When I Realized What I've Become

Chapter 1

I never really had friends in the younger years of my life. No one wanted to hang around with a nerd that had braces and glasses. It wasn't cool. I liked it then, no one noticing me in the halls and keeping my head and my blue eyes on the ground.

Eventually, the braces came off. But still, I got shoved at least once a month and it was always at the same spot at school. I'd always look in the mirror and see a nerd named Walker Reed in his nerdy clothes, red hair, and very pale skin. Never the guy I wanted to be. I always wanted to be the guy who was popular and had everything he wanted, including a good tan.

The person I got pushed around by a lot was a kid named Oliver. To me, he was one of the meanest kids in the school. He dressed like it and acted like it. With tight jeans, amber eyes, blonde hair, tight t-shirts, and cold glances to everyone, he acted like the person at the top of the totem pole. He acted like he got girls but we all knew the one time he had a girlfriend he didn't make it last. I never knew what it was that he pushed me around for but it was something with my nerdiness. It was always on the way out of the door, my 'check' with reality he called it. Only that check was always getting kicked in the balls.

Have I ever had a girlfriend? No, no one really noticed me in the halls. Would I try to be noticed? Yes, I tried a lot, from honor roles, to speech, and even trying to run cross country. Still, no one noticed me.

Today though, today was different. I was just done with people, with life. So done that I couldn't stand being alive anymore. A girl named Summer, who I liked, hated me now because she knew that I liked her and she apparently didn't want any filthy nerds to like her. Also, she said that if I changed then maybe she would.

Then Oscar stepped in.

Oscar Davis is my only friend, ever. We met when he moved in 4th grade. At that time I still had other friends. But as time goes by people change, and there's nothing you can do about it. Oscar was very protective, not gay, but protective. He was black so maybe that made him fit in more, but most of my school was white. Sure we had a couple of Latinos and blacks, but overall the school had more whites in it than other races, but I guess in the 21st century we just had that and. Oscar didn't seem to mind that he was one of the few blacks in our school, until 7th grade. We were walking home from school and Oliver and two other guys beat him up. Oliver held me back as I had to watch Oscar get kicked, beat, and called nasty names. I had to help Oscar home that night and had to help him recover some confidence. But Oliver saw me cry that night, because I couldn't help him, and must have thought that it was okay to tell the whole school about it, also bending the truth to make it seem like we were the ones attacking him, not the real truth. So then everyone hated me and left, except Oscar.

I was walking down the hallway and got to my locker. Naturally, I put in my locker combination and opened it quickly dodging aside, in case of anything that would pop out. Luckily, nothing came out so I was free to do my normal locker business like getting notebooks, folders, and textbooks.

In the middle of me reaching for my math textbook, I heard Oscar yelling from across the hall.

"WHY DO YOU THINK IT'S OKAY TO TRASH TALK MY FRIEND?"

I shut my locker and saw a large huddle of people around Oscar and a girl.

"Because YOU TWO are the ones that BEAT UP MY BOYFRIEND IN SEVENTH GRADE!"

I could instantly tell it was Summer yelling, talking about Liam, her boyfriend, who was also there when Oscar got beat up.

I ran into the crowd and pushed people aside to see what was happening. It was packed tight and somehow I managed to see what was happening.

"WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS SUMMER? IT WAS LIAM, OLIVER, AND BEN THAT DID IT, NOT ME AND WALKER! I SHOWED YOU MY SCARS FROM THEM," Oscar screamed at her.