Whatever it takes

4. The Hallway

August 3, 9:37 pm
George POV.

"Hey George," my mother called, "Can you take the trash out?" I sighed and put down my phone and carefully made my way out of my room that still had unopened boxes that I needed to unpack. "Yeah Mum I'll do it." I replied as I walked down the short hallway and into the kitchen.

"Thank you George." She said kissing my head before handing me the bag. I scrunched my face up and she just laughed at me. I took the bag and walked out to the trash shoot in the hallway. There was another boy standing there, he looked about my age and familiar.

As I got closer I was more interested in trying to figure out where I had seen this boy from instead of doing what I was sent here to do. I opened the shoot and put the bag in, but stood there looking at the boy, still curious.

"Like what ya see?" He asked, cocking his head. The boy wore an LAFD beanie on his head along with an oversized navy blue hoodie. I kept quiet, trying to not disturb him further.

"Sorry." I said before attempting to walk away. "Wait." Beanie boy called. "You're George aren't you? The new kid who tried out for the soccer team? Right?" "It's football actually." I corrected. "Football is a while other sport dummie. Anyways where you from in the UK if you don't mind me asking?" He asked. "Oh and I'm Quackity by the way." He held out his hand for me to shake, and I did.

"I'm from London, moved her about two, three weeks ago." I replied, awkwardly nodding my head. "That's cool. Hey, my friend Dream, his dads the coach and if you want I can ask him, Dream not his dad; if you made the team or not." He said, bringing his phone out of his pocket.

"No, you don't have to do that for me, it's fine. I don't really care about that really it's fine," I tried to say before I was cut off. "And sent! Dream never sleeps so we should have a reply soon." Quackity said cheerily. A ping rang from his phone, He looked down at it and smiled.

"See you at practice on Monday Gogy." He said Smiling and waving at me before walking back into his apartment. "Oh and if you need anything, like a tour of town I'd love to give it to you, if you want though." He offered, his head handing out of the doorway.

"I'll think about it." I replied, "good." He smiled and shut his door, the sound of the lock clicking into place was the final noise made in the hallway.

I shrugged and walked back into my new home where my mom was sitting at the the table. "What were you doing out there that made so much time go by, I thought you got kidnapped." She said, walking over to me and pulling me into a hug. I hugged her back and told her, "some kid from tryouts lives next door and we chatted for a bit. He offered to give me a tour of the town and even messaged his friend, who's dad is the coach apparently, to see if I made the team or not."

I let go of the hug, looking my mom in the eyes who just smiled. "I guess you might've made a friend." She said, cupping my face with her hands. "Not every nice person you meet is your new friend, Mum, I learned this the hard way, remember?" I asked.

She just sighed, "Maybe this time is different. Okay. Don't give up hope, you'll make friends eventually." She said as she pat my cheek and walked back into the kitchen, getting herself a glass of water. "In the meantime get ready for bed. I don't care what time you go to sleep, just make sure the light is out my eleven, okay?" She missed my forehead before walking off to her own bedroom.

She tried her best, she really did. The whole reason we had to move wasn't just because my mom got a job here, well primarily I guess. But another factor into the move was the fact that I was outed by my best friend to the entire school. It wasn't as bad as you might think it would be until you know that I went to an all boys school.

The whole reason I got outed anyways was because I accidentally kissed my best friend who was just giving me mixed signals for months. So one night he was staying over at my house helping me study for a test, he says something about kissing someone close you him and then boom, I kissed him.

He immediately shoved me off and called me disgusting and a slur before grabbing his coat and matching out of the room. It took a few days, but eventually the whole school knew. And the worst part of it all, well to me at least, wasn't the fact that I was being called slurs about once or twice a day. It was the fact that people thought it was acceptable to come up to me and ask me horrid questions about my love life, as if I even had one.

That went on for months before my former best friend sent me multiple text messages to 'go kill you self" and repeatedly called me the F slur. I ended up crying myself to sleep that night and by the morning my mom had taken my phone and read the messages. She then apparently emailed the principal about the situation, and texted his mother about it.

Nothing happened to him, he wasn't even punished. No expulsion, no suspension, no detention, no nothing. He just got a warning to never do it again whilst I was told I should see a therapist for the way I felt. My mom took me out fo the school for the rest of the year and let me finish the year online. Granted I only had about six weeks left at the time.

I pushed away the thought and memory of that even happening and decided I wanted to go to the park that was near the elementary school.

I walked to my mothers room and told her my plan, to which she responded, "go ahead, just keep your phone ugh you at all times and call me if you need me to pick you up if you get scared. And I don't care if I'm asleep when you get home, wake me up so I know your safe. Got it?" I just nodded before grabbing a spare set of keys before walking out of the apartment, out fo the complex and onto the pavement to the park.
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Word count: 1150