when he saw her face, he felt his insides freeze and his heart break. he parted his mouth in confusion and saw the pain and desperation in her eyes.
it was covered with red and purple bruises, a fresh cut on the side of her face and her lip busted as her eyes looked as if they held fear and horror.
the more ricky looked at her and saw what someone did to her, what he did to her, the hurt and disbelief grew into anger and rage.
he clenched his jaw and and fists, already knowing who did this to her and shook his head as he scoffed, turning on his heel and storming off to the cafeteria.
"r-ricky wait!" nini exclaims shakily, rushing after him as she puts her hood back on, whispers erupting around them as she continued to followed ricky.
he ignored her calls and pleads to stop, every fiber in his body boiling with adrenaline as he arrived into the cafeteria, his eyes scanning the crowded space before landing on the boy who was seated at an empty table eating his food.
"r-ricky-"
but he still didn't listen and headed towards noah's table, tapping on his shoulder impatiently.
noah turned back to face ricky, raising his eyebrows "can i help-"
he gets cut off by the contact ricky's fist at the side of his face, causing for him to stumble out of his seat and onto the floor, everyone gasping and turning to face the two boys
before noah could do anything though, ricky threw another punch, again and again as people started crowding them
"ricky stop it!" nini exclaims "ricky!"
the boy didn't listen as he kept punching noah non-stop as nini felt her anxiety grow, aria, jacob and the others running towards them
"what the hell-"
"ricky stop!" nini yells pleadingly
ricky looks back at her and hesitates before noah punches him back in the face and he falls to the floor, the both of them fighting before big red and jacob ran towards them, trying to break them up.
after a few minutes, jacob and big red pulled ricky up off the floor and held him back as ricky fought to run back to noah to fight him more, anger and hatred burning through his veins
"you did this to her!" ricky shouts, everyone widening their eyes as nini looked down, the rest of their friend group glancing towards her in confusion
noah smirks through his bruised eye "did what?"
ricky fights to go over to him but big red and jacob keep him in place
"dude, not here-"
"i don't care!" ricky exclaimed as noah was also being held back
"gentlemen,"
everyone in the cafeteria moves their attention to see mr mazzara heading towards them with a raised eyebrow
"is there something the matter?" he asks
ricky forcefully shakes jacob and big red off of him and clenches his jaw as mr mazzara looks between him and noah
"do we need to visit the principle once again mr bowen?" he asks
ricky bites his teeth together as he inhaled sharply "no sir."
mr mazzara nods before turning around to see the crowd of people "get back to your lunch."
the students all scramble back to their tables, mr mazzara giving one more look towards ricky and noah before making his way away from them
ricky watched as noah walked towards nini but he steps in front of the girl, clenching his fists to control himself
"you so much as look at her and i'll give you another bruised eye to balance it out." ricky snaps
noah smirked as he looked at nini for a few seconds before back at the boy "we'll see if you'll even want to look at her when you find out the truth about her,"
"okay, you better watch your mouth." jacob interrupted as maya put an arm on his shoulder to stop him from going closer to the boy
noah grinned evilly as he looked at nini once more "remember what i said."
the group all watched as he walked away from them and out of the cafeteria, leaving them all to look at nini
the girl felt her eyes sting as she kept her eyes on the ground before lifting them to see ricky shake his head as he scoffed and walked off
she felt a tear fall down her face as she used up all her courage and rushed towards him, following him into an empty hallway
"r-ricky-"
"this is why you were distant?" he questions, his eyes glossy as he turns back to face her
nini feels her eyes sting again and looks away from him as she hugs her hoodie closer to her.
"for two weeks. two freaking weeks, he's been doing this to you!" he exclaims in the empty hallway, gesturing to her face
nini felt another tear roll down her cheek "y-you don't understand-"
he shakes his head "no i don't. i don't understand why you didn't tell me!"
"maybe because i am terrified of losing you!" she shouts, ricky's face softening at the sight of her as she kept talking "h-he knows things that you'd hate me for-"
"i could never hate you nini." he tells her
nini shakes her head as she feels tears fall down from her eyes "you don't get it!"
"then help me get it!" he pleads
"i-i can't!" she cries
he sighs in frustration "why not?!"
"because i've dealt with a lot of things my entire life; but the worst thing i'm going to deal with when you find out or when i tell you is you looking at me with no love in your eyes." she tells him.
before ricky could say anything, he saw people arriving into the hallway with a few teachers and took a hold of her hand, leading her backstage of the auditorium.
YOU ARE READING
Lean on Me Forever || rini au
Fanfiction*spoilers in description! please read the first two books before reading this one!!!* "𝙩𝙖𝙡𝙠 𝙩𝙤 𝙢𝙚." "𝙞 𝙘𝙖𝙣'𝙩!" ricky and nini have had their ups and downs this past year and a half, but as they finally think they have their happy endin...
