Cheap Shots

00:18

UNEDITED

18.

            It wasn’t as hectic at school as I thought it would be, after finding out that one of the better known seniors of our high school was expelled, you’d think there’d be a little more hype and rumors accenting the many different things he could’ve been expelled for.  Someone even pulled out the school code of conduct and read under the “Expulsions and Suspensions” category, posting it in our class page with a sly winking emoji face and a star next to number three, which happened to be sexual assault.

            They weren’t far off.

            I hadn’t told anyone what happened Tuesday night, first because no one knew I was involved besides Jean, her father, my mother, Sean, Coach Smith, and Lauren; and second, because why the hell would I want to attract more attention to myself after causing a mass tear fest in the hallway, and scaring the crap out of anyone that looked at my face?

            Lauren was taking the day off from school, and I was supposed to be at home nursing my very bruised ribs and extremely painful fracture, but I had a huge Physics test today that I didn’t feel like making up.

            Jean’s father and the rest of his squad had pulled over Sean on the highway to Lauren’s house, a few minutes away, for speeding.  Those fuckers didn’t even know it was their guy until they saw his red hair and guilty face. 

            Lauren wasn’t too pleased to find out that someone assaulted one of her best friends, and it happened to be her loving boyfriend.

            “Lauren, open up!”  I yelled loudly at the wooden door.

            “Who is it?”  She responded, sounding slightly congested and muffled from the thick door.

            “Orion!”

            “Hold on a second, Rye,” she told me, her voice sounding much closer.

            The door swung open a few seconds later and I was yanked into the house by a puffy eyed blonde.  “What?”  I questioned dumbly as I stumbled on my own two feet.  “Why’d you do that?”

            A small frown tipped her lips, “I don’t want the neighbors to see me like this.”  Gesturing to her outfit, I rolled my eyes.

            “You look fine!”  She was wearing a bright orange Mickey Mouse shirt and matching pants, her hair flying everywhere and her dark eyeliner long smudged underneath my eyes.

            “I look like death!”  She whined, clearly on some sort of depression kick.  I would be too if I were in her situation, I was already having enough trouble coping with my end of the problem. 

            “Anyway,” I waved off the neighbor’s seeing her fear, “The only neighbor around here is Killian Brown, and I haven’t seen that kid since like, middle school.”

            “He moved,” she stated bluntly, walking down the hallway and to her basement door.

            I followed her, “No, I’m pretty sure he didn’t.  He still goes to our school.”

            “No, he really moved.  Last year.  There are new people in that house.”

            My eyebrows furrowed as I tried to imagine another family in the old Gothic style house down from this one, but couldn’t picture it.  “Can we go meet them, then?”  I asked her seriously, grabbing a Coke from her fridge and plopping down on the floor, leaning my back against the couch and jerking a blanket out of the wooden basket to my right.