I knew I was dreaming, but that did nothing to make it feel any less real.  It was one of those dreams in which all of the sensations are so heightened, everything in full Technicolor, surround sound, with smells and your skin can somehow feel every hallucinatory touch.   So while your brain is telling you that it isn't real, to not get caught up inside it all, your senses are telling you otherwise.

            I knew the hallways where I stood well.  They were painfully familiar, and as always, terrifying.  Walls lined with posters reminding us when prom tickets would go on sale, and when to vote for next year’s student council.  Large collages of graduating classes from years before, filled with smiling faces, remembrances of the big games, the fundraisers, the key moments of every senior class member.  They adorned the largest hallway at Biddleton High, the central line that ran from the front lobby, down past the cafeteria, and eventually finding its way to the gymnasium, the location of every pep rally, basketball game and convocation that I was forced to partake in, and chose to suffer through it, hidden in a corner, slouched down low upon the uncomfortable bleachers seats, casting loathing and jealous glances at everyone and anyone who was allowed to grace the glossy wooden floor.

            Those collages always grabbed my attention.  They were an ever present glimpse into the lives that had passed through the school prior to ours, and a reminder to all those who remained, until they too would one day find a spot on the cherished walls.

            Every year, two weeks before graduation, the graduating class would hold a ceremony and unveil the newest collection.  I wanted not to care when it was our turn, I wanted it not to matter that my picture would be there.  But it did.  It mattered.  It would be the one bit of evidence left behind that I had existed with these people, that I had been a part of it all.  And with my picture, cut out and meshed along with all the others, to a new freshman, it would have appeared that I had been just as valuable a member as any of the others shown beside me.  They wouldn't have to know the reality of my situation, no, to them, I would be just another face on a wall of memories.

            I walked down the darkened corridor, watching the pictures of seniors past move by me.  The lights were off, and I was alone, the school always possessing an eerie calm when shut down for the night.  It was rare for me to ever see this place empty.  That kind of tour was usually reserved for athletes, or other organizations whose activity required them to be present for early morning or late evening practices.  In fact, the only time I could recall actually walking empty hallways was when I had convinced my mother that I had been invited to a fall dance, only doing so to escape her constant ribbing as to why these events would come and go, always no acknowledgement from me.  One more ever present excuse for she and Gracie to belittle me and remind me of my station in life as a nothing that no one would have ever asked to go in the first place.

            I pulled off the charade as best I knew how, dressing up, and even dropping the name of a male student who was relatively new and therefore wouldn't be as easy for Gracie to trace back and prove what a fraud I actually was, and stating that he had intended to meet me at the dance.  The smirk mom wore as she drove me tore into me, silently advertising that she knew of the lie, that it had never served to fool anyone for the slightest of moments, but that she intended to let me play out the scenario anyway. 

            I walked into the school, choosing to slide in through a side door, not wanting to be seen by any of the other attendees as I could only handle being so much of a target for one night.  I only needed to be close enough to see the general idea, to be able to relay certain images and appearances to those waiting at home for my crumbling failure.  I knew what I was getting myself into, and deep down I knew it was a suicide mission, only setting the stage for further abuse and mockery, and yet I couldn't bring myself to back out.  I was the person who always mocked the idea of such festivities, citing them as childish and ridiculous, merely a chance for the most awesome of people to further prove their awesomeness.  Of course, I knew that deep down, all I had ever wanted was a chance to be a part of any of that, for even a single second, to have been worthy of being a part of that universe and all that it entailed.

            That night, I walked quietly around the school, cast in darkness, as everything had been locked up and shut down for the evening, save for the gymnasium that was lit up with thumping music and strobing lights, all of which I avoided the plague it was to me.  I studied the doors to each classroom, some decorated to signify the course taking place inside, some plain, with nothing but a number and teachers name attached.  I trudged around, in my dressy clothes, for no less than three hours, ducking behind pillars, or fleeing into a bathroom if I heard the sounds of someone headed in my direction.  Once I felt that a sufficient time had been spent, therefore proving in my mind that I had in fact been a participant to all the dancing hoopla, I sniped out a side door and walked my way home in the colder than I had been planning for night air.  My story had been that I was catching a ride home with the boy I had claimed to have been meeting.  So many years later, I don't have the slightest clue what his name might have been, but it wouldn't matter if I did, he might has well have been imaginary.

            When I got home, I plastered a smile onto my exhausted and frozen frame, never once admitting defeat with my plan.  My mother, sitting in our living room, only looked up for a second as I walked in, one raised eyebrow and that smirk plastered on her face.  I knew she knew.  And she did.  In a display of vicious brilliance, she never said a word beyond asking if I had fun.  Her face showed the mocking behind her words, the amusement at the lengths I had gone to.  All I could do was maintain the smile, adding a nod, and slowing making my way up to my room before bursting into tears at what I had done, or what I had felt I'd needed to do. 

            She and Gracie would later giggle about this to themselves, always dropping allusions to it in various conversations, never openly admitting to anything.  It was a showing of manipulative brilliance.  If they were to have just come out with it, to make the open accusation of my lie, then that would have been the end of it, save for the occasional mention of it from time to time to remind me of my stupidity.  No, not mentioning it was far more vengeful.  It allowed them to dangle the incident over me, letting it eat me alive, always trying to keep up appearances as to what my evening had been, but never being able to just come clean with the humiliation.

            The hallways in my dream carried the memory with them, that feeling of chest tightening guilt and shame.  I carried on towards the gymnasium, knowing it was where I was supposed to head, although not knowing why.  As I neared the entrance to the cafeteria, my attention was drawn to one of the collages.  "Class Of '99" it read at the top.  The tightening in my chest grew more pronounced as I stared at the giant, framed, display.  That day, the day two weeks before graduation, a mere fourteen days before I was to be freed of the horrors that were Biddleton High, when I had somehow allowed myself to relax knowing the end was near, and tensed up unable to wait until that final moment before my escape, I was hit again. 

            I should have seen it coming, I don't know why I allowed myself to get carried away with the end of the year enthusiasm that had encompassed all of my classmates.  I knew better than to ever believe I had been a part of any of that.

            We, all one hundred ad fifty-two seniors and several faculty members, all crammed into the giant hall, staring at the shrouded spot on the wall, waiting for the white sheet to be pulled away to reveal the hundreds of pictures that had been cut and condensed into one.  The ceremony proceeded, led by the student council, Ben Stevens standing there as president, and next to him, his girlfriend Amber, who served as Treasurer.  They all took turns speaking, telling of the hard work that had been put into selecting all the pictures by the year book committee, of which Amber was also a member, and told tales of high school days gone by to drum up reminiscent images of the four previous years.  After the festivities, all the students crammed forward, trying to find all the pictures of themselves, giggling, and shrieking, and high-fiving as each one was spotted.  A veritable Where's Waldo of the high school set.

            I pretended not to care, I rolled my eyes at the fervor, waltzed away as soon as we were released and carried myself as though the last thing in the world that could have ever grabbed my interest was that stupid collage.

            I stayed late after school that day, dawdling in the hallways, hiding in the library until the majority of minions had cleared the building.  I walked slowly back to that main hallway, not wanting to arouse any suspicion should anyone catch me in my efforts.  I stood there, studying that collection of faces, glancing over casually, thinking that I would be able to spot myself easily, but it proved harder than I would have thought, and so I began taking it section by section, eyes carefully dragging across every inch, seeing numerous pictures of Ben, Amber, Michelle, Allison, Callie, Tucker and every other face that I had passed in that hallway for those years.  After I had made one complete pass, I started again.  And then again.  The light shining in from the windows behind me moved and eventually dimmed as the sun went down.  Several people had passed behind me as I stood inches from that wall, but I wasn't able to break concentration enough to see who they were, not that I cared by then.

            Hours later my eyes blurring from the constant concentration, and from the appearance of tears I tried to force away, I had to give up.  My body ached from standing there, back arched and head up so I could see above me.  No matter how many times I drug my line of sight over those pictures, it wasn't going to change anything.  I wasn't up there.  There was no picture of me on that wall.  Nothing.  Other people had multiple shots, I counted eleven of Ben alone, and yet not a single one of me, not even a blurry crap shot that cut off part of my head or anything.

            As I had been forgotten in the actuality of high school, I was to be forgotten in the long run.  Never even known to those incoming students who looked upon those walls to see the person that reminded them of themselves, a person that they could look at and think that if they could have survived these four years, then surely I can too.  I would never get to be that image for anyone, nor would anyone notice the exclusion other than me.  In my head, a speech that a one of the teachers had made at the beginning of the year, promising that high school politics meant nothing in regards to that collage, that the staff would see to it that every student would be included, rang loudly in my ears.  Was it merely an oversight on someone's part, or did my station in life resound even into the minds of our supposedly impartial teachers as well?

            I never mentioned it to anyone.  I didn't want to bring attention to the fact that I would always be the butt of the joke, the bulls-eye for the prank.  I convinced myself that it had been an accident.  That obviously it was a mistake and that somewhere, there was a picture of my laying around in the yearbook office, hiding under a desk, or lying behind a piece of furniture, having fallen away from the rest of the stack.  I wouldn't allow myself to entertain the thought that it had been intentional.  That someone had deliberately taken me out, and that no one had stepped up to correct the injustice.  I knew it was the reality, but I refused to accept it.  I couldn't give any of them the satisfaction of seeing that final wound being inflicted.

            The dream collage was no different than the one I had seen years before.  I didn't need to stop and search in vain to know that I wouldn't be a part of this one either.  And so I kept walking.  I approached the cafeteria, but didn't dare go inside.  The location of far too many hideous events, and even in my surreal dream world, I knew to keep my distance.  As I passed the closed doors, I could see inside the windows, students stationed around the tables, laughing, talking, picking at trays of food.  The familiar and always somewhat nauseating smell of whatever it was that they were attempting to pass off as food, mixed with the familiar scent of frozen pizza, wafted around me.  Even as an adult, the sight of canned mixed vegetables evoked Vietnam-style flashbacks from me.

            I knew where I was headed.  I could hear the sounds of voices far away, down by the gymnasium, and followed them.  Cheers and enthusiastic screams grew louder and I made my way down the hall.  A pep rally, or basketball game happening inside, perhaps.  What confused me was that in the lobby outside the gym entrance, the lights were off, and there wasn't a single person outside.  I made my way to the doors, and tried to open one of them but soon found that all were locked shut.  Peering in through the thin vertical windows, I could see some sort of assembly was taking place, with cheerleaders and faculty on the floor, bouncing around revving up the crowd of students in the stands who were all on their feet and happily yelling right along.

            I stood there watching, feeling those twinges of envy biting in my stomach.  Cheerleaders, the vapid, snobbish, evil athlete concubines that I would openly piss and moan about their lack of contributing anything substantial to society other than sexual favors for football players, or providing eye candy to dirty old men who frequent games and aren't even aware that an actual sport is occurring behind the bouncing girls.  And all the while I would be verbally attacking them in any way I knew how, I would silently dream of being one.  Being the person that everyone claims to loathe, but wants to be.  Known for being gorgeous, and personable, and never without pep.  In every way, the antithesis of who I actually was.  Timid, hidden, and most certainly pep-less.  Even if I had managed to find some way to become the hyperkinetic version of myself required to pull off that job, I never would have stood a chance, would never make the cut.

            I knew that no matter how hard I wished for it, no matter how many times I dreamt of being in that privileged group of girls, there was and never would be a place for me there.  Hell, I would have been happy at times to have been a cheerleader groupie.  One of those girls that is traditionally less pretty, a little frumpier, or who was good enough and for some reason always was picked over, and yet still got to hang with the chosen ones.  All the benefits, and yet none of the skimpy outfits.

            What made them all so interesting to me wasn't what they did, or what they stood for, but it was what happened within their lives that us lowly bystanders would never be privy to.  What happened behind their closed doors, what fabulous conversational threads were woven at that lunch table?  It was the mystery that made it alluring.  Somehow, all of the things the mere mortals such as myself said and did were public record, not that anyone would have been interested in any of those facts, and yet the coveted peoples actual dealings managed to stay safe and secure within the confines of their impenetrable bubble.  We onlookers were forced to sustain our curiosity on scraps of rumors and speculation, feasting ravenously on the occasional morsel of factual gossip thrown our way.

            Mostly I just hated that things always seemed so much easier for all of them.  I never fooled myself into thinking their lives were without strain, or that having ones name on the A-List somehow lined their paths with diamonds, but within the walls of that school, things flowed faster and smoother than they did for any of the rest of us.  Maybe they earned it, maybe it was the result of hard work and commitment, and had that been the case, there would have been only mild jealousy and personal self loathing.  Why did they feel the need to punish the rest of us?  Where did certain members of that crew get the idea that we were there for their tormenting entertainment?

            As unsettling as I trip down memory lane had been, I felt the dream wasn't coming to an end.  There was somewhere else I was meant to be.  Stepping away from the gym and slowly walking through the lobby, I felt compelled to head around and try the back doors to see if perhaps I would be able to get in that way.  As I neared the rear entrance, I came across a familiar door, that was standing wide open.  Without actually wanting to go, my body led me in there anyway.

            The girl’s locker room.  Where I had spent many hours in, changing and preparing for hundreds of phys-ed classes that I would have sincerely broken a finger or leg to have weaseled out of.  I can think of few things more calculated and unfair than forcing pubescent teens to have to change in front of each other in the confines of a cold, stone, always too crowded room.  Mixing the haves with the have nots, in their most vulnerable state, and then allowing them to beat each other senseless during rousing games of dodge ball.

            In the far corner of the room, lying on one of the wooden benches by the lockers sat a lonely item of clothing.  Quietly and carefully I walked over and picked it up for inspection.  A pair of jeans.  Acid washed and tapered legs in true early nineties fashion.  I turned them over and saw the label sitting above the back pocket.  My stomach lurched.  "Guess" it read. 

            Grams had pleaded with me not to buy those jeans.  Being twelve years old, I obviously knew better than she and went ahead with the purchase.  My family never had a tremendous amount of money, and when we had any to spare, it would never go for things like brand name clothing for me.  Gracie had a slightly better social standing than I did, and so if nicer things were bought, they were for her.  I pretended not to care about labels, to come off that such nonsense was for simple minded and ridiculous people.  The truth was I didn't care really, never saw the real difference between my second hand clothes to the newer, more expensive items donned by the cooler masses.  They however, cared deeply in return. 

            The source of much mocking came from my lack of fashionability.  My nameless jeans and generic shoes never failed to catch the attention of those better suited.  While I never understood the need for the designer threads, I very much understood the need to eliminate any ammunition I could to prevent myself from further attacks.  I couldn't ask my mother for the money to improve my standing through clothing, I couldn't bear the embarrassment had she questioned my plan.  I did ask Grams however.  I never asked her for things, and thought for sure she would grant me this one request.  Instead I was given a speech on how clothing doesn't make the person, actions and personality and heart do.  Sage wisdom indeed, but to a tormented middle schooler, it was nothing but misunderstood noise.

            And so I saved.  I worked odd jobs for Grams, saved any bit of birthday money I would receive from her, and scrapped together every bit of spare change I could for months.  I had seen in the Sunday paper that a store in the St. Charles mall had a sale on designer jeans, and my meager savings allotted me just enough to finally purchase my very own pair.  I begged Grams to drive me, never fully revealing what I needing the ride for, but she clearly remembered.  She once again tried to instill in me that a person’s worth would never be decided based upon expensive clothing, but I was unrelenting in my pursuit.  Eventually, she let it go.  I will always remember the look of sadness and the subtle shaking of her head when I ran back to the car, grinning ear to ear, with my very first department store bag.  Her expression barely registered at the time, I was too excited to finally be rid of the taunting.

            The next Monday morning, I giddily dressed myself in the morning, noting that even though I had to wear my nameless shoes and Wal-Mart t-shirt, that it didn't matter, I was the proud owner of my very own pair of Guess jeans, and no one could take that from me.  That day, I had told myself, I could not be mocked.

            I made it through my courses unnoticed, but also without torment.  When final period rolled around, and I headed off to gym, I had been so pleased with myself that for a brief moment, I was relaxed and calm enough to look forward to the class.  I sat in my usual corner, changing into the hideous red and white school issued shorts and shirt, and quietly made my way to the bathroom.  When I came out, I couldn't understand why all the other girls had crowded into the little area where all the less that awesome people such as myself got ready.

            To this day I don't know how they found out.  If someone tipped them off, or if one of the cool kids had wandered over and seen the tag.  No matter how it started, that reality was that it was happening, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

            "Oh, so Max thinks she is cool now because she has some Guess jeans?" Amber announced, holding up my pants for all to see.

            I couldn't believe that the other girls were actually walking up to her, and studying the offending item. 

            "I bet she stole them!"  one girl offered.

            "Check the buttons!" another one suggested.  "She probably just ripped the tag off of someone else's jeans and sewed them onto her crappy ones!"

            On cue, Michelle appeared and started pulling on the buttons of my jeans, theorizing that perhaps I had found a way to put the "Guess" emblazoned buttons onto my cheap, usual rags.

            "Wait!" Amber shrieked.  "I was wearing my Guess jeans on Friday!  She probably waited until we were all changed and came in here and tore the tag off of mine so she could pretend that she had a pair too!"

            I hadn't said anything as this unfolded.  I just stood there, silent and surrounded by all of them, lionesses poised for a massive kill, hoping that either they would lose interest once they realized the jeans authenticity, or even that the P.E. teacher would find her way into the locker room and break up the chaos.  Luck wasn't on my side for either scenario.

            To prove her point, Amber grabbed hold of the tag above the pocket and began to pull.  The rest of us watched as she strained, and I stood there wondering how much evidence people needed to see that they were in fact what they appeared to be, just as all of theirs had been, and no one had questioned.  After a minute or so, her face had begun to turn red from the effort and she gave one extra burst of energy hoping to be able to expose my fraud.  There was a very tiny tearing sound.

            Her eyes popped even wider than they had been, and the hint of a smirk toyed with the corners of her mouth.  You could see the new jolt of electricity pulsing through her, powered by that faint noise.  Her upper lip curled slightly with her suppressed glee, and she pulled in a deep breath before powering out one final and forceful tug.

            This time the sound was not tiny.  Only meeting a hint of resistance this time, her arm whipped across her chest and she held in her hand the leather patch that had seconds ago, been attached to my now ravaged jeans.  The collective gasp from the other girls in the room actually caused me to jump.  Surely they had seen the effort she'd had to put into ripping it off, they couldn't possibly think that I had stolen the patch off of someone else's jeans and fixed it onto my own? 

            Within seconds, the girls scattered, each on retreating to their tiny section of the locker room, and began pulling their own pants out of their lockers, flinging them about and inspecting them, looking for missing labels and other signs of thievery.  Screams rang out of every little potential find from all directions.

            "My zipper is loose, she messed with it!"

            "There is a thread missing from the tag on my jeans!"

            "I think she tried to pry the buttons off of mine too!"

            I hadn't move a single inch, I stood staring at Amber, still clutching my ruined pants, glaring and grinning at me as the masses began to re-horde around me.  I hadn't been expecting it, but when I felt a hand slam into my shoulder, knocking me forward, it didn't surprise me.  I didn't know who it was who shoved me first, but it didn't matter as other hands were fast to follow, and before I'd had time to clarify what was happening, I was already on the ground.  Most chose to not participate in the actual violence, but instead stood and watched, some yelling encouragement to the attackers, others faces reading that they knew it had gone too far, but didn't dare say a word for fear the aggressors would turn on them.

            I balled up as best I could, trying to protect myself from the hands, and occasional foot that came my way, and just waited until it was over.  Eventually, seeing that I wouldn't retaliate, the blows lessened, and eventually stopped.  I never untucked myself to look and see what might be coming next, but felt the contents of my back pack dying dumped over me as I lie on the floor.  Someone, I believe it might have been Allison, warned that soon the teacher would come in to get everyone to head over to the gym, and so everyone snapped back to normal, their conversations light and chipper as they straightened themselves out and began filing towards the door. 

            Amber said nothing to me as she left, but merely dropped my pants on top of the lump on the floor that I had become.  The ripped tag fell beside my head making a pitiful little noise as it hit the concrete.  I heard her detailing to her friends how pathetic I was to think that my stupid plan to try and fake having those jeans would have tricked any of them, and they all fervently agreed.

            I stayed on that floor for some time, feeling the burning where the punches and kicks had connected with my limbs.  After I was sure that they were all gone and secure in the gymnasium, I got up as quickly as I could, stuffing the fallen items back into my back pack, throwing the fateful jeans in on top, and tore out of the locker room, never raising my head to see if anyone could see or not.

            I had run to Grams house.  There was no way I would have been able to go home after that.  It was a certainty that Gracie would hear and happily relay the information to my mom, and I knew I wouldn't be strong enough to take all that in one day.  I ran the whole way in my gym clothes, too afraid to put the jeans on again.  When I arrived, I was already in tears, and she welcomed me in, tucked me into my chair by the window under one of her quilts, and I wailed out the entire incident.  I expected her to chide me, to say that she had in fact told me so, that buying those jeans wouldn't bring me what I had hoped they would, but she never did.  She just held my hand, comforted me, and eventually brought me a mug of tea.  She wanted very much to call the school and make sure that the group of perpetrators were caught and punished, but we both knew that would only serve to make things worse, to make my target bigger still.

            I never wore those pants again.  I left them with her, asking her to throw them away, or burn them, anything to get them out of my life.  Months of effort and wishing had come crashing down onto me with the power of adolescent fists and the rage of the status quo.  Adding insult to injury, the school would call my mother later that day, informing her that I had cut gym class, and I would end up serving a detention the next afternoon for this crime.

            Holding the jeans in the dream slammed the memory into me, each painful image ripping through my chest, pulling air from my lungs until the only air I could find was shallow, and insufficient.  The remembered points of impact tingled on my arms and legs, as if the attack had just happened.  The locker room had been empty save for the pair of jeans, I had looked, but I suddenly felt preyed upon, as though round two was looming and I had missed that I was only being lured in for more.  My heart began to race, my head spinning, waiting for the pain that I knew would come.  I couldn't take the uncertainty any longer and I whipped around to catch whomever it was that was preparing to pounce.

            There he sat.  Quiet, partially hidden in the shadows of the darkened locker room, his beauty just as vivid and painful as it had ever been in real life.  Ben Stevens, silently observing me from his corner, the look on his face at first completely blank, but then contorted in a way that I was unfamiliar with.  His eyes narrowed, one side of his perfect mouth pulled up into a smile that had no familiarity to the crooked smile that I adored.  No this one seemed spiteful...  Mean. 

            I am not sure if she suddenly appeared, or if I just hadn't seen her before, my attention always being drawn right towards Ben, but there was Amber, sitting coquettishly beside him, and I followed her arm to find that her hand was intertwined with his, as they had been so many times before in high school.  Her smile was not as subtle as his, no hers was openly amused, and vindictive.  She stood up, her hand lingering in his before she walked slowly towards me.  I carefully turned my head around to see that the empty side of the room I had been facing seconds before now contained all of my fellow classmates from that painful day.  Their presence was made even more terrifying as they were all partially covered by the same darkness as Ben.

            The old wounds were throbbing now, reminding me of the pain I was about to feel again, and I whipped my head around to face Amber, who was now only a foot away, and holding the jeans that had seconds ago been clamped tight within the vice of my fingers, that were now empty.

            My eyes were on Ben when the first and familiar punch connected with my shoulder.