lovely neighbour | tommyinnit

twenty.

We both looked up from our sculpture at the same time to see who had called him. The pair of boys seated diagonally from us started laughing at our reaction.

I looked to the side at Jacob to see him shrugging his shoulders at me. He was trying to tell me that he didn't tell them about the channel.

"Ignore them, keep working on the sculpture," I said as I went to the side of the table and blocked Tommy's view of the boys. I continued shaving off the clay while occasionally looking back up at Tommy to see how he was doing.

Finally lunch period rolled around, by then everyone got word of Tommy's channel.

I was sad that I couldn't go for lunch with his group, I had to go for a meeting with my Teachers. We had to discuss how I could get a guardian's signature for all my consent forms as my parents were not here.

"I could ask my neighbour to sign on my parents behalf," I suggested to the group of Teachers.

"The problem is that we need your parents to acknowledge that you had the consent form signed," A female administrator replied to me.

"Well, they can just call my parents. They're close friends with my parents anyway," I said to her. The Teachers discussed for a moment and then decided on their verdict.

"Okay, please bring said neighbour to school tomorrow. We will need to change the signature in our records," The female administrator said as she packed up her files.

"She already signs all my consent forms," I replied.

"What," The administrator looked me Dead in The Eye.

"My parents aren't always around so I get her to sign the forms for me," I told the group of Teachers. They all started to talk at the same time telling me that I shouldn't have done that.

I finally came out of the conference room and immediately headed for the cafeteria. I was so hungry, I hoped there was still time for me to eat. I found the table where the trio sat and I quickly rushed over to them.

"Did no one bother to buy me lunch," I whined as I leaned onto Izzy.

"Sorry, I assumed the meeting wouldn't be long so I didn't get you anything," Izzy said as she slowly patted my head.

"You can have this I can't finish it," A voice came from behind me. I turned around seeing Tommy hold a burrito in his hand.

"Thank you, I love you so much," I said as I graciously and took the burrito from him. He quickly turned and walked away without looking at me. That was sad, I was hoping to get a reaction out of him.

After lunch, we headed back to class to prepare for our next lesson. Surprisingly, everyone was already in class as well.

"Oi TommyInnit!" Someone shouted as they threw a paper ball at Tommy. I immediately turned my head to see who it was and turned back to see Tommy open the paper ball. It was just scribbles of math equations on the piece of paper.

I got up from my seat and tried to walk over to the guy's seat before getting stopped by Oliver holding down my shoulder. He moved his head towards the ground signalling for me to sit down.

"Don't bother, just let them do it they'll stop soon enough," He whispered to me. I bit my tongue, I didn't like seeing my friends get bullied. I didn't like having to sit by and watch someone suffer.

I continued on the rest of the day constantly looking back at Tommy to see how he was doing. He wasn't lame for playing a kids game, he was pretty cool when he managed to do clutches in the game.

Within the next few weeks, more and more people started to make fun of him for his channel. It was the herd mentality of jealous teenagers. They all normalised the action of bullying Tommy, just for laughs.

Some Teachers even partook in the bullying, by playing his videos during class just to torment him. It was heartbreaking to see Tommy fake his laugh whenever people made fun of him.

Finally one afternoon, he cracked.

I was watching him do his work through my window as per normal, when he couldn't figure out how to solve a math problem.

"Why can't I just get the answer," He said as he brushed his hand through his hair. He was visibly frustrated, but not because he couldn't solve the problem.

I climbed into his room and rested my arms on the back of his chair as I leaned forward looking at the question.

"Come, I'll teach you how to do it," I said as I took the pen from his hand.

"No, I would know how to do this question if it wasn't for that teacher who played MY videos in class instead of actually teaching," He said as his voice cracked a little. I pushed down the back of his chair a little to see his face.

He was crying.

I turned his chair to face his bed as I sat down on it. I kept quiet, letting him continue to talk.

"I-I just don't understand why they're picking on me," He said as he started breathing unsteadily.

I reached out my arms for him to come onto the bed. He got up from the chair and sat down beside me. I sat against the wall and held him close to me in a hug. He leaned against my chest as he let out all of his sobs. It was heartbreaking to see him like this.

I crumble completely when you cry

"I'll fix everything," I said as I pulled him closer in a hug.

I wasn't going to go easy on anyone anymore, this was the last straw. I couldn't keep quiet and standby any longer. I was going to make sure he would be shown some respect.

I knew exactly what I had to do.

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