Meet me halfway

12. Get out of my way

TRIGGER WARNING: Violence

It wasn't until the last break that Reyna and Jason finally gave in and let me walk to the next class alone since they were both worried about me running into Octavian (YUCK) on my way. Turns out they weren't worried for nothing. 

I was walking through an almost empty corridor when I noticed him leaning against a locker. As soon as he saw me, he straightened up and walked over to me, stopping before me and blocking my path.

"I need to get somewhere, so would you get out of my way?" I said as calmly as I could, but he ignored me.

"You haven't used the number I gave you." he said and I couldn't help but let out a mix of a scoff and a laugh.

"And?" 

"I thought we said you'd contact me to catch up."

"Why would I? Maybe the legal threat wasn't clear enough for you, but I don't want anything to do with you. I especially don't want to catch up." I snap, which seems to make something inside of him snap. He quickly and harshly pushed me up against the locker, some lock poking me painfully in the back while my eyes widened in chock and fear. 

Suddenly, I was right back to eighteen months ago, a little kid in a situation he had never expected and didn't know how to handle. What he said next snapped me out of the flashbacks.

"Why are you being such a bitch? You should be thankful." he spat out and I chuckled humorlessly.

"Thankful? Why would I be thankful." I asked and Octavian presses me slightly harder, surely going to cause bruises from the lock.

"If it weren't for me you'd be nothing. Before we met, you were nothing. No one knew who you were. You were just little traumatized, Nico Di Angelo. Thanks to me, you changed. Instead of that weak little shit, you are now the most popular guy in school. Do you really think your sunshine boyfriend would've even noticed you if you hadn't met me? I made you, Nico." he snarled and just the mention of Will made me seethe with anger.

"Get. Out. Of. My. Way." I said through clenched teeth, making him chuckle.

"What are you going to do, call for little RARA to beat me up for you?" he asked in a mocking tone, and a small smirk formed on my lips.

"You were right about one thing Octavian, I've changed." I said. "Now I can beat you up myself." I continued, before punching him in the face with a loud crack following. He stumbled to the ground with a broken jaw (more likely to happen accidentally than on purpose) and I froze, chocked.

"What are you doing?!" A voice called and I turned, only to see a teacher looking scandalized, eyes flicking between me and Octavian (*spits*). And I have to admit, it didn't look very good on my part. "You, go to the principal's office right now, I'll join you soon." the teacher continued, looking rather cross with me and I made a salute, before walking to my assigned location while he helped Octavian up from the ground and probably to the nurse's office.

It took the teacher five minutes before he could join me, another five minutes to speak to the principal and ten minutes for my dad to get here. Once he did, I got seated outside the office while he talked to both the teacher and the principal.

Their conversation lasted for fifteen minutes and dad didn't look too pleased when he exited.

"Let's go." he said to me as he passed by and I quickly stood up and followed. The walk to the car was spent in silence, but he turned to me as soon as we were inside with closed doors, smiling slightly and patting my shoulder. "Way to stand up to your bullies. Though next time, I would recommend doing it in a less public area because you are suspended for three days. They wanted you to be expulsed for three months, but I pulled some strings." he said with a smile and I furrowed my brows.

"Shouldn't you be madder?"  asked and he shrugged while turning on the engine.

"I probably should, which is why this happened behind closed doors. But I'm not madder. Because who was it that approached who?" he asked.

"He approached me."

"And who got aggressive with words first?"

"He did." I told him honestly and dad nodded.

"Did he resort to violence before you did?" he asked and I nodded again. "Then I think it is more of a self-defense situation." he said simply and I smiled. Sometimes it was nice to have an odd dad.

>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<>-<

"Is it true, the rumors?" I asked Nico as soon as he picked up the phone. I had waited with calling him until I was alone in my room, but I wanted to hear the story from him instead of the entire school.

"Hello to you to." he mumbled and I sighed.

"Yes, hello. Is it true?"

"If the rumor is that I broke Octavian's jaw, then yes." he admitted, sounding nervous. "It wasn't on purpose though. I didn't mean to break his jaw." he quickly added and I realized why he was nervous. Since day one, he had been slightly concerned that I'd be scared of him and this probably wasn't helping with that fear.

"Dam it." I mumbled. "I wish I could've seen the look on his face." I added with a small smile and he breathed out a chuckle.

"Yeah, it was kind of epic." he admitted and I chuckled.

"So, what's the penalty for this wonderful crime?" I asked, nervous to hear the answer. What if he was expelled? Or grounded for the rest of his life. Or-

"I'm suspended from school for three days." he said and I froze.

"Three days?" I asked and he hummed a yes. "I had expected it to be worse."

"It would have been, but lawyer dad so..." he said and I thought for a moment, processing what I had learned.

"Wait, isn't your dad strict? What did he say about you getting into this much trouble?" I asked and he chuckled.

"He gave me a pat and told me to do it out of the public eye next time." he said and I chuckled again.

"That's awesome-" I started, but cut myself off when there was a knock on the door. "I got to go, see you soon?" I asked and he repeated the last words, making me smile in relief. I shut down the call and turned to my door. "Come in!"

The door opened, revealing dad. I smiled at him, before noticing that mom was there too and that they were both looking serious. This can't be good.

1145 words

I'm kind of getting to the main plot now, which is nice.  It also means I'm about halfway through writing this, another nice thing. So, yeah. Peace out!

- A/N