Helen gripped her latest mission assignment, staring at it with dread. So much so that her hands were shaking. I can’t believe…
He thoughts were interrupted when Jason let himself into the lounge where she was and pulled out a carton of orange juice from the fridge. “Hey Helen,” He said as he took a big gulp right out of the carton.
Helen ignored him. Jason noticed that she looked pretty tense.
“What’s this?” He asked as he swiped the slip from out of her hands.
“Hey!” Helen protested.
“Oh, a mission, no wonder you’re so tense. We’re supposed to be on holidays!”
“Who said I’m tense?” Helen snapped. She grabbed the paper back and shoved it in her pocket.
“Hey, I can always tell when my baby’s upset.” He came up and wrapped his arms around her from behind.
Helen pushed him away, “How many times have I told you not to call me that?”
“Whoa, all this for one simple little mission in…” He looked at the assignment that was somehow back in his hands. “Sudbury? Where the heck is that?”
“It’s in Ontario, Canada.” Helen sighed, “How did you get that?”
”Oh I have my ways,” Jason laughed. “Do you still not want to go back there or something?” He wondered.
Helen knew what he meant. Ever since Toronto had been bombed eight months ago, she found it painful to even think about going back to her home country. “No, it has nothing to do with that.” Helen groaned, “But Jason, I used to live in Sudbury…”
“Yeah? So?”
“I don’t ever want to go back there…”
“Oh…you wanna tell me about it?”
“Will you let me leave if I don’t?”
“Of course not.” Helen sighed deeply and closed her eyes, and suddenly she was recalling the early years of when she was living with her adoptive family. It was so painful, but she soon found herself telling Jason everything. “I was ten when we moved from Toronto to Sudbury, I hated it right away…”
“Isn’t it pretty, Helen?” Ann gasped as she surveyed their new home in Sudbury. Her husband, Rob, had been offered a promotion and a raise to move there. It wasn’t much, but it was a lot better than their place in Toronto. Besides, they would need the extra room once the baby came along.
Helen looked up at her mother and rolled her eyes. “This place sucks,” She muttered, “There’s nothing to do!” She eyed her mother, who was by now very, very pregnant. It looked almost like she was about ready to burst at the seams. Everyone was looking forward to the new baby but Helen. Helen hated everything about moving to such a small place in the middle of nowhere. At least, it was small compared to Toronto.
As it turned out, Helen’s hatred for the place did not go without support.
The first day of school was a nightmare. She was immediately labeled an outcast.
“Look at her,” She heard one girl whisper as she walked past her in the hall. “She sure is freaky-looking.”
“And she’s from Toronto too? I never would have guessed.” Her friend replied. Helen quickly ducked her head and hurried to her next class.
It was true what they said, at only ten years old, she was not developed at all. She was too thin with stringy, mousy shoulder-length hair that she always kept in a tight braid. No matter how hard she tried, her hair always looked greasy and her clothes were less than acceptable. She’d tried to find something ‘cool’ to wear, wanting desperately to fit it, but it would seem that she didn’t have any taste in clothes.
In class she was shy, keeping to herself and never volunteering answers. Although she was very smart, she got bad marks because she did not participate.
She dreaded group work, because no one would ever want to work with her. Even her fellow outcasts ignored her. The other students came up with embarrassing nicknames for her. She didn’t have a single friend in the world. That was exactly how it was all the way through to grade seven.
It was at that age that all her classmates were starting to grow up a bit, start dating, and talking about boys and make-up and things that Helen had never thought about before.
Still, she thought she could catch a break. She did find two girls she talked to at lunch. They were kind enough to let her sit with them at lunch and they talked to her too!
Natalie was an overweight girl with tussled dirty blonde hair in a style that could only be described as a long mullet. She was dumb and cruel, and she loved to poke fun at Helen.
Her friend, Suzanna, was East Indian, an immigrant who spoke very little English and had to wear long sleeved sweaters, ankle length skirts and scarves over her face all year round.
Helen was glad she finally had some friends to talk to. They even seemed to like and hate the same things. Including a shared hatred for Jill, easily the most popular girl in Sudbury Junior High.
It was the seventeenth of November when Helen’s life took a turn for the worst.
“Hey mutt,” Jill laughed as she passed Helen at her locker. “How’s life in your doghouse?”
Jill and her ‘boyfriend’ Tyler both laughed. They stopped and leaned against the locker right next to Helen.
“You know what I heard?” Jill started, “I heard that that mutt over there has a bastard little sister too.”
Helen’s face darkened. There was no one in the world she loved more than her baby sister. “You know that girl is just a stray. Her mother was a whore and her father was a crackpot. They dumped her in some alley and left her to die. They didn’t even want her. She was lucky those Barker dogs decided to pick her up. It makes them look good to do a little charity work, you know.”
Tyler laughed loudly, and Helen wanted to die. “Look at her,” Tyler added, looking her over as if she was some kind of display. “She so ugly!” They were both rolling with laughter.
Helen kept her head down, and found that tears were springing to her eyes. She slammed her locker shut and ran outside for break. She could hear Jill and Tyler laughed and she went.
Outside, she climbed up the stone steps to where Suzanna and Natalie usually sat at recess.
“Hey Hel,” Natalie said casually as Helen ran up the stairs.
“Oh my god!” Helen complained, she could complain to them, right? That’s what friends were for, right? “I hate Jill so much! Just now she…”
Natalie looked annoyed, “You got your science homework done?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah…” Helen sighed and fished it out of her backpack. Natalie smiled and she and Suzanna quickly began to copy it. Helen felt a little hurt but ignored it. They didn’t mean to, they were her friends.
“We still going out for lunch today? I got my mom to get me a note.”
“Huh? Oh yeah, sure. Is this an ‘f’ or a ‘t’?” Natalie asked evasively.
“It’s a ‘t’,” Helen sighed. The bell rang and the students went back inside for the rest of their classes before lunch.
In geography she got a detention after school for falling asleep while the teacher broke out into a 45-minute lecture on sedimentary rock. The only thing she had to look forward to was going out for lunch.
When the lunch bell rang she felt as if she was finally free.
She ran to meet Natalie and Suzanna at their usual spot at the stairs. She waited for them 20 minutes but they never came. She walked back inside and checked some of the rooms where they ate on colder days. They were nowhere to be found. Maybe they got lunch detention she thought sadly. Their lunch plans were ruined.
She sat down at a desk in one of the rooms and waited for classes to start again. She was starving, but there was nothing for her to eat.
After school, Helen caught up with Natalie and Suzanna.
“Where were you guys at lunch today?” She asked.
“Oh yeah…about that…” Natalie laughed. “We went out for pizza. We kinda ditched you because we were gonna smoke and we knew you wouldn’t want to come with.”
Helen’s mouth fell open. “You what!?”
“Chill out, Hel, it’s only lunch.”
Helen wanted to scream, she wanted to cry, and wanted to beat Natalie to a bloody pulp. They let her starve and ditched her just to smoke? And they had both told her they hated smoking. She felt so incredibly betrayed. Her only so-called friends in the world had just stabbed her in the back. She turned without saying a word to them and got onto her bus.
On the bus ride home, the driver hit a speed bump and the guy behind her ‘accidentally’ spilt grape crush in her hair. It was the worst day of her life.
That night before she went to bed at ten o’clock, she crept into the bathroom and sat down on the edge of the tub. Shakily, she bragged a razor from the sink. She stared at it for a long time before she held it over her upturned wrist. She got as far as pressing it down hard against her skin.
Ultimately, however, she couldn’t do it. She dropped the razor and fell to the against the floor weeping.
Afterwards, Helen never spoke to Natalie or Suzanna ever again.
Grade eight passed by slowly, she stuck to herself, not trusting herself to make friends. Just in case she found more like Natalie and Suzanna. She talked to the teachers and just sat in a corner at break and recess. Until finally, high school! Glorious high school! Freedom to leave the grounds at lunch, only four classes each day, and more open-minded teachers and students. Unfortunately, there were also students much, much older than her, and still she was not accepted.
She saw less of Jill and Tyler, which was good, and Natalie and Suzanna ended up going to a different high school altogether.
But there were at least three people to take each of their places in her life. Namely, an abnormally tall guy on the football team. He was in the tenth grade, but was several years older than she. He'd been in high school for nearly three years now, and would probably be in it for many years longer. No one really knew his real name; all his friends just called him ‘Tips’.
Tips and his friends loved to tease her when she walked by. She was embarrassed that she was in high school now and her breasts had just begun to grow and she still hadn’t gotten her first period. She felt like some kind of freak of nature.
She was so miserable she was actually failing math and gym. Math was her best subject, but she’d always just scraped by in P.E. class.
Because of this, she was forced to do math drills Thursdays with Mr. Nells, and running drills with Ms. Parch on Wednesdays.
It happened on a Wednesday.
She was walking home from basketball drills and it was dark out. She was sweating and tired and she just wanted to go home and see her sister. Erin always cheered her up. Erin made her feel loved.
She walked outside and headed across the parking lot. Tips and his football buddies were standing around a big van. They had obviously been drinking.
“Hey baby!” Tips called as she walked by.
Helen ignored him.
Tips said something to his friends and they disappeared around the side of the school.
Helen began to get nervous and she walked faster.
“Baby! Babe! Come here!” Tips called. He ran up to her and grabbed her arm. Helen gasped and spun around, dropping her books on the ground.
After that it was all a blur. Tips pushed her into the van and was pulling off her clothes.
“I love you baby, come on, give me what I need.” He whispered to her. Helen screamed and knew that she crying harder than she ever had in her life. He succeeded in what he had intended to do. She felt stupid because she was completely unable to stop him. He kept calling her ‘babe’ or ‘baby’, and touching her all over. He laughed at her. He was enjoying this, that sick bastard! When he finally stopped and passed out she grabbed her clothes and ran home faster than she thought was physically possible.
She collapsed in her mother’s arms and told her everything that happened.
Helen never went back to that school and the next day they were packing to go back to Toronto.
When they arrived, Helen made it her mission to make sure no one could ever get close to her again.
On her first day back in Toronto she opened up the classifieds and looked for a personal trainer.
One small add on the last page caught her eyes. ‘Master Stone’s gym, Personal training.’
Master Stone became like a second father to her. He taught her how to be strong in body, mind and spirit. He taught her how to fight, how to defend herself. He loved to recite old Chinese proverbs and other little tidbits of wisdom to her. His favorites, however, were “Live like there’s no tomorrow, love like you’ve never been hurt, and dance like no one’s watching.” And “A heart of stone can crumble, but an unshakeable spirit will never fail you.”
He put her on a proper diet and she gained some weight, and some muscles. Her body began to take on the shape of a normal young woman.
One day she looked in the mirror and gasped at the reflection staring back at her. She was beautiful! Even more beautiful than Jill even. She quickly tired to hide it. She didn’t want to be seen as beautiful. She was ice cold. She was a rock that could not be broken. Nothing would ever hurt her again.
Helen took a deep, shuddering breath and dropped her head. She couldn’t even look up at Jason.
Jason was stuck in a stunned silence. “Helen…why…” He choked, “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Tell you!” She cried, “How could I ever tell you! You’d never believe that was me way back then…” She laughed bitterly.
“Well hey... I promise I’ll never call you ‘babe’ or ‘baby’ again. I understand why you don’t like it.”
He drew her up into his arms and rocked her back and forth slowly.
“Well hey, do you think all those people will still be there?” He asked.
Helen snorted, “Knowing them they’ll probably be stuck in High School for the rest of their lives.”
“Well what do you say to a little payback?”
“What…?”
“You know, you’re hot, you’ve got a hot boyfriend, and you’re a Preventor, I think we could work with that…”
Despite her mood, Helen smiled ever so slightly and looked at him.
”Sounds like a great idea!” She grinned.
“That’s why you love me!”
“That is why I love you.” She kissed him deeply. “Come on! Let’s go!” She grabbed his hand and pulled him towards the hanger.
Sudbury High was exactly the way Helen remembered it. She doubted that they had even painted the halls that desperately needed painting since she had left. She also noted that they still didn’t have the new lockers that they had been promised. Damn school board, Helen thought with a laugh.
She noted the envious expressions on the girls’ faces as she walked through the halls with Jason, and the appreciative glances from the guys. Things sure had changed since she had been there only a few short years ago.
She was armed with a small list from the office that consisted of homerooms and locker numbers and she approached her first stop with confidence. She walked down to a locker and immediately found who she was looking for: Tyler.
“Hey,” She said casually as she leaned against the locker next to him.
Tyler stopped and stared at her.
“H-hi…” He gawked. He didn’t look any different than when they were in the ninth grade. He was just bigger and dumber.
“Wow…I still remember you.” Helen smiled wistfully.
Jason stood a short distance away and smirked.
“You do?”
“Yes, don’t you remember me?” Helen pouted.
“Of course I do! How have you been doing? We uh…missed having you around. Where’ve you been?”
“Oh, you know, here and there. Outer space, Preventor Headquarters, I’ve been working a lot.”
“Really…?” Tyler tried to sound interested.
“Oh! And guess what! I found my real father!”
“That’s great!”
“Yes, my name is Helen Maxwell now, not Helen Barker.”
There was a long pause, “Wait a second…” Tyler said after a minute as he caught on. “You’re Helen Barker!?”
“Yup,” Helen grinned widely.
Tyler’s mouth hung open but he never had a chance to say anything more, since Jill walked up to them.
“Well, if it isn’t the little mutt.” Jill smirked. She apparently took no notice of the fact that Helen was now gorgeous, and she seemed bland in comparison. Jill hadn’t changed either.
This time, the teasing didn’t even faze Helen. She was a top Preventor pilot; nothing fazed her anymore.
“Come crawling back? So you found your pimp father, did you?”
“My father is no pimp, a player maybe, but not a pimp. My mom would never allow it.” Helen said it as if she was talking about the weather. Jill scowled. Normally Helen would be almost in tears by now.
“So who is he then?” Jill snarled.
“His name is Duo Maxwell. Maybe you’ve heard of him.”
Jill’s face wrinkled as she tried to recall where she’d hear the name. She obviously never paid any attention to anything other than the mirror.
“No? I figured not. But well…I’d love to stay and chat, Jill, but I’m here to make an arrest.”
“Wh-what…?” But Jill got no answer, because Helen was already walking away, Jason on her arm.
“What the hell was that!? And how did she get a hottie like him?”
“Hey!” Tyler said, offended.
Helen continued on her merry way, enjoying every bit of her revenge. The next person she ran into actually found her.
“Oh my God! Helen?! Is that really you?”
Helen turned around and saw Suzanna running towards her. Helen smiled; Jason got nervous. He knew that smile.
“Hello, Suzanna.” She said sweetly.
“It is you! Nat! Natalie come here!” Suzanna called behind her.
Jason winced when he saw Natalie.
“You weren’t kidding when you described her.”
Helen chuckled and told him to shut up.
“Helen we missed you.”
“Did you really? Or did you miss copying my homework?”
Natalie laughed, “Yeah, that too…”
”I wasn’t kidding.” Helen’s face remained perfectly stern.
“Well uh…you look great! Where ever you’ve been it agrees with you.”
“Well apparently this place doesn’t agree with you. Have you gained weight?” There was absolutely no malice in her voice.
Natalie shrugged it off. “I saw you talking to Jill but I didn’t recognize you. You sure showed her, you look great now! And who is this?” She eyed Jason.
Jason shuddered inwardly. It wasn’t just her looks that appalled him, it was what she’d done to his girlfriend.
“This is my boyfriend, Jason Yuy.” Helen said, smiling.
“Yeah well, Jill is still a bitch you know.”
“Yes, I noticed,” Helen sighed.
“She still calls me porky, you know, can you believe her?”
“Yes,”
“What?”
“You know what Natalie? I’ve been wanting to tell you something ever since I left Sudbury.”
“Really?”
“Yes: I am absolutely appalled and disgusted that I ever considered you a friend. What the hell was I thinking? I am way too good for you!”
Natalie’s mouth fell open.
“And don’t think you escape, Suzanna, you went along with everything she told you to, didn’t you? I hope I never see either of you again. You made me feel ignored, unappreciated and insignificant to the point where I considered suicide, and I hope you burn in hell for it.”
She turned on her hell and walked away. “Another brilliant exit for Helen Maxwell!” Jason cheered. “Now for the last on our list,”
Helen nodded and took a deep breath. This one wouldn’t be so easy.
She opened the door to a classroom and let herself in. Jason followed her.
“Young lady, were you raised in a barn?” The teacher hissed, “In a civilized place we knock before we enter. Where are your manners?”
Helen rolled her eyes. “Don’t talk to me like that, you fucking bitch.” She snapped. The class gasped.
“I won’t allow simple citizens to talk to me in that way. Where are your manners? You treat me like one of your lowly students!”
“What is your name? Are you Mimi Parker?” The teacher angrily consulted her class list.
“No, I’m Helen Maxwell, I used to be a student here under the name of Helen Barker, but not anymore.”
“Hey it’s the mutt!” Someone cried. Helen and the teacher both ignored him.
The teacher stared at her in shock. “Young lady! I will have you reported the principal’s office…”
“And what will they do?” Helen was getting tired of the charade, so she pulled out her badge. “I am Lieutenant Helen Maxwell of the Preventors. I’m here to make an arrest. So if you don’t mind letting me do my job, I’ll let you do yours.”
“Holy shit!” The same guy cried again, “The mutt’s a Preventor!”
“And a fucking hot one too!” Another guy added.
Helen turned and smirked at the class. “Now, now, be nice or I’ll throw you all in prison. I’m just looking for someone who calls himself ‘Tips’.”
She spotted him in the back of the room. He was sweating and he gulped. He knew what this is about.
She motioned with her finger for him to come to the front. “You know why I’m here, don’t you Tips?” Helen glared at him. He tried to look away, but found himself engulfed in Jason’s own penetrating glare. He didn’t use it often, but when he did he it was even more frightening than Helen’s. At the moment, he probably even out-glared his father. Tips was in a panic.
Helen grabbed his collar and raised her fist, but before she could do anything Jason slammed his fist into his jaw.
“Jason! I wanted to do that!” Helen protested. Jason ignored her. He punched Tips again and again until he fell to the floor.
“I’ll fucking kill you for what you did to her!” He growled as he kicked him in the ribs. After a minute he picked him up off the floor and let him stumble over in Helen’s direction.
“OK Helen, he’s all yours, I’m done.” He said; he was out of breath.
Helen wasted no time in giving him her own beating, and it was probably more painful than Jason’s.
Finally she left him alone, moaning and bleeding on the floor. “Take him out!” She called.
A group of Preventors ran in, picked him up and carried him out. “Make sure you give him the star treatment.” Helen winked at the Captain.
He stood at attention and saluted, “Ma’am, yes Ma’am!” He hurried out.
“This guy must have been nuts to mess with Lt. Maxwell,” One of the soldiers said as they left.
Helen just laughed. She turned to the teacher and nodded at her, “I’m very sorry to have disturbed your class. And uh…” She looked at the bloodied floors, “I’ll call a janitor to come clean this up.”
The teacher just blinked at her.
“Feel better?” Jason asked as he put his hand around Helen’s waist and led her out.
“Much,” She smiled and leaned against him, glad to have finally made peace with her past. A shrink would probably tell her it wasn’t a healthy way to deal with her problems, but she never listened to shrinks. She liked her way.
Helen yawned and stretched her tired, stiff, jet-lagged limbs, “Let’s go home.”
