Winter Chill

Chapter 2--The Girl and the Stranger

It was a friday, thankfully. He doubted he could survive another day like this. It was his first week at a new school and he had already been beaten up twice.

They were on their second-to-last subject of the day. After this, there would be a short recess, one final subject, then he would have to race home. But it was going to be a while before then. He glanced around the classroom. Everyone was talking despite how hard the teacher was trying to regain their attention. She was fairly timid for a teacher, and she seemed to have a strange aversion to being stern. The kids took advantage of that. Except him, of course. He had no friends. He was the only exception.

At least, he thought he was. As he was glancing around, he noticed one other person that everyone seemed to ignore. It was a girl. She was pale with contrastingly black hair, and she wore clothes that were ratty and, in some places, torn. Despite this, she was clearly a beautiful young girl.

As he was staring at her, she turned to face him, as if she could sense his gaze. Her neutral look turned to a glare. Turning away, he focused once more on the lesson being taught.

After a while, the recess bell rang, and they were excused to go outside. Tuck was never too excited for recess; he had no friends, so what was the point?

As he was sitting down, bored, he once more noticed that girl from his classroom. The one that had glared at him. She was lying down, staring at the sky with an unreadable expression. He decided to approach her.

When he was only feet away, her gaze settled on him, and that same glare returned. It made him consider leaving, but, for some reason, he kept walking until he was standing just above her.

"What do you want?" It wasn't a question. It was a demand.

"You're alone. Like me."

"So what?" The glare hadn't disappeared yet. He wasn't sure it ever would.

He decided to change tactics. "What's your name?" he asked. Without answering, she continued glaring at him. He sighed. "My name is Tuck," he continued.

"I don't care. Leave me alone."

His frustration was quickly becoming anger. "Fine," he snapped. "I just thought we could be friends."

As he was walking away, he thought he could hear her whisper, "I have no friends," but he wasn't sure if he had imagined it or not.

An hour later, just as the final bell rang, Tuck ran out the door again. He had to escape the bullies this time. No, he would. If he didn't, it would become clear to his mom that he was being bullied. And he didn't want her to know.

The bullies quickly gave chase and caught him just as his house was in sight. Again, they beat him up, taunting him and calling him names. Before long, he was bleeding from his head, fingers, lips, and nose, as well as other places he wouldn't have thought to check. The pain was immense.

Many times during their torture, he considered fighting back. But fighting back wasn't an option. He remembered what his father used to teach him: "Use your strength not for yourself, but for others. Otherwise, it's not strength at all." He was wise. He used to say a lot of things like that. Used to.

Before he died.

When the bullies finally left him, he felt like he had been hit by a truck. His body ached from his head, to his groin, down to his toes, and his eyesight seemed unnaturally blurry. They hadn't missed a spot.

He still remembered that sadistic grin Jackson had worn as his foot slammed into Tuck repeatedly. His face, his stomach, his groin. Jackson had yelled and hollered in joy at Tuck's pain. Tuck shivered, though he was too numb to do much else.

A person seemed to appear next to him out of nowhere, standing and gazing down at him. He tried to see who it was, but his eyesight was far too blurry. Was it the bullies? Were they back for him? He began crawling away, but his body lacked the energy, so he just moaned in despair. They weren't done with him? They hadn't done enough already?

Deeply inside him, he felt an anger begin to bubble to the surface. It was hotter than magma; it was hotter than any anger he could have imagined.

It quickly diminished because, just as he was sure he was about to be attacked again, the person only shoved their finger in his mouth. At first, he was confused. He wondered if he should bite down. But, as the person's finger left his mouth, he felt all his pain begin to disappear, and his eyesight slowly returned to him. By the time it did, the person was gone, leaving him wondering who this mysterious savior was.

After finally climbing to his feet, he glanced around to see if he could spot this mysterious boy. No one was in sight. Confused and intrigued, he opened the front door to his home and walked inside.

*****

She watched as he entered his house, intrigued by this boy who had fearlessly confronted her and who, later, had been put through the ringer without even raising a finger against his bullies. It wasn't out of fear or helplessness, either. She could tell he had he wanted to fight back. Regardless, he had resisted, for a reason unknown to her.

After she had seen him lying on the concrete, obviously too weak to even move, she hadn't been able to resist helping him. She had only given him a drop of it, but it had been enough--not to induce euphoria, just to take the pain away. It wouldn't heal him or take away the bruises--she had no such power--but it would certainly help him not be as miserable.

As she sat perched on a street lamp directly across from his house, she thought about her strange desire to assist him. It had been a long time since she had wanted to help anyone from his kind, and she searched herself for the reason. He certainly wasn't special, even amongst his kind.

His kind. Human. Mortal. Weak. A plague to the earth.

Whatever had caused such a desire within her, she doubted it would happen again. From now on, that kid was on his own. She leaped from the post and landed three houses away. Time to go home.