✔ DRUNK words, SOBER thoughts ✖ hemmings au

16. Lesson Un-Learned

LUKE.

They came out of nowhere. 

I was walking to my locker the morning before class started when some kind of cloth sack was thrown over my head and I was roughly pulled down to the floor. I was dragged by my hands and no matter how hard I kicked and tried to free myself, the grasp on my wrists were too tight. 

I was pushed against a chair and when the sack was finally pulled off of my head, I was face to face with Jake and two of his teammates from football. They loomed before me with nasty glares, the two large douche bags cracking their knuckles. 

"Hey Hemmings," Jake smirked, his arms crossed above his chest. 

"What the fúck are you doing Jake?" I yelled. I should've known that it was him who would be so frigging dramatic. 

"Did your punk-ass forget? You left my group, and honestly," Jake paused, theatrically putting a hand to his chest, "that hurt me Luke. I thought we were friends." 

"I thought so too," I sneered, "but you're nothing but a fake ass person. You, Katie and everyone else that sits at the popular table." 

"Popular kids are supposed to stick together. We're the superior group who our peers want to look up to. They want to be like us because we're the cool ones," Jake explained and I scoffed at his words. There was a point when I believed everything he was saying but I knew better now. High school popularity wouldn't matter in the future. 

"I don't want to be like you," I hissed, staring at Jake with the same amount of intensity as he glared at me. 

"Oh trust me Luke, you say that now but I promise you're going to be begging to be back with the popular kids," he hinted. He let out a sigh and a smile so devious it could cause cancer and milk to curdle. "Go at him boys. Let him learn his lesson." 

One moment later and I had two football players pounce on me. I fell backwards in the chair, hitting the linoleum floors with a bang. I couldn't fight back, not when one guy was straddling me and punching my face and the other was kicking my sides. I cowered, trying to blockade their punches with my arms. 

"You're gonna fúcking regret turning your backs on us," one grunted, as his foot rammed into my body with each word. 

"Stop! Get off of me!" I bellowed, but only their mischievous cackles answered my plea. 

"You're pathetic Hemmings!" the other exclaimed with a chuckle. Another blow to the side of my head caused me to groan in pain and instantly my hands flew to the throbbing pain.

"Guys! Teacher is coming!" 

The punches stopped and the next moment, the classroom lights were turned off. The door creaked open and slammed shut, as the sounds of squeaking sneakers to floor echoed in my ears. I slowly sat up, pain shooting at every part of my body. It was hard to breath, and when I touched my stomach, I winched from the amount of sting I felt. 

All the stupid crap of being a popular kid was supposed to stop the second I decided to leave them, not intensify. They should've just let me go in silence, but instead their wrath was too crazy to control. First they trash my home - the place where mum and I can escape and feel safe. Now they're jumping me? What really pissed me off was that Jake never did any of the fighting. The son of a bitch was all talk but was too much of a wimp to lay a finger on anyone. He deserved no respect because he couldn't fight his own battles. 

When I looked at myself in the mirror after crawling my way to the nearest bathroom, I saw how insanely horrible I looked. Sunken eyes, swollen lips and bruising around my left eye that was getting darker and darker by the second. I carefully washed my face and with all the blood gone, I looked decent-- well as decent as a beat up Aussie kid could look.