I waited and waited and waited for what felt like a long time. But I would check the time on my phone to see only few minutes, seconds even have only passed. That just made me think I'll be here for a while. I kept making Parker talk to keep him awake, but when he stopped I knew that he fell asleep. At first he slept with faint, soft breathing. But then it turned to snores that made my eye twitch.
I just sat there with my eyes closed with an unconscious Parker next to me, thinking about how things were or will become. That was when I thought about that moment when things were what I'd like to call... normal.
"Don't think you can run away from us Nerds," he sneered, tugging my backpack forcefully to make me fall backwards onto the ground.
I scrambled back on my feet and glared at him. "I don't know unless I try," I retorted back before turning on my heel and about to run away again.
But just as I was, a guy just walking right towards me held out his foot into my path and gave it a casual kick as soon as it met mine. I was only able to look at him as he did. My surprised face met his smug smile. I practically flew forward and crashed onto the floor, groaning at my shoulder that took the impact. I heard laughter and high fives behind me, I looked behind me and saw them acknowledging "the tripper" for his good move.
"Where did you get that?"
"Trying to be all slick with that move."
"I wish I did that."
I sat up, massaging my probably bruised shoulder. I was about to pick up my backpack when the very same foot kicked it away.
He kneeled down to look at me face-to-face and smiled. "Where do you think you're going?"
Going up to heaven while you can go to its downstairs apartment, I thought coldly to myself. I learned all too well if I say it out loud, I'll be going there sooner than I wanted to.
"No where," I muttered, looking away.
"You're no one you say?" He mused, jutting up my chin so I could look at him.
I jerked my head away. "I didn't say that."
"But it's true, don't you think?"
"That's in your opinion."
He looked at his friends. "Don't you guys think so too?"
All of them agreed with him instantly.
"That's biased."
He grabbed me by the shirt and pulled me to my feet.
"What're you-"
"C'mon, let's go on a little field trip."
I grasped his arm, trying to get away. But his grip was strong, and I really liked the shirt, so I couldn't help but follow. Just when I had enough of getting dragged, he stop and threw me towards something. I was able to stop myself with my hands, and was left looking at the glass case of the hall that held all of the trophies over the years from past students.
"What do you see?"
"Trophies?"
He rolled his eyes. "No stupid, I meant the reflection on the glass."
I focused my eyes at the reflection on the glass of the dim hallway lights.
"Me," I said finally.
He snorted, shaking his head. "You're only half right."
I looked at him. "What do you mean?"
He grabbed the back of my head and turned it roughly to stare at the glass again.
"Do you know what I see?" He asked me.
I didn't ask him, because I already knew the answer.
Parker smirked. "Nothing."
"Hey guys!" Jordan's voice called out. "I found them!"
"Damn."
"We went to go eat and this is what happens?"
I felt a poke on my cheek.
"Hey, you alive?"
I heard a smack. "Really? That's what you ask?"
"What?" He whined.
I stirred and cracked my eyes open. "Hi."
Jordan smiled sadly. "Hi." I felt his hand slightly touch my eye, making me wince. "Sorry."
"It's alright."
Bennett kneeled down next to me. He lifted his hand to touch my eye, but stopped and set it down. "Are you okay?"
I nodded. "Yeah-" I touched my eye "-just a bruise. I don't know about him though."
I turned my head at Parker who was asleep. Myth my ass, if that idiot doesn't wake up, I'm going to kill him. "Is he okay?" I slowly reached my arm and brushed some hair off his face.
Jordan abruptly lifted his head and turned it to its side, making me have a mini heartattack like he's trying to snap it. "There's a cut here, the blood's dry now. He could've gotten a concussion with the hit."
"I can't believe he fell asleep, what if he-"
"-doesn't wake up?" Jordan asked then snorted. "That's a myth."
I didn't even bother arguing.
Declan started to inspect Parker if anything was broken or hurt.
"His arm," I started.
"It's alright," Declan concluded, unlike Jordan he lifted his arm carefully, feeling his shoulder. "It's the shoulder that's dislocated, snapped from behind. I'm going to need to pop it back in." He looked at me cautiously. "I'll do that later though, not in front of you."
"Anything else broken?" Jordan asked Declan.
"No," Declan snapped. "I would've said something if found out that he broke anything else, and I didn't."
"Sheesh, no need to get all mad."
"No need to get mad?" Declan repeated. "While you were talking our ears off as we went to go grab a bite to eat, this-" he gestured to Parker and I "-happened."
I began to sit up. "Declan..."
"No, don't start, and don't get up either."
"Not want to break anything, like break Declan's mood- Ow! I think something broke."
"I'll break your face next."
Bennett sighed. "Jordan, help me with Parker. Declan, carry Naomi."
"I don't need him to carry me," I told him, beginning to get up.
Declan slightly pushed me back and I landed back on my butt.
"Oh no," he said in a deadpanned voice. "You can't get up, even if you tried."
"Yes I can," I said as I tried to get up again, but he pushed me again, making me fall back to the ground.
"I guess I'm going to have to carry you myself," he finished with the same deadpanned voice.
He was about to lift me up when Jordan stopped him.
"How come he gets to carry Naomi?" Jordan whined.
"Well, Declan's strong-"
"Don't you know it?" Declan said proudly, flexing his muscles and even going as far as to kiss it.
"And Naomi's-"
"I dare you to finish that sentence," I warned him. "I dare you."
Bennett awkwardly cleared his throat. "I mean, Naomi should have someone strong carry her. We'll be able to carry Parker to the car together rather than carry her by ourselves."
"So you're calling me weak?"
"I'm also calling myself weak, but I'm just saying that we're slightly weaker than Declan."
"You didn't answer my question. Are you calling me weak?"
"Yes."
Jordan touched his heart like he's been shot. "I think something else broke."
"Besides your head?" Declan asked.
Bennett knocked on it. "It's always been like that."
"Well, I can carry her," Jordan huffed. "Watch this."
He went up to me, hooked his arm around me and began to lift me up. I thought he was pretty capable of carrying me until his arms and legs started to wobble. Then he accidentally fell backwards, and I landed right on top of him.
"I'm not weak, I swear!" He denied. "It's only because Naomi's-"
"I dare you to finish that sentence, I dare you."
"C'mon, up you go," Declan said, picking me up bridal style.
Declan was only able to take two steps before I jumped out of his arms. He was confused at first, then tried to pick me up again, but I backed away from him.
"I can walk by myself," I told him, but then looked at Parker. "Just please, help him."
-
"Why is there a chandelier?"
I looked up from my magazine and smiled. "That's the first thing I thought too."
Parker cracked a smile and nodded to the magazine I was reading. "What are you reading?"
"The Food Network Magazine," I said with a shrug. "It was on Bennett's nightstand. Just looking at the food is making me hungry."
He laughed as he tried to sit up from bed. But he winced that grasped his arm, sucking in air through his teeth. I set the magazine down and sat next to him to sit him back on the bed.
"Damn, my arm," Parker said.
"Declan popped it back into its socket," I told him. "He said it was going to hurt a lot when you came to."
"And it does," he said as he looked around the room. "Where are we?"
"Bennett's place."
"Bennett?"
It was then I explained what had happened when he was knocked out. But I left out a few details like the app and that we stopped by some drive-thru with a big M on it before we got here. I didn't want to tell him that while he was unconscious we went to eat some burgers. That would ruin the heroicness of the story. But I did I tell him that he stayed over here for the night, and I sat next to the bed waiting for him. His mom was probably used to his late partying on Friday's and would think he was over at a friend's. My parents on the other hand were okay, thinking I went to do some late studying with the guys and ended up staying the night.
"You promised me you were going to stay awake."
"I told you it was just a myth," Parker said, smiling.
"But still..." I trailed off and said nothing.
He massaged his shoulder. "They're vicious, aren't they?" He said, changing the subject.
"They've been worse. I think they were holding back because it was you."
I saw him cringe at that, but I ignored it. His hand went up to his head to see some bandage on his forehead, hiding the scar from that hit he got to the wall. He probably remembered it when he sighed and set his head back down.
"I can see them like zombies, maybe it could be easier that way," Parker began. "They're coming at you, dead and being incapable of having any human emotion and mad that you have brains, so they want to eat it out of you."
I chuckled, shaking my head. "That's stupid."
"No, think about it," he continued. "They're like zombies. Now all you gotta do it blow their heads off."
He motioned his hands like he was holding a rifle, then imitated shooting sounds. Then he switched to a handgun, then mimicked reloading the gun before shooting again.
"Pew, pew," Parker said like a little kid.
It was then I took his hand, pretending to be a gun, then pointed it at his head.
"Bam," I said quietly, jerking the gun as if there was a kick to it when it went off.
Parker was quiet and set his hand back down.
"Will that really solve anything?" I asked him. "Will killing people who bullied me like those stories of school shootouts do anything? To make someone pay, you have to make them guilty of ever doing it. You shouldn't be the one feeling guilty as you sit there in a jail cell." I sighed. "The same thing goes for killing yourself, thinking that ending your life would solve your problems, because there will be no more problems. But that just makes those bullies win, you can't make them win."
"Is that what you tell yourself?"
"Every day."
"But that just made you stronger."
I smiled softly. "Yeah, you can say it like that." I plopped down next to him on the bed, hugging a pillow in front of me.
"It's funny when you think about it," I mused.
He looked at me. "What's funny?"
I shrugged. "I don' know, maybe because how you used to be at the opposite end of the fist. Now you know what it feels like. If only people, my bullies would know how it would feel like to be in my shoes, not suffering being unpopular but suffering being bullying, it might do something. I'm mean, even the slightest hesitation when they hold their arm back to punch me or they open my mouth to say something, it would mean something. " I shook my head. "I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm saying this. I guess I've been thinking about this for a long time and then I remembered about that time you..." I trailed off.
"What?" Parker asked me, turning his head to look at me. "That time I did what?"
I shook my head.
"Naomi, the time I did what?"
I told him that reflection incident, back in sophomore year. Back when I didn't know him and he didn't care about me.
He was quiet for a long time. I didn't know why I said it. I didn't know why I even started this.
"Parker it's alright, that was a long time a-" I paused when I was trying to reach for his hand, but he suddenly pulled it away, looking at me uneasily.
I blinked. What was that just now?
He looked conflicted, like he was thinking over things. Then he shook his head and brought his hand up and to the back of my neck. I was already facing towards him, sitting next to him on the bed. All he had to do was give me a slight pull me forward to kiss him, not that he really had to. I lean next to him further, lying down on the bed as he pulled me closer.
"Please don't make out on my bed."
We snapped away from each other and looked at the door to see Bennett standing there with the others behind him. Then I heard the snap of a camera.
"Turn that off Jordan!" I exclaimed. "And delete that!"
"Alright, alright," Jordan muttered, deleting the picture from his phone.
Well, hopefully.
Bennett cleared his throat. "Your clothes are waiting for you in the bathroom which is down the hall to the left. You can see yourself out when you go through the rest of the hall. Your car is waiting for you downstairs."
Bennett was about to leave when I stopped him.
"Wait, that's it? You're kicking him out? Just like that?"
"I'm not kicking him out," he corrected me calmly. "I've helped him as much as I can, so now he can leave."
"You weren't like this when I was here."
Parker blinked. "You've been here before?"
Bennett ignored him. "That was different."
"And how is that?"
"Simple," he said. "You're our friend and you were hurt."
"But he's my boyfriend and he's hurt."
Parker took my hand. "Naomi, it's alright." He turned to look at Bennett. "Thanks."
He nodded then stepped to the side of the door, making a clear path for Parker. Parker got the idea and began to get up from the bed. I helped him up and he began to walk out of the bedroom. He paused and looked at the guys, each in the eye then gave them a slight nod before leaving. Before I could follow after him, Declan slowly closed the door behind him.
Now it was just the four of us.
"Don't think you can get away that easily," Jordan said. "You owe us an explanation."
"What more do you want?" I asked them. "There were three guys who beat us up: Scott, Jeff and Dyl-"
"We don't care about their names," Declan said. "Oh, actually we do. I gotta write them down for people to kill..."
"And you know what's happening," I said. "My bullying is coming back ever since that website shut down."
"You're not saying that the website held back people's anger," Declan said.
"No, I'm saying it just made them angrier," I replied. "Just look what they did to Parker just for defending me, I can't even imagine what they'll do to you-"
"They won't do anything," Bennett said. "They don't have the guts."
"I thought of that a lot of times just before they really do that. They have guts, a lot of it."
"And Parker knew what was coming for him the moment he asked you out," Jordan said.
"But that doesn't mean we were ready for it," I said before saying quietly, "for any of it."
"But we are," Bennett said. "Judging from what happened to the two of you, I don't think Parker was much help."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "Excuse me?"
"All I'm saying is-"
"You were never there," I told them, rising from the bed. "None of you were ever there, and you never will. You don't know what it feels like to be beat up just because you're different, and you don't know what it feels like to watch that person get beat up because of you. So you-"
"We have!" Declan retorted angrily, then blinked and looked away. "I mean, close to it. That time when we went to the principal's office, you were all alone... We didn't watch you get beat up. Only worse, we imagined what happened to you when we saw you. I don't ever want to see that to you, much less see the after effects."
I let out a forced laugh. "No one wants to feel it either."
Declan grabbed both of my shoulders and looked at me. "Exactly. We don't want that to happen to you ever again. And the only way we can make sure of that is for you to stay with us, not with him."
"You want me to break up with him?" I asked him quietly.
"W-well I didn't say that..."
"But that doesn't mean you implied it," I finished, shrugged his hands off my shoulder and walked around him towards the door. "You can't expect me to do that. I'll never do that."
"The more you push us away, the better of a target you'll be to them," Bennett told me just as I touched the doorknob.
I gripped the knob. "I'll take my chances."
"You're too stubborn for your own good," Bennett said. "You shouldn't keep on depending on yourself. You have to remember that you have us now."
"I know that. And I know that Parker's there too."
With that, I shut the door. But that didn't mean I left it.
"What are we going to do?" Jordan asked them. "We can just sit back and watch, though it'll be something when she comes to us for help or better yet, we go rescue her again."
"Jordan..."
"I know, I know, but still."
"I don't know why she's being like this," Bennett muttered. "If she doesn't want Parker to get hurt along with her, she should just break up with him."
"You can't blame her," Declan said. "She really likes the guy."
"And you can't forget the fact you just asked her to break up with him," Jordan pointed out. "You know that just screams jealousy, right?"
"As if you aren't feeling the same thing," Bennett said.
I heard the sound of someone jumping on Bennett's bed.
"Ooh, comfy."
That person was Jordan.
"Get off my bed."
"You didn't tell that to Park- Well, you kinda did, but you didn't to Naomi."
"Well, that was different."
"Oof!" Jordan exclaimed, probably been hit by Bennett with a pillow.
"I'll hit you again," Declan threatened.
Nevermind, that's actually Declan.
"Come at me then, slumber party chick style."
There was another "oof" and then a thud on the ground.
"Knock out!" Declan exclaimed dramatically.
I couldn't help but chuckle at that.
"Y'know, sometimes I wonder," Jordan said. "Sometimes I wonder how we can put up with Naomi."
I twitched my eye, I think the same thing about Jordan.
"I mean, not in a bad way or anything," he said quickly. "It's just... she can be a bit stubborn and blind-" he chuckled to himself at that word "-she can't see that we're trying to help her, after all of these things we did for her."
The others were quiet, I was quiet.
"I miss hanging out with her," he muttered. "But now all she spends her time with is Parker, Parker, Parker. We were there for her first, not him."
I know that, I wanted to tell him. I just... I don't know. Neither of them likes each other. The guys don't trust him, and he doesn't trust the guys. And if all of us were to hang out, it would be awkward, the atmosphere would be tense. So I tried to always keep them apart, but I guess I spend more time with Parker than them. I closed my eyes and rested my head against the door. I wish I didn't do that, I wish I can just start all over from the top and do something other than this. From the moment I was first bullied, yeah, that would be something.
"It's patience."
I blinked.
"What?" Jordan asked.
"It's patience," Bennett said again. "That's how we put up with her after all of this time, with patience."
Jordan snorted. "Patience. That's it?"
"It takes patience, a lot of it, for someone like Naomi to trust you."
"But shouldn't she trust us by now?" Declan asked.
"It's not her trusting us," Bennett said slowly. "It's her trusting herself."
"I don't get it," Jordan said.
"You stop trusting yourself when you lost faith in yourself," Bennett explained. "Whether you regret things you did or choices you made, when you give up on yourself because you think you're not enough. Naomi's been bullied for years. It not only took a physical toll to her, but an emotional one too. You see her taking all those hits and brushing them off even, lying about the bruises to her parents just to hide the real truth of them. But do we really know where the verbal bruises go? What happens to them? It'll look like she's brushing them off, but that's just an act. After all of these years of people saying the same things over and over again, you either don't believe them or you do, and you accept the fact, and think they're right."
"But this is Naomi we're talking about," Jordan said. "She wouldn't believe in something so stupid."
"She didn't believe she'll ever be bullied until she did. Maybe she'll think she doesn't believe them, but really she does. And every time she does something, she'll think that she's not good enough, her self esteem getting smaller and smaller."
"So what? She doesn't think she's good enough for us?"
"Maybe," Bennett said. "But she'll always deny it. Everyone does when someone tells them something they don't want to believe. We of all people know that."
They didn't say anything at that.
"We just need to wait like we always have, to be patient for her. And in the end, we'll have our good girl."
I backed up away from the door.
He's wrong, I told myself. He's wrong about all of it. I don't believe all of the stupid things people called me. Who can? Who can believe things told to me again and again, and again after all of these years. I would just ignore them, not ever believe them. And no, I'm not denying it. Who can believe that I'm stupid?
Ugly?
Fat?
Worthless?
Useless?
No body?
Nothing?
Don't believe in anything people call you. You of all people know who you are. Not them, not ever.
I don't know why I added that last part, it wasn't supposed to be there. I guess I just wanted to find and explain the reason why Naomi is so... stubborn, too independent, selfish even. We all are, I guess, we don't want to admit, but we're human, and we're not perfect. People have trust issues, Naomi of all people have it. After having the whole world against her and no one by her side, she lost her trust in everything. But by now, she should trust the guys by now. So what's the problem? She just doesn't trust herself. It took me a while to figure this out, and I had to read a couple of online articles about it to really understand it. Do we trust ourselves? With a secret? With not giving in for the last cookie in the cookie jar? What about something deeper? Do we trust ourselves for making a decision, to make choices which then causes us not believe in ourselves and lose more self esteem that we already have?
This is just something to think about. That's all. Well then, there's a meme and video to "Breathe" by He Is We, I think the song is fitting. He Is We is a great band, I love to listen to her songs when I'm feeling down and want to stare dramatically out of the window. Ha ha ha, there's the old funny me, don't want a depressed Rubix for too long right? Again thanks for the read, hope you enjoyed or... something.
RubixCube89201
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