Chapter Text
It's her favorite time of day. When she can forget about the judgemental stares, even though she deserves them, and can just be herself. The time of day where she can stand on her cliff edge that leads to the calm waters she grew up learning how to swim in. Whenever things get to be too much coming here and diving into the water below her always seems to relax her. Her therapist says swimming helps her relax so who is she to go against doctor's orders.
She remembers the first time she was up this high. It was the lowest point her life, and she couldn't forget if she tried. She was on the roof of the school right after the picture surfaced and just after she knocked Ty's tooth out. She ran all the way to the roof and just sat on the edge just to get away from it all. She just needed a quiet place to think, but she couldn't find it anywhere. She looked over the edge for a little bit too long before she stood ready to jump. She had always loved being high in the air, her love of gymnastics and cheerleading enabling her in that love, that feeling of weightlessness in the drop is betterment than any drug.
She's always been impulsive, sending the picture was an impulsive decision, but the decision to jump off the roof of the school to end her life? Yeah that was a new low for her. If it wasn't for some girl that was on the roof too that told her to stop Kim would be dead by now. She didn't know the girl, and she didn't even say anything special. There was just something about how she said the words that made Kim feel like she wasn't alone. Like she went through the same thing Kim did.
After that day she never saw that girl again around school, and she looked all over for her. Then again the girl was spending her lunch period on the roof instead of in the cafeteria or library. Maybe she just didn't want to be found and that is something Kim can relate to. Which brings her back to the present on the cliff. When things always got to be too much for her she ended up here. When she did something for herself that inevitably made her parents upset, she ended up here. When she couldn't find anyone to be her friend, like her therapist asked her to do, she came here. When it felt like she was living someone else's life, Kim stood on this cliff that had a great view of the lake and shut the rest of the world off.
This was her place. It was far enough from the trail that if you found it you likely were lost and looking for something else. She first came out here when she was ten and hiking with her father. When you're the only Indian kid in your small town you get picked on a lot, so her father brought her up here as a way to bond and talk to her. It was here that she decided to take self defense classes to ward off bullies at ten and join gymnastics at eleven. She found the cliff when she was twelve. After promising her mother that she wasn't going to go far from the house by herself that is exactly what she did. On the way back she had got lost and ended up following the sound of water. Knowing the lake was close to her house she followed the sound not paying attention, and almost fell in from the very cliff Kim stands on now.
If it wasn't past her curfew she would have stayed out on her cliff the whole night until the sun rose. Later when she was older, and learned the art of sneaking out she did stay out on the cliff until sunrise. Not only was it beautiful it watch the sun rise, but it was the first time she felt like herself since she was twelve. Kim ends up here more than she's at home most of the time. She always told her parents that's she's going for a jog, but now they don't care where she is as long as she's out of the house. There used to be a time where she wouldn't leave her room if it wasn't for school, and that is how she got the therapist and an Antidepressants prescription. She would shut the world off, pull her covers over her head, and sit in complete silence. In the dark. Once her parents figured out that that wasn't just Kimberly being a teenage girl they took her to a therapist to see what was wrong.
After that she realized she wasn't as alone as she thought and started opening up to her parents more, which led to her coming out as a bisexual. Kimberly was always sure of herself and her sexuality it was never a question. Why would she deny herself of being with someone attractive just because they were another girl? That's like saying she'll only date another Indian person. In such a small town where all of the Indian population is probably her family and one other, she would never date until she left for college. That doesn't mean dating for her was easy by any means, it was just easier to keep your options open. She has had to deal with multiple racist elder relatives of the people she dated. Luckily they didn't last long in her life to leave a lasting impression on her life to actually her feelings.
As Kim takes a deep breath and jumps in the water, she comes up for air as a new woman. She feels like she's being baptized all over again. As she lazily floats on her back, she gazes up at the full moon and smiles a true smile that reaches her eyes. Tomorrow is just another Saturday where she'll go to detention for three hours and ignore Jason Scott's attempts to talk to her. The routine may make her want to beat herself over the head with a rock, but no matter what happens at the end of the day she'll always have her lake and her Cliff.