The Fall of the Aftons

096: Michael Afton

The first few weeks of school were going great. All of his classmates were super nice and his teachers were just as kind. He wasn't challenged in his new classes, but at least they were more difficult to ace. And Mason quickly became a close friend. He, Michael, and Analex had a ton of fun together inside and outside of school. The three quickly became a trio of great friends.

But, about a month and a half into the school year, things changed on the flip of a dime.

When he walked into the school on what would've been a normal Thursday morning, his fellow classmates were whispering and scowling at him. He reached his locker as fast as he could so he could avoid as many people as possible, but it was extremely difficult with kids coming up behind him and shoving his face into his locker or onto the cold tile floor.

"Lex, what's going on?" Michael whisper-shouted when he sat down in his seat at his first class. "Everybody keeps either glaring at me, gossiping about me, or shoving me. Did I miss something?"

Analex frowned. "Somebody started a rumor. People are saying that you're, like..." She stayed silent, trying to think of the words before she skipped over her sentence entirely, forgetting about it. "You're not, right? I support you if you are, but this school isn't the nicest when it comes to people like that."

"Not what?"

"What do you mean, 'not what?'"

"You didn't finish your sentence."

"Oh. Oops." She chuckled, then breathed a sigh of annoyance and disappointment. "People keep saying that you're homosexual."

"Homo-what?"

"Homosexual. That you're attracted to men."

"What?!" he exclaimed, bewildered and hurt. He wasn't homosexual! "Who said that? Why would they think I'm homosexual?"

"So you're not?"

"No, of course not. I never even heard of it until just now."

She shrugged. "I don't know. People are just cruel. If I had to guess, someone said it just to ruin your reputation."

"Why? And what reputation? I'm still new here! I barely even have a rep!"

She shrugged again, her frown digging deeper into her cheeks. "I don't know. As I said, people are just cruel. But rumors last pretty long here. Like, really long. This'll be a dark stain on your reputation for a long time, I'm afraid."

Michael sighed miserably. "A dark stain on white cloth."

"Be careful, okay? The kids here are really mean to homosexuals."

"Yeah, I learned that the hard way," he grumbled.

"I'm serious, Michael. You think that what's happening now is bad? It's going to get a lot worse."

"Yeah, whatever."

Analex was right. Very right.

Out of the entire school, the only people left that cared about him were Analex, his art teacher, and the principal. Everyone else pretty much hated him. Especially Mason.

Just days after the rumor started, Mason's behavior turned on a dime. When Michael had desperately tried to explain that the rumor wasn't true, Mason had slapped him across the face and shouted, "Get away from me, you fag!" in front of over twenty kids in the hallway.

Ever since that unforgettable event, Mason and a bunch of other kids started to bully him. Some of them wrote harsh things on his locker, stuck sticky notes on him with cruel things written on them, and called him names. Others pushed him around and beat him up. It went on for weeks, getting worse and worse as each day passed.

After many difficult weeks, the bullying got so bad that Michael started skipping some of his classes. All of his teachers except for one showed no concern. They knew he was way more intelligently advanced than his other students, and besides, they didn't want to teach someone who wasn't paying any attention anymore because he was constantly on the verge of breaking down.

At the moment, Michael was getting supplies for his art class. Every day, just before his classes switched, he would go to the restroom and hide out in one of the stalls until the passing period passed. Only after the passing period passed would he leave, get his things from his locker as quickly as possible, and rush to class. So at that moment, he was kneeling in front of his locker, digging through his backpack as he looked for his drawing pencils that he couldn't find in his locker.

"Ugh, where is my stupid pencil pouch?" he grumbled when he suddenly came across something familiar.

His birth family necklace.

He sat back, holding the necklace in his hands. He missed wearing it every day. Days after the rumor had spread, he stopped wearing it so it couldn't be used as a choking mechanism against him.

With a heavy sigh, he tucked his necklace bag in his bag. At the most perfect time, too, because suddenly a pair of large hands grabbed him, making him shriek in fear as the person lifted him from the floor and held him high enough that his feet wouldn't be on the ground.

"Let me go!" he shouted as he kicked and flailed, trying to get himself free.

All of a sudden, the person practically him into his locker and slammed the door shut. The people outside his locker punched the locker door before they hit it with something large enough to make a dent, making him scream in fear.

Michael pounded on the door, shouting for Analex because she knew his locker combo. They had both told each other their locker combos in case the other needed something or something happened in an emergency.

"Analex! Analex, help!" he shouted as loud as he could. But he knew that it was no use. He knew that she was probably in class already. It was pointless.

Suddenly, something occurred to him.

His art class was the last class of the day. This meant that once 3:30 PM hit, no one would be able to help him since nobody came down this hallway after school. 

And it was a Friday.

Tomorrow was Saturday, beginning the weekend.

A three-day weekend.

Michael started to hyperventilate. He'd been stuck inside his locker before, but only for a maximum of a few hours because the janitor at his old school found him sobbing inside of it.

But that was at his old school.

The janitor at his new school didn't work on the weekends.

And, at that time, he had his backpack with him, so he had food to eat and water to drink.

But this time, his backpack was outside of his locker.

"Let me out! Let me out!" he screamed, banging on the locker door. "Someone, anyone, please! Help me!" His whole body trembled as he continued to pound on the door. "Please! I know you guys don't like me, but you can't do this!"

The kids outside of his locker started to laugh, their cackles maniacal.

That was when he realized just how dangerous of a situation he was in.

Three days, no food or water.

The average person couldn't live without water for three to four days.

"Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!" His entire body started shaking in terror. "Let me out!" he screamed at the top of his lungs, tears streaming down his cheeks. "You can't do this! You can't keep me in here all weekend! You'll kill me!"

He could hear the kids walking away, laughing and chatting about what they had just accomplished.

"No. No, come back! Please! You can't keep me in here! Please!" he cried, starting to sob. "Please... Please come back..."

He fell to the floor, sitting in a cramped position at the bottom of his locker as the reality of his current situation sunk in.

He was going to be stuck in his locker for the rest of the weekend.