Not My Problem by Ciara Smyth

Author:Ciara Smyth
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperTeen
Published: 2021-03-11T00:00:00+00:00

18.

I thought my chest was going to explode. There was sweat dripping down my . . . my everything. And I don’t mean a light sheen of sweat; I mean there was actual dripping. My legs burned for a bit and then they became numb and heavy. I stopped repeatedly and retched. Ms. Devlin watched me from a deck chair she’d set in the middle of the field. She had a stack of papers to mark but it looked like she found my struggle more entertaining because she didn’t seem to be doing a whole lot of work. She’d dressed me in long-lost gym gear. The T-shirt was too big and the shorts were too small and she’d slipped off her own trainers and thrown them to me.

“Aren’t you lucky we both have small feet, Aideen,” she’d said, amused.

I gagged.

These were working trainers.

After five laps I lay down in the grass and begged for death. It took Ms. Devlin a minute to appear, blocking the weak January sun from my eye line. I felt tears rolling down my face but they could have been sweat. I wasn’t sure.

“Aideen, that’s ten percent done.”

“Miss, no,” I croaked. “The Geneva convention prohibits this kind of torture.”

I had no idea what the Geneva convention was but I thought I’d heard that line in a film before.

“The Geneva protocol prohibits biological warfare, Aideen. Nice try. Up you get.”

“I can’t. I literally cannot move. I live here now. The birds will take me eventually. Try to move on with your life. Don’t blame yourself.”

“If you’re still spouting nonsense, then you have a few more laps in you. Take it at a walk.”

I groaned but, sensing her resolve weaken, I thought I could give her another few laps at a snail’s pace and then maybe she’d let me go because I’d tried so hard. What was there to go home to anyway? Would Dad be there again this evening? Drinking out of my mugs. Getting his gross molecules all over my sofa. Kissing my mother and pretending like he wasn’t just taking a break from his real life.

Rage got me through another few laps. When it began to ebb out of me and I slowed down, Ms. Devlin blew a whistle, entirely unnecessarily.

“All right,” she said. “Hit the showers.”

“Ew, gross. I am not getting in those showers. And I am definitely not drying myself off with an abandoned towel.”

“Whatever, princess. Go home then. And if anything like this happens again—”

“What, a hundred laps?” I said.

Her face turned serious. “It won’t be laps next time, Aideen. There’s only so much I can do.”

I nodded, understanding she’d gone to bat for me on this. She might not even have told Mr. Walker what had happened.

I sloped off the field toward my schoolbag and pile of clothes. I threw everything into my schoolbag and slung it over my shoulder. Ms. Devlin called my name again.

“Trainers,” she said, pointing at my feet. They were basically welded to my swollen feet now, so I cursed as I kicked them off.

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