The Sun and The Moon (SatoGou)

Chapter 7

TW- Bullying, homophobia

(I have no idea how trigger warnings are supposed to work on this website, please let me know if I did something wrong)

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I can't move. I can't breathe. Panic has a choke-hold on me as I stare ahead at my locker, and the thick, big letters scribbled over the front of it in red permanent marker. Beside me, Chloe gently shakes my arm, speaking, but I can't hear her.

This locker belongs to a - and then there's a homophobic slur. I've never been bullied at school before. Looked down on, maybe, but this? This is new, and I'm absolutely terrified, and humiliated.

I'm still in shock when I'm pulled into the headmaster's office at the end of the day, and he sits me down at the desk, speaking gently to me, asking if I know who might have done it. I tell him the truth- that I have no idea. I keep to myself too much to have beef with someone. They've already had the janitor scrubbing my locker, and now it's almost all gone, but I can still see it when I blink, and I can hear everyone around me gasping, some of them laughing. Did Ash see it too? The whole school has been talking about it, so even if he didn't, he'll know. All of the dopamine I got from hanging out with him last night is gone again, dragging me down to the lowest point I've probably ever been.

"We'll get to the bottom of this, I promise," Oak says. Chloe is waiting outside of his office for me when I come out.

"Well? Do they know who did it?"

"No. The cameras don't work properly." I sigh. I just want to go home. Everyone's staring at me, and I'm not used to it. I don't like being the centre of attention for any reason, never mind this.

"Who would do something like this, especially at our age?" she asks no one in particular, frowning deeply at the floor. I know this will be affecting her too- she's not out yet, and this can't be helping her confidence in doing it. I wish I had some comforting words for her, but I don't.

As we head out the main entrance, I spot Ash at the foot of the stairs, standing beside Gary, Dawn, Serena and two other people I don't know. His eyes catch mine, and he smiles sadly, but as we walk down the stairs, it's clear he's not going to come over. I turn away from him, clenching my jaw, not smiling back. Maybe it's wrong of me to expect so much from him so soon, but I at least thought he'd come to check on me. All this tells me is that I was right. He might like me, but he's still ashamed to be my friend, and so he's keeping it a secret, and avoiding me in public.

"What's going on?" Chloe asks, noticing the looks we gave one another.

I need to tell someone, to get it off my chest. "We hung out last night."

She's clearly surprised. "Not tutoring?"

"No, we went out in his car," I sigh. "I asked him why he wanted to hang out with me, and he said he doesn't care about popularity and that he likes me." I turn to look up at the sky. It's going to snow again. "But it's pretty obvious he was lying, because his friends don't even know I'm tutoring him, never mind that we've hung out a couple times."

She looks like she feels sorry for me. "It's not fair if he's keeping you a secret. Maybe you should bring it up to him?"

I shake my head. "No. We've only hung out two times, anyway. Maybe to him, we're not even friends. He has so many already."

I can tell she wants to argue, but she doesn't, and I change the subject until I drop her off outside her house and head the rest of the way back to mine alone. I'm sure as hell not telling my parents what happened today. I don't need anymore people thinking I'm getting bullied at school at the age of seventeen. It's humiliating enough as it is.