will be doing that in the next few hours. The girl who took the towel will be written up, and I’ll be speaking with the administrators about it. Again—you did not ask anyone to take your towel for you?”

    “I did not,” Tabitha said.

    “Okay,” Coach Baylor grit her teeth in anger. “And. You forgot your jacket somewhere, or you ‘forgot’ your jacket somewhere?”

    “I… uh,” Tabitha flushed as she connected the dots. “I think it really is just. I think I forgot it at home.”

    Again Coach Baylor stared, clearly not believing her.

    “I should be able to bring it in tomorrow,” Tabitha promised. “I swear.”

    “Alright,” Coach Baylor shook her head. “This should not have happened, and I apologize. Certainly not after those incidents last semester. We’re very fortunate that this time someone was able to inform me right away. If anything at all happens—an-y-thing, I’d like you to come to me right away. Please keep your eyes and ears open. If someone says something, if you hear word of who’s done what—well. I’ll probably hear it before you do, but I’d like you to come to me anyways, and everything will be addressed and taken care of. Can you do that for me?”

    “I will,” Tabitha nodded quickly.

    “Varsity cheer was having additional tryouts so that we could pad out the size of our team a bit more,” Coach Baylor said, crossing her arms. “However. Now, because of this.. we will actually have an open position.”

    “Oh,” Tabitha blinked. “...Oh.”

    “Yes,” Coach Baylor visibly seethed. “She’s getting a write-up, I don’t know if she’ll see a suspension or not. I’ll be taking that up with administration today. But, my girls will not have that kind of behavior and expect to remain on the team.”

    “I, uh… then should I even…?” Tabitha’s head was spinning. If there’s already cheerleaders—NONE OF WHOM I EVEN KNOW—THAT against me, then how could I expect them to ever accept having Elena or I in cheer?!

    “I’ll be speaking with everyone about this, and we’re going to reach an understanding,” Coach Baylor said. “I do still want to encourage you to join cheer, so you can maybe believe how personally embarrassing and completely unacceptable this incident is to me—any and all rumors going around about you are going to stop, period, and all of this petty bullying bullshit is going to have immediate consequences. Please excuse my language.”

    “It’s okay,” Tabitha gave the woman a wincing smile. “None of this was your fault. I’m getting used to it.” 

    “Don’t,” Coach Baylor said, turning and pacing again with a small hiss—her first few steps were hobbling ones as she got her bad knee into motion again.

    “Don’t get used to it, because this is not okay, and this is not going to go on. Not with my girls, and not in any of my classes. In fact—here. For today. You’re cold.”

    Coach Baylor opened one of cardboard boxes clustered off to the side of the teacher’s desk and pulled out a gray cheer jacket—a zip-up sweatshirt with SHS emblazoned in block letters across the breast and SPRINGTON SPIRIT in large blue print on the back, as well as running down both sleeves. The woman dropped that one back into the box and rifled through the folded cheer jackets there for a moment as she eyeballed Tabitha for the appropriate size.

    “Oh, no—no, that’s okay, really,” Tabitha protested. “I—I don’t even know how much those are. I only had enough money on me to cover my locker. And, aren’t those just for cheerleaders?”

    “We’ll worry about that some other time,” Coach Baylor said, pulling another one out and shaking it loose. “Please, I insist. You look like a Medium, but a Large might be more comfy?”

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/// Short post today.

Have been struggling the past few days to work on RE:TT, because absolutely furious at Aethon/Webtoon over RE: Trailer Trash lately. They had the gall to ask me for the book two plot beats, so they can start work on the next season of the comic. Had no clue what to tell them, because in the comic they completely diverged from what I wrote in book one.

How is the story there going to be about Tabitha living with the Macintires, when there are no Macintires, and there was no shooting? Tabitha didn't even withdraw from school in the webtoon. Rather than an aggressive trashy woman, their Aunt Lisa was a shrinking violet who was to be pitied. None of the current plot beats make any sense whatsoever for them now, because they went completely off the rails with story events.

/// So... gonna switch back to After AnimeCon for a section or two while I cool my head.