You Have To Be Cruel To Be Kind

Charlotte ate green peppers all day long. Both Joy and Greta stared and openly groaned at her in disgust. There she went again in the cafeteria, treating the joy of the spiciest food in the world like it was an ice cream sundae that had come to life. On days like these, Joy Conwell could literally groan out loud. If she didn't want to flunk AP Calculus, she had to get her sorry ass to the library as fast she should say Taco Tuesday. It was definitely more entertaining than someone whose idea of fun was eating a horrible vegetable.

Both of them couldn't wait until they could leave the cafeteria to go to the library. At least it was better than seeing unentertaining students feed their selves.

Who even wanted to take Calculus? She had better things to do than study a useless subject that wasn’t worth learning about. The thing about Joy was that she didn’t believe in sucking up to others; it was more fun to tear them down instead. Another wise woman in her orbit was none other than Greta Beth Wilford. Her hacker name was “Indigo” back in the day. Joy went by her own nickname: Vanity. With those two names in sync, both girls created the rock band, Indigo and Vanity.

Usually, the two devious comrades were always able to cause havoc and create fear in the incompetent souls of others. There was nothing that could tear these two feisty ladies down. High school would be brought down to ashes, just like the rest of this burning rock. Word around Justice High School was the fact that a small but stern librarian ruled the library with an iron fist. She once made three juniors cry so badly for making noise that they didn’t stay around to attend their senior homecoming.

How could anyone justify treating children like this? Joy couldn’t take it any longer. If she couldn’t pass her Calculus course, she and Beth might as well make some noise to enjoy.

The Lucy J. Beauvoir High School Library had been found in 1908 by some old French fart named Jacques Beauvoir. Honestly, Greta didn’t know the name of the founder herself. She braced herself for seeing the face of Abigail Harper, who was known around her campus as “The Nagging Hag.” It wasn’t even an exaggeration. Abigail had been born in Tennessee, then she moved to Lansing, Michigan when she was twenty-three years old. Now at twenty-eight years old, she had the face of a forty-five year old woman, overweight, not caring one iota about her physical appearance. Dark circles under her eyes remained permanent with no concealer to get rid of them.

Another year, another long agony of entitled preppy adolescents not respecting the library. The sardonic tone that captured Abigail’s disdain for children still remained on her mind as she walked towards the Lucy J. Wells Public Library. While its mahogany doors didn’t lose any of the magic, she was able to make sure that everything would remain in tip top shape. Just because she didn’t have a backbone didn’t mean that the whole entire staff had to struggle in this unappreciated institution. Sadly, she was also aware of Joy and her dictatorial ways. Abigail could even recall that fateful conversation that the two young women had when the school year of 2019 started. She was able to manipulate Abigail into giving her a B instead of a D for Intermediate Art. Abigail caught onto it though. Coincidentally, Joy, the cunning former student from art class thought the advice Joy was giving her became so divine in her mind that she wrote it down in her barely filled scarlet diary on March 24^th, 2019.

“You could make a living doing that kind of thing.” I suppose I could, but I had never thought about it, until then.

Perhaps that was the day that evil had entered her bones. Maybe it had always been deep inside of her soul. If evil messes up everyone’s perky lives, why not join the side of the villains? No one could save Joy Conwell but herself. Besides, she would be King, or in her case, Queen of the Heap.

The clock above the bookcases was about to ring. At 12:30 p.m., Joy and Greta were about to wreak havoc on the library. The first step was so juvenile, yet so worth it. Both of them ran down the different aisles of the books. Greta ended up in the category of Young Adults; Joy was in the category of Sci-Fi Fantasy. Joy shot her fingers up and went one, two, three, and both girls slammed the books down yelling, “Freedom!”

Thud!

Abigail was aghast. She could expect childish behavior from seven-year-olds, but a couple of teenage girls? That was unacceptable. To think that she thought her former colleague Tom was a man who used to be very immature. What was she saying? He is still immature to this day. Both ladies smirked as she shook her head at herself.

“Why can’t the two of you just grow up?” She didn’t bother putting her finger up towards her prune lips.

Tom lost 25 bucks at the races. He was an old acquaintance back from Boston University when they were both aspiring English majors. The horseracing tournament was an intense one. Despite being in their early 20s, they had already known the thrill of a horse winning a race. Abigail still had that competitive streak in her as well. Most people would find it perfectly insane that a woman would compare herself to a horse, but she felt elegant when she did. Gambling on the other hand was something that Abigail had never participated in. Thanks to Tom’s insistent whining, he bet her that if he won 25 bucks, he would see her groan in agony as she dealt with entitled teenagers. However, if he lost, he needed to become a stripper at Tonya’s Strip Club on Reagan Boulevard. Even though it felt good to see Tom embarrass himself on stage, that didn’t get her out of being a librarian. Budget cuts were bad enough. So she couldn’t risk her job for that.

Another arsenal up her sleeve was the woman in 3B. It was originally an abandoned room that allowed high schoolers to get in all sorts of mischief. When the library was forbidden from rebellious pranks, the woman in 3B could put an end to it all. To make matters worse, Joy and Greta had never gotten in trouble a day in their lives. Joy’s father, Wren Conwell, used to own a lot of stocks in the Wall Street market. When the Wall Street crash of 1987 occurred, he lost most of them, but one was still kicking. The woman in 3B took a long drink of her red wind and said, “He was skating on thin ice—that’s all I can say.”

Thin ice? What did that even mean?

Thud!

She turned around to see a lamp on the ground. Abigail couldn’t handle it anymore. She still couldn’t trust the woman in 3B. Was she a friend or a foe?

“Well, Ms. Harper, I can see that we will enjoy making your life a living hell.”

She was trying her best to not cry in front of the ladies. The last thing she wanted was her supervisor giving her grief for not giving these girls any consequences.

Her lips trembled as she spoke. “If you girls don’t leave this library right now, I’ll go…”

Greta slammed her hand on the right side of the wall. “You’ll go where? Back to that godawful Michigan farm where the closest thing you had to luxury was a farmer’s overalls? My friend has a wealthy father than can fire you right on the spot.”

Joy Conwell straightened her natural fro out, her makeup immaculate as always. As she walked slowly towards Abigail, her eyes had a snide appearance about them. Her Louboutin heels would always remain spotless as well.

She leaned close towards Abigail. “She’s right, Harper. You can’t chase us down. We’re like the demonic girls from Carrie, but a hell of a lot scarier.”

Tears finally fell from her face. The redness in her cheeks didn’t help matters either. She always turned red whenever she was overwhelmed by unnecessary conflict.

Nighttime had come over. The woman in 3B had never contacted her throughout the day. No one had even known about her incident in the library. No matter how hard she tried, no ounce of authority roared through her. Turning on the television, Abigail planned to wash this horrible day off of her.

“We’re coming to you live from Beauvoir High School, where two teenage girls had been reprimanded by a librarian. Twenty-eight year old Abigail Harper has been employed at the local high school library for roughly three years. Despite the fact that she wasn’t an experienced librarian, seventeen-year olds Greta Wilford and Joy Conwell…”

Bitchy Conwell, you mean. Abigail exhaled loudly towards herself. Who gets this wound up over a child? How were these girls even able to get onto the news? Her head was completely spinning. She saw the newscaster, Mark Frederick, with a concerned look on his face.

“She was so cruel….we just wanted to read books in her library. I even wanted to point out that tear in her dress, but she was already having a hard day, and I didn’t want her to feel even more embarrassed.”

Abigail’s eyes were still entranced by the television. Greta hugged her with a compassionate smile, even though all she saw was venom. One thing still confused her though: When did she have a tear in her dress?

She went over to her bathroom mirror. Nothing was torn on top, so Abigail decided to look downwards. She walked over towards her bed, and hiked up her skirt. Lo and behold, a single tear of her red dress was scene. It was even a small tear, it was a tear large enough to see her underwear. She freaked out. How long was I out in public like this? Did anyone else see? They must have cut me when they were violating my personal space!

Abigail took everything to not scream at the top of her lungs. The girls, the news story they were able to manipulate within their own twisted narrative…it was too much. She screamed in a guttural tone, never wanting to let go of her rage. The final tear in the dress was officially her breaking point. A tear in her favorite dress from her deceased husband, Wilfred Torrington III, was clearly a step too far. . As quickly as the tears came, they stopped. She rose up from the floor, splashed water on her face, and went to her desk. On top of her desk was a ripe apple. The apple was succulent enough to taste. It wasn't much of a task, but it would maintain Abigail's sanity against her vengeance against the two spoiled brats who dared to damage her family name. Afterwards, she was able to put on some red lipstick from Revlon in front of the bathroom mirror to feel confident again. These girls wanted war? Fine. They got a bloody battle ahead of them. Nothing would tear Abigail Harper's spirit ever again.