The Serpent Queen

Esqueleto | Part One

After another gruelling day of school, Eli sat at the dark wooden table in the modern white and black kitchen of his family's three bedroom house. Pictures decorated the boring white walls, but the centrepiece was a massive plain grey sun like decoration that hung from the wall.

A week ago, he celebrated the highs of Phoebe winning the Championships, however a few days later in school and every day since then for weeks, he was bullied. Not just verbally to his face, whispering, snickering and mean comments this time, it began to seep into his online life.

While his mom had baked his favourite double chocolate chip cookies with her phone held to her ear talking to the school counsellor, he stared down at the blankly listening to her every word, trying to not let anymore tears leak out and sat the same time fidgeting with his fingers.

"No, you don't understand. My son is getting bullied every day. Yeah, they call him names. 'Freak,' 'loser,' 'shitlip.'" Mrs Moskowitz set a plate with a few cookies in front of her son and squeezed his arm a little in comfort. "It's not right. You have to do something about this." She walked back over to the island with a black marble countertop, "You're gonna make an announcement?"

Eli looked up with panic written over his face. He half whispered to his mom, pleading to her, "Don't have them make an announcement."

She waved her hand out at him so he could calm down, "Just, please keep his name out of it. I don't want him to be embarrassed. I'm sure that this will nip it in the bud. Uh-huh."

When she ended the call, Eli looked straight at his parent. His eyes were puffy from crying and eyes filled with unshed tears. He spoke up, "Do you realize what you've done?"

"The school needed to know that this behaviour should not be tolerated."

"Don't you get it? They're never going to stop making fun of me because I'm a loser."

"That's not true."

"Wake up, Mom!" Eli slammed his hands down again the table, making the plate move ever so slightly. Shooting up from the chair, he walked over to her. "I'm a freak. I'm never gonna have any other friends besides Demetri." He quickly thought of Miguel and Phoebe. Miguel only sat with him because there were no other seats and Phoebe was Demetri's cousin. They felt pity for him. That's why she invited him to see her win because she felt sorry for him. They only spent their lunches with him because of the blood between the two Alexopoulos' and the bond between the newcomers. "I'm never going to get a girlfriend, I'm never going to be anything other than a kid with a weird lip!"

Eli ran by his mom and up the stairs. When he reached his bedroom door, he yanked it open. As soon as he crossed the threshold, he sniffed. The boy slammed the door closed behind him and flopped into his blue, white and orange stripy duvet in complete dispair. Burying his head into the pillows, he let the dam of tears break.

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Rock music blasted in Miguel's room as he practiced punching an invisible dummy in the centre of his room.

Phoebe sat on his bed, giggling at him, more specifically at his grunting noises. Jumping up, she stood beside him so he could hear her, "You know that your grandmother might think we're doing something in here especially since the door is closed and we have the music blasting."

Miguel looked at her and shrugged while continuing to punch air, "Shouldn't you be practicing?"

"I'll think about training for the championships again closer to the time. I don't know if I'll be able to top the Prondunova."