The "Good Kid"

(Written in October 2019)

Ever since the age of eight, she's always been “the good kid.” The kid who focused on her schoolwork instead of on fashion, boys, and parties. The kid who cared more for her little sibling than her sex life. The kid who is more likely to be seen with hot chocolate than with alcohol. She’s always been the kid that secretaries say “hello” to in the hallways, the kid to greet her teachers from past years a little too enthusiastically. The girl with the straight As, number two in her class, teacher’s pet, brown-noser, leads in the drama, National Merit Semifinalist, that kid. The one you probably detest.

As well you should.

The numbers are just a cover for the shame. You can’t quantify the shame, but it definitely outweighs the 4+ GPA and the 1580 SAT. You can’t quantify the years and years of lost sleep due to pointless procrastination—ironically, I’m writing this at 11:08 on a school night—or the lost social opportunities due to poor planning and an off-putting personality. And the lies. You definitely can’t quantify the piles and piles of lies, each one more elaborate than the last, only believable due to a reputation that precedes her and moments of morality that make it appear that she’s a competent human being. But those lost homework assignments and trips to her locker and forgotten folders are all figments of the imagination of a kid who has let her accomplishments dictate how much she can flout the rules.

She’s not really the good kid; she’s just good at flying by the seat of her pants. She’s sleeping too much and studying too little, she’s lying to everyone about everything. Hell, she’s not even sure if her own personality exists anymore. The angelic teacher’s pet is also the flaming ball of anxiety is also the cold family member is also the lonely piece of shit writing this fucking bullshit when there’s so much more to be done is also is also is also. She doesn’t know who she is or why she does what she does anymore. She’s just trying to get by.

And her rebellions aren’t classic rebellions. No, they take place in moments of solitude, when she only has a laptop and a fridge stocked full of wine to keep her company. Those, coupled with the knowledge of familial taboos and social unacceptability. Her own hands become a substitute for the intimacy she knows she’ll never find, and her glass—filled only a quarter of the way, not enough to make a real difference—becomes a physical manifestation of her ability to take some kind of action against authority, even though it’s unknown to anyone but herself. But she doesn’t take pleasure in these rebellions anymore; they’re mere distractions, the oxytocin and dopamine taking her attention momentarily away from the rest of the world. Nor does she depend on them, as she’s still smart enough to recognize the patterns of addiction in her family and knows not to fall in too deep.

Ah, her family, that loosely defined group of people who know in their heart of hearts that she really isn’t the good kid anymore. That group that loves her but doesn’t like her. The group that’s tired of her complaining when her lip is already bleeding from biting down on it too hard, the group that congratulates her on her report card but criticizes her every attempt to be part of the family. Are they the problem, or is she the odd one out? Is she the only one who feels ashamed of the carnal thoughts that flit through her head way too often, or the small amount of self-respect she has left, or the mere weight her own existence has upon them each and every day? She doesn’t know, and she can’t ask.

And those grades she’s so “proud” of? Those coveted As, that long list of AP scores, that stack of textbooks on her desk? They’re the only thing she can do that doesn’t add to the shame. Open up, take notes, bubble in, get an A. Do it again, in a different class this time, maybe on a different day if you’re lucky. She claims that tests don’t really assess your ability, and they don’t, but she wants them to. She wants them to be validation, proof that she might have some knowledge for the future that could be useful somewhere, but they’re just little numbers on a transcript. Sure, that transcript might get her into college, but what next? What will happen when the façade inevitably falls away and there’s nothing to hide her complete incompatibility with the world around her?

She doesn’t know.

She doesn’t really want to know.

She doesn’t really want to know why she can’t muster up the energy to focus for one goddamned second (though that’s probably just because she’s lazy and selfish). She doesn’t really want to know why she can’t tell the damn truth when she repeatedly messes up (though that might be because she’s trying to maintain some external semblance of stability). She doesn’t really want to know why she’s so ashamed of thoughts she can’t control and desires that are biologically normal (though that’s probably because her mother told her to not have sex before marriage and that everything surrounding sex is dirty). She doesn’t really want to know why she cares so fucking much and so fucking little about all of this, the numbers, the prestige, the way people regard her. Why bother? She knows that her energy could be spent better elsewhere. She knows that her conscience is a construct, and she’s flouted it so many times that she’s shocked it hasn’t disappeared altogether. She knows that she’s no longer the kid that everyone hoped for and dreamed for, the one that was meant to accomplish great things because she was good and pure and smart and who the hell knows what else. She’s skating by on no more than her grades, her prestige, her reputation that she started to build when she still was what people think she is.

And so she turns to YouTube, to Netflix, to PornHub, to BuzzFeed, anything brainless that can drown out her own thoughts. She doesn’t want to think about the future, she doesn’t want to think about her failures, she doesn’t want to think about her constant decline into something she doesn’t even recognize. She chooses to imagine outlandish fantasies instead of thinking about the reality of the situation she’s put herself in.