Averagely Unaverage

Chapter 1 - Strength

"Aaron! Hey! Wait up!" Colin shouts. Ignore him, he's only an attention-seeker. "Aaron! I mean it-" he's catching up... "Aaro-"
"Just LEAVE ME ALONE." I shouldn't have screamed. Everyone is looking at me.
"Well fine! I guess you wouldn't come anyway," he says.
"Come to what?" I question.
"No no, I'll just leave you alone." he daunts. Honestly, this kid needs to f*** off.
"I'm listening now..." I say; a crowd has formed.
He takes a hesitant breath and looks towards his friends. "Well?" I start tapping my foot nervously.
"Brady is having a party on Saturday, come if you want, Carly will be the-" I clamp a hand over his mouth, after taking a step forward I stare into his eyes. I grip his upper arm tightly and lower him to the ground with a painful twist. Colin shrieks.
No. Not here. Do not speak of her. God. My heads spinning.
"Let go of him, you bastard" a kid steps out of the crowd. "He doesn't deserve this."
"What'd you say? Oh right, you were just apologizing for last week in the locker room." I challenge. He turns red.
"What..? What happened in the locker room? Heh.."
"Don't lie to me. You bastard. How's Lucy by the way?" I step closer to him, my breath shining from the streetlights above. I look down, I'm practically dragging Colin.
"She's... Fine." he looks uncomfortable.
"Oh she must feel so good about herself after you practically ate her face, I'm sure." I can feel myself giving slightly, Colin has stopped screaming. "And, you shouldn't be apologizing to me, you should be apologizing to her." I step aside, revealing Haley, his girlfriend. Her face is overcome by shock, her hands slowly fall from her sides and she runs at him, but instead of punching him, she runs past him, crying.
"You Bitch." he says. Come at me. I f***ing dare you.
"YOU F***ING BITCH!" He screams again, sprinting at me with full force.
I feel the first hit as the lights flicker up ahead, the cellphones flashes continue.
The first, second, third, and fourth. Will this... stop? My mother will worry...
Up until now, I hadn't noticed that I could be this weak. I always thought of myself as a strong person. But I suppose that I was wrong.
Metallic taste fills my mouth.
The streetlights begin to fade.
Suddenly, the color black isn't my favorite;
And the world around me refuses to stay still.
"Heh.. and he was the one talking shit. Look where he is now."
The crowd is thinning, and he is leaving. Thank god. . .
Bye Mama.
I wake to the light of day with a splitting headache.
Slowly, I turn my head to the right.
This is ridiculous. I better get home.
Trying to get up seems impossible, my left eye refuses to open, and my chest is covered in blood. But it is when I attempt to sit up that I truly feel the real pain.
I place both hands on the blood-soaked cement and force myself upright, but I cannot stay up longer than five seconds, as piercing pain courses through my body; no broken bones, but the amount of bruises left on my skin covers as much space as the olive skin that is now a puke green.
"Hey! Is that you Aaron?" a voice rings from behind me. I scream. It is all I can do to make any noise with my useless, no good, trouble-making, mouth. When I hear the footsteps getting closer, a sliver of hope appears. There is no way I'm being left on this street. There's no way.
"Aye!! You! You're a Mason kid, right?" the man appears, red in the face from running.
"Tha- yes" Just f***ing help me already.
"Aiight, let's get you home." he helps me up. Oh lucky me, more f***ing pain.
By the time we've made it home, I can hear crickets chirping and a ringing in my ear that hasn't gone away even though I've seemed to have washed and applied ointments to the cuts on my head and drank water, generously provided by this man, who has not revealed his name to me quite yet.
"Kid, it looks like we're here." he says, with a gentle tone in his voice.
"Thanks." I coldly state. I don't look back when as a reach my door. The hinges creak, a mouse scurries past and the clock chimes. 6;30 the clock reads.
"I'm home!" I shout. No response. "I'm ho-" but I stop myself because I hear a noise.
CLANG! CRASH! BANG!
"Mama!" I shriek. Panic arises in my voice. "Mama!" I repeat.
"LET GO OF ME CRAIG!" I suddenly hear. Mama! I'm coming!
It takes me approximately two steps to climb our staircase and I'm in her room faster than you can say 'I'm in trouble'. I arrive in her room to reveal a horrifying sight.
Mama, on the floor, with Craig, almost on top of her with a glass bottle in his hand, raised to strike. I run to her. "Mama!" I grab Craig's arm, sending the bottle flying to the other side of the room. He latches onto my shoulders, releasing Mama. His grip feels like fire. I stumble backward, surprised at the gut-wrenching pain. On the ground now, my shoulder refuses to work, as it juts awkwardly out in pain. My mother screams.
"Shut the hell up Martha!" he kicks her.
F*** you. F*** my life. Craig picks up the phone. "Jenkins speaking, who is this?". I force myself to get up, even though the pain that courses through me does not fade away. But he forces me down again. If only I could reach my phone, a weapon.. Then I see it. Mama is holding a bat. I climb helplessly on the floor, with Craig occasionally staring down at me and giving a few kicks to the side. By the time I've reached Mama I can feel my ribs dragging across the floor in a symphony of crackle. Finally, reaching her, I struggle to grip the bat and I aimlessly swing at his ankles, letting go of the bat from the pressure. And at this moment, I realized: it's my time to go.