Free New Horizons by Dan Carr

said. Her hot breath smacked me in the centre of my face.
    “I’m listening.” I closed my eyes.
    “You're not as strong as you pretend to be."
    I laughed. “I know I’m not strong.”
    She put her hand over my mouth, and her fingers grazed my teeth. I gagged on the taste of salty sweat, and finally shoved her off of me.
    “Don’t touch my face,” I told her. “That’s disgusting.”
    “Stay out of my way, toothpick,” she said.
    “Sure thing, tree trunk.” I moved around her and jumped back onto my top bunk.
    Twin and Twinner laughed from their bunks. Their laughs raised the hairs on the back of my neck. It was one of the best feelings to have someone laugh at your joke—not just any joke, but a joke that killed someone else.
    The silence from Karen as she climbed back up onto her bunk was satisfying. But it went on for too long. And then it stung me.
    “Damn you’re annoying,” I said. My head was on my pillow and I pulled out the elastic from my hair. The roots were greasy but the ends were dry.
    “And why is that?” she asked.
    “You know I’m just trying to bother you, but you let that bother you. You’re so annoying. I don’t get you.” I sat up. “If you’re going to talk, fucking talk.”
    Karen popped up in her bunk. I thought her head was going to hit the beams running across the ceiling. “It’s pretty easy to laugh at the fat girl. You’re all so predictable.” Her breathing laboured and there was a shakiness that made my stomach drop. “Girls like you are the reason other girls hate themselves. And then it’s all a surprise why I’m the way I am—you girls are bitches.”
    Maybe she was crying. There was shaky breathing, and quiet sniffs of air that only holding in sobs could produce. When she wiped her nose on her grey blanket, I wondered if she had a soft shell like the rest of us. It was nuts how when you were vulnerable, you leaked every kind of liquid out of every crevice in your face, all for the world to judge.
    “You’re right,” I finally told her. “I am a bitch. But you’re a fucking bitch too.”
    “Fuck off.”
    “Fuck off? No—you fuck off. You’re fat and I’m skinny and we’re all in this damn cabin because we’re all offended by the stupidest shit. Get over yourself. None of us are right. We’re all the problem you dumb fuck. That’s why we are here.”
    “Oh that’s nice.” Her voice was higher than normal, set to mocking mode. “How good of you to know why things are the way they are. You’re so amazing.”
    “You’re the amazing one, actually.”
    “Could you shut your mouth and sleep. Nobody cares.”
    I laughed. “Sticks and stones, skin and bones—remember that one, Karen .”
    “Sure thing, Valerie .”
    I wanted to sleep and dream of normal dreamy type stuff. Like saving someone from something, or flying through the sky. But I laid on my back, wide awake. And I thought about the weirdest stuff. Like moments that suddenly mattered when it was dark. I was alone in a way that made me feel disconnected from my group, and that strangely bothered me.
    “Goodnight ladies,” Sharon whispered. She was back in the cabin, holding the lantern she had promised to take back. Sharon looked right up at me. “Sleep tight.”
    I looked over at Karen. She was on her back and motionless. Dead asleep. It was funny that she and I were in the same cabin, because that was the way of the world. Karen was the type of girl back home that bothered me. And apparently, I was the type of girl that bothered her too.
    There was always someone, somewhere, that was bothered by some kind of person, and the universe was paying us both back for being shitty human beings. We were in the same kind of boat. Mean girls were rotten, and girls like us died from the inside, out.
     
    The morning was fantastic until I got out of bed, and then my body wanted to crumble to the ground. After climbing down the ladder, I laid down on the dirty, wooden floor and fell into a