17 Black

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Mondays are already bad enough by themselves. Louis is tired and cranky from the weekend, and on top of that, he has to go to school. And on top of that, in half an hour is his first practice with the newly formed football team. Which he so is not looking forward to attending. Actually, Louis gets to thinking, and he realizes that if Harry was not the coach of his team, he would probably be excited to go to practice. If Harry wasn't the coach of his team, a lot of things would be different, probably none of which he would miss. It's kind of stupid that he practically is now deathly afraid of his own coach. Well, really, though, you can't blame him. Harry is a whole head taller than Louis, and he was on the verge of smashing his head into a slab of metal, and that's reason enough for him to be absolutely dreading their encounter tonight. But then, there was that look in Harry's eye, and the way that he spoke to Louis after he had told him what he really thought. Louis doesn't know what the hell it was or what it could've meant, he can't even guess. It's been troubling him all day, the scenes in the locker room replaying in his mind nonstop, making him even more curious as to what exactly it was. But he decides that he's done thinking about it, because he's getting too distracted over his coach. And of course that's why Louis finds himself completely obliviously walking straight into Ryan Shoemaker.

His mouth opens, and he is about go ape on whoever ran into him, but then he looks up and sees who it is. Ryan is tall and stocky, towering above Louis menacingly with a scowl on his face. His eyes are green, like Harry's, but dull and threatening. Louis looks away and closes his mouth quickly, gathering his gym bag in his arms and stepping past to walk to practice. A meaty hand clamps on his shoulder and stops him in his tracks.

"Hey, Tommo, boy," Ryan's booming voice sneers for behind him. The hand on his shoulder spins him around and grips the collar of his shirt, just like Harry had yesterday. He drops his bag in surprise.

"Congrats on making the team, faggot," Ryan says, smiling as he slams Louis's back against the lockers.

As his back slams into the hard metal, his head hits the lockers, too, and hard. So hard that for a moment, all he sees is black, and the pain is so great he thinks he might pass out right then. Louis groans and screws his eyes shut, white spots dancing across the insides of his eyelids. Gasps escape his lips as he feels something hard relentlessly pummel into his stomach, and then a fist crash into his cheek. Helplessly, with tears running down his cheeks, Louis struggles against Ryan's hold on his shirt and tries to wiggle out of his grasp, but Ryan's hand catches his arm. His meaty fingers fit around his whole arm and are as tight as a vice, preventing Louis from running this time.

Ryan leans down, so close to Louis's face that he smells his bitter breath, and growls, "Faggot's don't play football, they just don't."

With a snort, he releases Louis' arm and shoves him to the floor. Louis whimpers pathetically and lays curled up on the cold tile as Ryan's foot slams once into his back and once into his hip for the last time. Then, he hears a brute laugh and Ryan's receding footsteps, before everything is silent again, aside from his own staggered breaths as he regains his wind. He tastes the saltiness of his tears--or maybe his blood-- in his mouth and lays on the floor motionless, lost in his own pain. Some people just hate him, so of course he has been beaten up before, but never this badly. The sad thing is, he's not even surprised.

After he gathers himself, Louis reaches for his bag, and scoots over and props himself against the lockers to get off of the ground, the sharp pain in his abdomen causing a breathless groan to fall from his lips as he finally stands. He begins to take steps forward, the throbbing in his head causing the hallway around him to swirl into one big blur. His hand shoots out to brace himself on the wall as he continues walking.