The bully (minsung)

30

the bell had rung, signalling that we had 5 minutes to get to 2nd period.

on the way to our lessons, felix threw out another question for me, "hey, ji?"

I hummed in response, listening to what he had to say.

a whole bunch of other students pushed past the two of us, probably the year 7s rushing to not be late for their lesson.
i formed dirty looks at the 2 boys that had roughly pushed me to the side nearly making my fragile body hit the floor.

"you okay?" felix grabbed my arm by reflex.

"fucking year 7s," i brushed myself off, "yeah, i'm fine. carry on."

we continued to walk through the crowded hallway as i paid most of my attention to where i was walking.

"do you like niki?" felix finally asked.

despite the loud noises around us, i heard that question loud and clear, echoing through one ear to the other. I didn't actually know whether i liked him or not. Our friendship just happened out of the blue and niki had just been acting like we knew eachother for years when in-fact, we only knew eachother for a couple days.

shouldn't friendships grow over time? to be honest, i never knew how friendships worked since the only 'real' friend i had was felix—that only lasted less than a year—and he never acted like how niki acted.

"well, yeah..i guess?" my response didn't sound very convincing.

"well, it's just because of the shit you told me. don't you find it weird?" he took a glance at my pale face, visible that i wasn't ready to answer his question yet.

"not to mention, he literally gave your friends dirty looks." he added with a scoff.

that is true. i even saw it with my own two eyes but chose to ignore it for some reason. I was so distracted from when he comforted me (when i was laying sick in the nurses bed), that i didn't even bother worrying about how he was treating my other friends.

Niki was probably the only person that kept me company during my mental breakdown. right as i re-drew the memory of that day, a glimpse of another memory i had completely forgotten about had drawn me out from reality.

𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑖𝑔𝑔𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑠𝑒𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑦 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖 h𝑎𝑑 𝑜𝑎𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑚𝑦𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑖 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑡𝑜 𝑡𝑒𝑙𝑙 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒. 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑖 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑡𝑜 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑚𝑦 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑣𝑒, h𝑎𝑑 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑡𝑜𝑙𝑑 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑜𝑛𝑙𝑦, 𝐿𝑒𝑒 𝑚𝑖𝑛ℎ𝑜—𝑎𝑘𝑎, 𝑚𝑦 𝑏𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑦. 𝐴𝑙𝑙 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑎𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑖 𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝑖 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑠𝑡 him 𝑎𝑓𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑗𝑢𝑠𝑡 𝑎 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑝𝑙𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑑𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑐𝑎𝑚𝑒 𝑜𝑢𝑡 h𝑖𝑠 𝑑𝑖𝑠𝑔𝑢𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑦 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑦 𝑙𝑖𝑝𝑠.

𝐴𝑠 𝑒𝑎𝑐ℎ 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑑 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑦 𝑠𝑒𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑡𝑠 𝑠𝑙𝑖𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑑 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑏𝑖𝑡 𝑏𝑦 𝑏𝑖𝑡—𝐹𝑖𝑟𝑠𝑡 𝑤𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑚𝑦 𝑚𝑢𝑚𝑠 𝑎𝑙𝑐𝑜ℎ𝑜𝑙 𝑎𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛, 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑤𝑒𝑛𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑎𝑏𝑢𝑠𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑠𝑖𝑑𝑒 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑜𝑜𝑛 𝑖 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑛 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑚𝑦 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 '𝑓𝑒𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑖𝑛ℎ𝑜'— 𝑖 ℎ𝑎𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑 𝑚𝑦𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓 𝑏𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑦 𝑜𝑤𝑛 𝑎𝑟𝑚𝑠, 𝑚𝑖𝑛ℎ𝑜 𝑟𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝑖𝑛𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑒, 𝑤𝑖𝑡𝑛𝑒𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑦 𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝑏𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑘𝑑𝑜𝑤𝑛𝑠.