January 31, 2000

I guess the whole fight thing is an extremely big deal. Chris Walker is being charged with assault and battery with a deadly weapon - the steel-toed boots he was wearing. A police officer called my house today and I had to go down to the station. They took more photographs of my eye, which is still fairly swollen, and had me tell them exactly what happened. They said I was a victim, like James, and that I should file a complaint or something against Chris, to add to the charges against him.

My parents really want me to do that, but I don't really want to get more involved than I already am. I am willing to serve as a witness to what happened to James, but I don't want to make a big thing out of how Chris hit me. I told my mom to tell the officer that, because he told us to talk about what we wanted to do, and she said she'd think about it.

Today in school was very retarded. [I just have to apologize, many years too late, for carelessly tossing around the word "retarded" as much as I did. It's embarrassing.] At the beginning of the day, everyone was like, "Oh, Emily, your eye!" But then, people started to spread rumors, like they always do. There were so many going around: "Emily's father did that to her, and she's just saying it was Chris to cover it up." And, "Emily did that to herself. She cuts her wrists, why not punch herself in the eye?" [I'm imagining punching myself in the eye - okay, I just tried it - and it's comically ineffectual.] And, "She's wearing a lot of make up to make it look like she has a black eye."

I was very upset that people who I considered to be so-so friends, like Erin, were saying these things. Why can't people just accept things the way they are? Why do they always have to look for holes in everything, and if they don't find any, just make their own?