The Bully: Madison, the basic Queen Bee, who's determined to make the best out of this school year, even if it means making everyone else's a living hell.
The Bullied: Nayla, the shy, sweet, and lovable protagonist who's just trying to get through t...
Nayla rushed into the third stall in the corner of the bathroom. This stall was more of a friend to her than anyone she had ever known. Nayla's muscles tensed as she tried to fight the tears. She really thought that Anwar was going to stand up for her. That he was going to say something.
Nayla tossed her backpack on the floor and sat on the toilet in a slouched position. She let the tears stream down her face. Why did Madison always ruin everything? And Anwar... he had basically agreed with her.
She sobbed harder as she recreated the picture in her head. Madison laughing as Anwar shrugged off her insults. He didn't deny them, nor did he come to Nayla's aid. Nayla took some tissues out of her pocket, he wasn't the one to blame though; Madison's presence was frightening to everyone.
She wished Madison would just drop dead. She wanted to claw her eyes out of her face. Why was she always on her case? Honestly, she was such a bitch.
Nayla listened to make sure no one was in the bathroom and then slowly emerged from her stall. Nayla looked at her reflection. She looked so defeated. With her wet eyes and sticky face. She put her head down and washed her face. She didn't need to see that right now. She didn't want to be reminded of her insecurities and failures.
*** Nayla got home later that day and just went straight to her bed. She wasn't in the mood to go to the hospital with Khalid today. Madison and her friends had been talking and laughing at her non-stop the rest of the school day. Did they think she was stupid? That she couldn't put together what they were saying?
Nayla screamed into her pillow. She wanted to drown in her tears, so she would never have to return to that wretched building. Madison and her stupid friends had talked about her in their presentation. Claiming that it was about some fictional character. A girl with a stutter and wore a hijab, but not Nayla, a different one. They had stood there, for what seemed like hours, completely ripping her to shreds and insulting her in front of everyone. How did that have anything to do with the theme of Romeo and Juliet? Romeo loved Juliet, he didn't point out all her flaws, what the hell. Did they think they were better than her or were they just bored? She couldn't tell, and she didn't care.
The worst part of all this was that they had called every single person Nayla was assigned to work with over to their little group to take a look at it after they were done. It was humiliating and Mr. Blake wasn't there to put an end to it. Stupid Mrs. Watson. She was beyond useless. Nayla lay there sprawled on her bed feeling helpless and out of ideas. She didn't know what to do.
She cringed as she recalled Asher coming back from their stupid little meeting, "She was just asking me when the new Avenger's movie is coming out." He had said, giving Nayla a pitiful smile.
She had given him a smile back and tried to act like nothing was wrong, as if her world wasn't collapsing around her.
She didn't think that Madison, or any other stupid bully for that matter, realized the impact they had on people's lives. Like PSA being mean is not cool. Teens who are bullied have a much higher chance of getting a mental disorder, developing self-esteem issues, and committing suicide. And telling a teacher on them only seemed to fuel their passion for destroying other people's will to live.
First off, you had the bully. The emotionally unstable one that was violently attacking people mentally and sometimes physically. Then the bullied, which Nayla assumed would be her, the insecure one that was being constantly attacked for absolutely no reason and was endlessly questioning if they belonged in this world and if their life mattered. And then you had the bystander, the worst out of the three. The person that went out of their way to tell the bullied that they 'didn't want to get involved' that they were 'scared', or just plain laughed when anything happened and put it on their snapchat story. Nayla growled in frustration. She needed to write about this.
It was like Madison was oblivious to all the stupid shit she was doing. And the only thing worse than when Madison made fun of her was when her stupid followers did. How daft do you have to be to yell at someone on command? To attack someone that didn't do anything to you and that you had nothing against? Kristennnnn, Nayla thought.
Her and Kristen had actually been sort of friends back in the day, so it stung so much worse when she had yelled at her. And for what? Telling people that Asher had a crush on Betty? Nayla hadn't even known about that. Nayla let the tears fall and pulled out her laptop.
She needed a Wattpad session right now. She had never felt so alone and out of place. Why did everyone always yell at her for no reason, was there a sticker on her back or something? Anwar had betrayed her, she didn't have any friends on her side, and her parents were oblivious. She gave a weak chuckle, classic highschool depression story. She logged into her Wattpad account and sat there for a while as she updated her story. Her fingers flew across the keyboard and the stream of tears finally came to an end. She was in her element. A place where she felt safe and could write about whatever she pleased without being insecure about people thought. Nayla decided that she would let her readers give her advice and tell her what to do. Maybe she should write a Wattpad book about her highschool life. What would she call it though? She drummed up some names, how about The Bully, The Bullied, and The Bystander she thought? She pondered it for a second, nah, she brushed it off, it was to cliche.
Nayla read the comments. She loved Wattpad. Everyone on the app was so supportive and good-hearted. She wished they went to her school. She laughed at the comments. Half of them said to 'drag her' while the other half told her to 'expose her.' She didn't think those were good options, but she responded to them anyway. 'How?'
They told her to 'stalk her online and see what you can dig up.'
Nayla laughed. It was worth a shot. She would try anything to make this girl leave her alone at this point. Nayla opened up a private tab and searched up 'Madison Zavier.' Her Insta came up, Twitter, and her Facebook. Nayla scrolled down and went to the second page of Google, the land of the forgotten. She didn't find anything on there, so she went to the third page.
Nayla quickly sat up as she read the title of an article, "Local Attorney, Leaving His Family Behind as He Heads to Prison," Nayla gasped. Madison had always claimed her dad was a hotshot lawyer in Manhattan because 'that's where all the crime was.' Nayla clicked on the article eagerly, not knowing what to expect.
Her eyes flew across the page as she read it, "A local Public Defense attorney, who's demanding to stay anonymous was just arrested after being caught "aiding and abetting" illegal immigrants. Not being able to get him on that alone, the prosecutors nailed him with tax fraud. In an open investigation, the IRS discovered he had illegally pilfered $2 Million in the past 5 years. The local attorney at the mayor's office being an old friend of his expresses her sentiment, "Even the best of us have our lows. I have known [this man]for many years and he is the most honest man I know. I genuinely don't know what overcame him." The judge has reportedly granted him a 5-year sentence with no bail in Richfield County Prison, which can be reduced to 3 if he gets out on parole with good behavior. He will be leaving his wife, Bailey Zavier, his 2 sons, Jake and Jullian Zavier, and his eldest daughter, Madison Zavier."
Nayla clasped her hands over her mouth as she finished reading the article; someone was about to get exposed.
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