Lean on Me Forever || rini au

18. torturous gaze

tw: abuse

ricky got out of his car, making his way into the school to see nini further away at her locker, her hood over her head and her hands slightly trembling as it held the opened locker door.

his heart sank as he saw how thin she was and wanted to see her, but he didn't want her to run off because he knew that's what she was going to do if she went up to talk to her.

he saw how the new boy came towards her and spoke to her, nini nodding before she closed her locker and turned around to walk off with him, not noticing ricky at the entrance of the school as she disappeared around the corner.

ricky sighs as he makes his way towards his locker, seeing his friends waiting for him as they all spoke to each other.

"no, red you can't just up and talk to her-"

"but you have to be direct!" the red-head tells aria, everyone sighing before seeing ricky arrive

"hey ricky," ashlyn says with a small frown

"didn't even take you guys five minutes," ricky said to gina and red, who just smiled awkwardly

"you okay?" kourtney asks

ricky shakes his head "i don't care about me, i care about her. and she's not okay i can tell."

"us too, she keeps running off whenever we try to talk to her," aria frowns

"yeah she locks her door and doesn't come out all day." jacob says

"she even quit her shifts." ashlyn adds

"what the hell is going on with her?" carlos questions

"it's that dude, it has to be." ricky said determined

everyone looked behind them to see nini going into a classroom alone, all of them exchanging looks before taking deep breaths and parting ways to class.

*

nini felt her nerves rise as she walked out of school at the end of the day.

all day, she's been thinking about having to see jake again. she didn't know why he was helping noah. she wasn't surprised after what he did in the past though, which is what scared her the most.

as she made her way out of school, she saw ricky on his phone, leaning back against his car.

her heart ached at the sight of him. she wanted so badly to run towards him and hug him so that he wouldn't let her go and protect her, but she knew he wasn't a match for noah. noah would hurt him in any way just to hurt her, and she wasn't going to let him get hurt.

when ricky looked up from his phone, her eyes met his and she felt her fear increase, quickly looking away and pulling her hood further over her face.

she quickly walked away, down the sidewalk as noah followed her a few seconds later and they made their way into an alleyway.

"what was that?" noah questioned

nini shook her head "n-nothing."

she felt noah grab ahold of her wrist, making her wince at the feeling of someone touching her

"don't lie to me." he threatened

"i-i'm not-"

before she could say anything, she felt him roughly let go of her wrist, shoving her to the floor as she gasped in pain at the contact of the concrete floor grazing the side of her face, her hood falling off her face.

"get up." noah demanded

nini whimpered as she felt a burning pain surge through her, staying on the floor before noah grabbed ahold of her hair and pulled her back up, nini feeling her eyes sting but trying to not make a sound.

before noah could do anything else, he looked up and let go, a smirk on his face at the sight of the tall, brown-haired boy coming towards them.

nini fell to the ground weakly, coughing before looking up, her eyes meeting jake's after years.