Healing ||mileven||

Taking notes

School was a struggle for El at first, being surrounded by so many people was stifling at times, the noise overwhelming. She'd spent the first 12 years of her life in a quiet lab, with only the low hum of machines in the background, the silence occasionally broken by the talks that Papa gave her and her tasks. She was usually surrounded by her friends, protecting her from the worst of school life, but sometimes things slipped through the net.

Freak. She'd found the note sticking out of her locker. El didn't think much of it at first, she'd found out that other kids could be mean for no reason so just brushed it off, and quite frankly with what she'd been through in her life it was nothing. She had a note like that, always the same word, freak, for the next few days. She didn't show it to Mike, not wanting to upset him, especially as they'd worked hard at getting her settled and were so happy they'd nailed it, so she screwed them up and tossed them in the trash every day.

The next week she opened her locker and sighed, another note. She opened it out of habit and gasped, on the paper was a crude, labelled stick figure drawing of Mike, lying on the ground with crosses for eyes. She looked around, trying to see if anyone was watching, but there were so many students walking past that it was impossible to see. Every day she got another, each one had a picture of her friends, dead on the ground. Friday, the picture was of her standing over them all, blood coming from her nose, I know what you are, you'll kill them all, you freak! But this note wasn't in her locker, it was folded on her desk, waiting for her in class.

She looked around and found Troy smirking at her, mouthbreather. Realising it was Troy strangely made her feel better, like she didn't actually have to worry about people having found out the truth, no one would believe him. Two can play at this game, looking over at Troy, she smiled deviously to herself.

El became Troy's shadow at school, following him during breaks and at lunch, but not so that he saw. A boy in school bullied for wearing glasses, she was there, a girl in the hall mid-lesson with Troy trying to hit on her, she was there, 2 A/V club members being pushed around, she was there. Every time.

"Fuck off you freak! Why are you always fucking following me?!" Troy shouted when she stopped his latest bullying, a new girl in school wearing the 'wrong' clothes, whatever the hell that means.

"What's the matter, Troy? Am I interrupting your fun" asked El, innocently. A crowd had started to gather around them. The new girl just watching open mouthed, in awe that a complete stranger, this slight looking girl, would defend her against the biggest bully in school.

"If you don't stop following me I'll..."

"You'll do what?" she said, quickly. "Don't you remember what happened last time you picked on my friends? Or would you like me to break your other arm to remind you?"

An audible gasp came from the crowd, followed by lots of hushed conversations starting.

"She broke his arm?"

"He said he fell off his bike..."

"Troy got beat up by her?"

Troy was furious. "Shut your face you freak!"

"I'd rather be a freak than a fucking cowardly bully!" El shouted back. "If I ever see you near my friends again, and by friends I mean every nerd, geek, small kid, freak, hell, anyone in this school, I'll make you do more than piss yourself again!"

Troy looked at her smirking face, stunned, "that was you? You fucking bitch!" and with that he lunged at her with his fist.

She calmly jumped aside, using her powers to make him trip face first onto the ground, busting his nose.