"One moment please, Alice," my troll of a first period teacher calls over the discordant buzz of my fellow students rushing from his classroom. I hesitate near the door and glance back at him, slightly suspicious. The moment that my stomach rounded out enough to make my pregnancy obvious, he had started to refuse to make eye-contact with me. I find it annoying, and slightly disheartening. The teachers have become almost as bad as the students.The troll sits behind his desk, staring adamantly at several stacks of paper splayed out in front of him. He waves me over without looking up.

The classroom is clear within seconds. I walk over and stop in front of his desk, hugging my backpack to my chest. He doesn't look up and meet my gaze, instead choosing to skim over the paper in his hands. "You've missed a lot of school, Alice," he states, as if I wasn't aware already. My grip on my backpack tightens as he continues. "While I understand the necessity given your situation, it still does not mean that you will receive special treatment in my class. The material taught in my lectures cannot be learned entirely through your textbook."

I grimace.

"You will need to make at least an eighty on your final to pass this class," the troll states. He holds out the paper and I take it. My grimace deepens; it's another quiz of mine, with a bright red fifty-three in the corner.

"Thank you for letting me know," I say and shove the paper into my backpack.

This time, the troll glances up. His beady eyes zero in on my face, a mixture of disgust and disappointment evident in his features. I steel myself. I've seen the look a dozen times before, from adults and teenagers alike, and I knew what was coming next.

"You've made a big mistake," he says quietly. "You know that right? You had your whole life ahead of you. You just threw it away because you couldn't control yourself."

"That's the thing though," I say, "I'm not dead. My life isn't going to stop just because I'm going to have a child. No, I'm not going to have those wild, crazy college days and go out partying and getting drunk like everyone else. I'll have bigger responsibilities at home. But shouldn't that make you happy? You'll have one less drunk teenager throwing up on your lawn."

The troll looks mildly stunned, as most do when I erupt into my little practiced spiel. I hold my head high. "Instead, I'll be going to college and working to provide for my kid, just like an actual adult with kids should do."

I shrug my backpack onto my shoulders and walk out of the room then, not bothering to listen to his retort. I don't need to. I knew what his problem was; it was the same as everybody else's. It isn't normal, or accepted for someone my age to have a child. But what he didn't know were my circumstances. For all he knew, my little peanut could have been the product of a violent rape. I mean, who was he to judge?

As I walk down the hall, a strange noise sounds from behind me. I pause and look around. The hallway is fairly empty, with only a few late stragglers bustling to and fro. The noise sounds again; it sounds like a screaming baby and seems to be coming from a nearby locker. I hesitate. This could be another prank...

The screaming grows louder. I suck in my gut and rush toward the locker, unhooking the conveniently unlocked lock. I open the door and then immediately grimace. Inside is a deformed plastic baby doll, with red paint streaming down its cheeks like tears. A sign is placed next to it, reading, "You should have aborted me, Mommy!" And next to that is a cellphone opened to a video on YouTube, called, "Baby Crying: Extended".

I slam the locker shut. The image refuses to leave my mind, however. The late bell chimes loudly around my head. I rub at my eyes and rush toward my next class.

By the time lunch period approaches, I've almost forgotten about the crude doll. When the bell rings, I rush to my locker and snatch up my new-found lunchbox. In my last visit, my doctor had decided that I needed rounder diet, and instructed my mother on the best foods for me to eat. Now she makes my lunch.

But I can still leave campus to eat with Amanda and Kylie, should they ever decide that they're sick of school food.

I notice that my lunchbox is a bit heavier than normal, but I don't think much of it. I meet Amanda and Kylie outside the cafeteria. Together, we walk inside and get a table. Each take a turn waiting in line for food, careful not to leave me alone.

I set my lunchbox down on the table with a heavy clunk. My eyebrows furrow and Kylie stares at it, her eyes wide. "What did your mother pack today?" she asks.

"I don't know," I say with a sigh. "She loves surprising me."

I pull the top open. My insides drop through the floor. A heavy sense of dread replaces them as I stare at the multitude of small circular jars that sit inside my lunchbox. I pull one out. It's a mushed up mixture of strawberry-banana flavored baby food.

I gingerly set it back down inside my lunchbox. Kylie looks as pale and sickly as I feel. "Oh my gosh," she whispers. "Oh my gosh, Alice. That's horrible."

Kylie reaches out and snatches the lunchbox away. She whips it around and glares at the insides, hiding the jars from my vision behind the lid. Then she slams it shut and sets the lunchbox down onto the bench beside her. "That's just plain messed up," she snaps.

"How creative," I say, as sardonically as I can muster. "Exchanging my lunch for baby food." I stand and glance around the cafeteria. No one really stands out as the perpetrator, but then again, I already know who it is, and she never eats cafeteria food. I glance at Kylie again. "I'm going to the bathroom."

"I'll come with you," she says quickly and goes to stand.

I shake my head. "Don't worry about it. I'll be fine. What are they going to do? Physically attack me?"

Kylie grimaces.

I make my way toward the cafeteria bathrooms, which are located just outside the building. As soon as I step inside the white tiled room, the tears hit, hard. I lock myself into a stall and press my hands against my mouth, trying to stifle the sobs. My whole chest hurts, and my throat burns.

I haven't cried this hard since Jake died.

The defaced doll pops back up into my mind, and I cry a little harder. Don't these people have anything better to do with their lives? Aren't I already going through enough?

It's bad enough with the rapid weight gain, bodily insecurities, weird cravings, having to pee all the time, and you know, having the baby beat up your insides like punching bags. I didn't ask for this. I'm not that slut you see at the usual parties, gang-banging a bunch of guys, whose birth control slipped up.

I rub hard at my eyes and struggle to compose myself. I should have taken the principal up on his original offer to be home-schooled. It would have been so much easier.

I eventually calm down. The moment the distressed heartbreak and humiliation fades from my system, a hard resolution burns through. "That's it," I whisper to myself as I wipe at my eyes and exit the stall. "I have to drop out. This is too much."

I shake my head to myself and walk toward the sinks. My reflection in the mirror looks hellish. I run some water over my hands and wash my face. "It will look bad when I go to apply for major universities," I argue with myself. "But at least this will end. I can still get past that."

"Oh but then we'd miss you at senior prom!" A familiar voice sounds from behind me, painfully familiar. I grimace and turn around. Miley smirks at me, flanked by her cronies. "And graduation. I had so much more planned."

"You're a bitch, you know that?" I say.

She steps up next to me and examines herself in the mirror beside mine. "At least I'm a good friend," she says as she fluffs her hair. "And I'm not pregnant. Like seriously, you look like a constipated penguin, wobbling around like that."

I swallow hard. "It's not like I can help it. At least I don't look like I have a stick up my ass."

Miley snickers.

"Leave her alone!" Another familiar voice growls. Amanda knocks through the small group of girls surrounding the door and stomps toward me. She grabs my arm and wrenches me backward, putting herself between Miley and I.

Miley looks at her, amused. Her gaze flickers toward me. "I am curious... Do you two plan to raise the kid as a lesbian couple?" Her head cocks to the side and she presses a finger to her chin. "Amanda will obviously have to be the dad. She's too stocky and ogre like to be the mother."

I clench my hands into tight fists, wishing desperately that I had some sort of force field protecting my stomach. Then I could beat the snot out of Miley without worry that she'd harm my peanut.

Amanda balls her hands into fists as well, and steps forward, looking murderous. Kylie enters the bathroom then, with Ms. Henry. The older woman takes one look at the situation and then snaps. "Alright, break it up before I send all of you to the principal's office with referrals," Ms. Henry orders sternly, and glares at Miley.

Miley and her cronies exit the bathroom looking irritated. Amanda whirls around and punches the wall beside her. Ms. Henry, Kylie, and I jump with surprise.

"Sorry," Amanda says, as she shakes her hand. "That chick just makes me want to punch her sometimes."

I sigh and step forward, throwing my arms around Amanda's neck. "Thank you for sticking up for me. You're amazing," I say as I hug her tight. Amanda hugs me back, just as tight.

"Don't worry," I say as we separate. I smile a little at Ms. Henry, Kylie, and Amanda. "This ends now. I've decided to drop out of school."

The silence that fills the bathroom is palpable. Amanda stares at me, wearing the expression that one would expect had they just sprouted an antenna. Kylie immediately starts to shake her head with disapproval, and Ms. Henry frowns.

"Alice," Ms. Henry starts.

Kylie steps forward and folds her arms across her chest. "It won't stop just because you don't come to school, Alice."

"Don't give them another reason to think that you're a failure," Amanda adds.

Ms. Henry nods slightly. "If you drop out now, you'll only further cement yourself as part of the statistic. Graduating like a normal teen, as a teen mother, will naturally be hard. But it's not impossible."

I fold my arms across my chest. I stare at the floor. While I would love to walk across the stage like any normal girl (and beat the statistic), it really was impossible for me. There were only a few months left of school. "I'm failing most of my classes though," I admit.

"We can help you," Kylie says. She, Ms. Henry, and Amanda share a look. The trio nod and Ms. Henry steps forward with a warm, motherly smile. "Just figure out what kind of grades you'll need in order to pass, and then we'll help you get them. You can do this, Alice. You've made it this far already."

I grimace. Then I suck in a sharp breath and nod. They were right; all I needed to do was focus on my grades. Blocking the bullies out would be difficult, but it could be done.

"You also need to come to senior prom," Amanda says, out of the blue.

My grimace deepens. "You're joking right?"