Chapter – 2 { PART 2}

I walked in the crowded halls avoiding eye contact. Avoiding eye contact and keeping my presence to the bare minimum was how I got through till lunch.

But at lunch something dreadful happened, someone dreadful happened, Matt. Matt has been my bully since middle school, beating me up, shoving me in lockers etc. I have been through all of that. It’s tiring and it’s shitty.

Today, he was particularly in a bad mood, not that he wasn’t in one always. He brushed past me and said to me, “Hall 3, five minutes.”

Shivers ran down my spine but I walked to the hall. My legs were getting shakier with each step that was taken and I could only pray to God to save me.

I had this bad feeling in my gut which was just increasing.

After what felt like a lifetime, I finally reached, the deserted Hall three, and there was Matt waiting for me. He slowly walked towards me and said to me, “I heard, you’re gay.”

The whole English language didn’t have words to do justice to the panic, I felt. I wanted to cry, deny his accusations, run away, die, all at the same time but before I could do any one of these, his fist connected with my jaw and I crashed into the locker. I fell to the ground but his blows didn’t stop. I heard words like disgusting, filthy, faggot and even though I was on the verge of losing consciousness, I repeated the same sentence over and over. ‘I am not gay.’

And in the last moments of my consciousness when I heard someone yelling and saving me from his blows, I said it again till I was finally incapable.

I regained consciousness in a soft, warm bed with someone’s presence beside me. I fluttered my eyelids open to see Hayden nursing my wounds. As he noticed me wake up, he helped me up and brought a glass of water to my lips.

After a few moment of silence, he said to me, “If you were getting bullied, you should have said something to your dad or my mom.”

I remained quiet after that. I finally had my once abusive dad’s love and I didn’t want anything in the world to spoil that, I had been alone for far longer than I could stand.

Hayden brought me something to eat and after a while he was convinced that I was okay so, he started showering me with questions.

“How long?”

“Middle school but it wasn’t anything major, today was unprecedented.”

“I am talking to your dad about this.”

When I heard those words, everything that could go wrong went flashing in my head and I clutched Hayden’s arm and begged him, “Please, don’t.” I had tears forming in my eyes and Hayden panicked. He stroked my back and promised he wouldn’t tell my dad about this.

“One more thing.”

“Yea?”

“Why did Matt call you gay? Are you?”

I was dead silent at this question but I managed to give a shaky laugh and said, “No, of course, I am not! Matt was being crazy.”

Hayden’s eyes that had been cold to me, all these months softened and he brushed his fingers through my hair.

“Okay. Matt won’t bother you anymore but if anyone else does, I want you to call me, no matter what, no matter where.”

I nodded and Hayden inched closer to me, his hand still in my hair. He kissed my forehead gently and said, “If you need anything, tell me. I’ll come, check on you, again in a while.”

And he did. He brought food up for me, checked my wounds almost every hour. It wasn’t anything major just bruises which would take a while to heal, and my opinion of Hayden which left me restless the whole night.