Stand A Little Too Tall, Say A Little Too Much

I woke up to find myself alone in the double bed. I was partially scared but my instincts told me not to worry. I checked my phone; it was 7am. What was I doing up this early? I heard some plates and utensils being smashed about downstairs.

I got up and walked downstairs in my pyjamas. I didn’t care considering it was still early. I turned into the kitchen and saw Alex cooking something.
“Morning handsome.”
He turned his head round immediately and put his hand up to his chest. “You scared me haha. Morning beautiful. How’re you feeling?” he left his cooking, put his arms around my waist and rested his chin on my head.
“I’m feeling tired but other than that, I’m fine thankyou. How’re you?” I cupped my hands under his chin and smiled.
“I’m doing good, just cooking up some breakfast for me and you.”
“Aw thankyou baby.”
“It’s alright,” he smiled, “May’s not here, she’s gone to work, but we’ve both got college today. We’ve gotta go back sometime.”
“Urgh, that shithole.”
“Things will be better. Plus, you’re not alone there now, I’m in your classes anyway.”
“True point. Fine, I’ll go, but I’m only doing this for you.”
“Good girl.” He kissed my forehead and went back to his cooking.
“I’m gonna go get dressed and get my college stuff ready. Back in a second.”
I ran upstairs and checked my phone. 3 new messages. I prayed that none were from Unknown. Luckily, they weren’t. One was from Chloe, one from Layna and one from Ellie. How weird.
“Justine? Are you okay? I heard about what happened. Reply to this when you get it? Chloe xxx”
“Hey Justine, it’s Layna. I saved your number this time haha! Chloe told me what happened, are you alright? Everyone’s really worried. Xx”
“Hiya, how’re you? Hope you’re okay, see you soon. Ellie.”

I decided that the texts could wait until I’d eaten my breakfast. I was hungry and tired.
I put on a flowery top and a pair of light blue skinny jeans and headed downstairs. Breakfast was just being served. I sat down to the table and Alex put down my plate. He’d cooked a bacon, egg and cheese panini. I dug in as soon as he sat down and started on his. It was the most mouth-watering food I’d ever tasted in my life.

After I’d eaten I placed my plate in the bowl and washed the pots. Soon after, Alex came into the kitchen and placed his plate in the bowl too.
“I’ll dry, you wash, okay?” He said.
“Deal.”

After I’d washed the pots and Alex had dried and put them away, we both grabbed our college things and headed for Alex’s car.
“Justine, you get in. I’ll just be a second, my phone’s ringing.”
“Okay.” I got in and waited for Alex. He was smiling a bit and talking very quietly, probably making sure I couldn’t hear.

After a few minutes, Alex got into the car and started the engine.
“What was that about?”
“Oh, nothing, don’t worry. Just something to do with my family.”
“Oh okay.”
“Hey, don’t worry about college Justine. It’s gonna be fine.”
“How’d you know?”
“Because, I’ve just got a warm feeling about today. Then again, that’s probably your fault.”
“Aw, you’re cute Alex.”
“That’s still you.”
“Oh no you didn’t!” I smirked.
“Oh yes I did!”
The good mood was returning and I was starting to feel happier about today. Alex was right, even if college was rubbish; I still had him in all my classes so it wasn’t like I was alone or anything.

We arrived at college a few minutes later than normal and quickly hurried to our form room. We got to the form door and I put my hand on the door handle. I froze. I couldn’t open the door. I was getting that hole down in the pit of my stomach again. I was scared. There were so many people in this class that Josh knew and were friends with. What if they all started cussing at me? What if they all cornered me and beat me up? What would happen if I were to go into that classroom?
“Justine, you can go in you know.” Alex put his arms firmly on my shoulders.
“Alex, I-I,” I took a deep breath, “I can’t.”
He spun me around.
“What’s wrong?”
“Alex, what if those people all stare at me and start cussing…”
“They’re not gonna do that.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I’ll screw them up if they do.”
“And what happened last time when you tried to beat up Josh? That didn’t go to plan did it?”
“These people aren’t Josh though.”
“I know but-” A brown-haired girl dressed in brown boots, silver skinnies and a checkered red top cut me off.
“Hey, you’re Justine right? Do you remember me? I’m Hannah. We met at that dancing studio?”
I looked over at her. “Oh, hey,” I smiled, “Yeah, of course I do.”
“You come here?” she asked.
“Yeah. Howcome you’re here?”
“Oh, I just moved from my old school to this one. My old school was full of stuck up cows and bullies and I’d had enough so I thought it was time to move.”
“Ah. Well this school is basically the same really.”
“I’m sure it’s not as bad as my old school. Seriously, people were trying to set this girls hair on fire…” she stopped speaking and shuddered at the thought.
“Ah, that’s not good. Maybe it’s not as bad then.”
She smiled. “You going in then? You’re gonna be late.”
“You can go in if you want, I’m just here freaking out.”
“What’s up? Oh and I need to talk to you about something in a bit.”
“I’m quite sure you saw exactly what happened at the dancing studio. That’s what.”
“Oh… yeah. Come on, you can come in with me.”
“Hmm.” I hesitated and clutched onto Alex.
Alex pulled me closer and started to whisper into my ear. “Walk on the left side of me, that way you don’t have everyone looking at you as I’ll be in the way. We can walk round the side.”
“Alright.” I whispered back.
Hannah was still standing there waiting. “Come on, it’ll be fine. I’ll walk in first and you can follow behind.” She braved a smile at me.
“Okay.”
Hannah opened the door and walked in first, I started to follow behind her and started to hesitate but Alex pushed me forward. Once we’d got inside the classroom I looked back at Alex and waited as he came to my side. We walked down the side of the desks and I put my arm around Alex. I heard somebody whisper, “slut” as I walked past but I ignored it. I just looked over at my desk. Hannah went down the row first and placed herself at the end so she was next to the window. I sat next to her and Alex sat down at the end.
“Nice of you guys to turn up for once.” Miss Clark smiled. She was still the same lovely tutor that had put Alex and me together in the first place.
“We’ll explain once registration has finished.” Alex spoke up.
“Alright.” She turned back to the rest of the class, “Right guys. We’ve got a new member to our tutor group. Please welcome Hannah.” She pointed over to Hannah’s desk and everyone looked around.
“Hey.” She replied.
A blonde-haired girl across the room gave me dirty looks and rudely gestured with her hands, which put me off being in this tutor. How many more people were going to do this?
Alex put his arm round the back of my shoulders and whispered in my ear. “Ignore the blonde girl. I’ll get her later.”
I tried to smile but just as soon as I did, a bulky black-haired guy stared directly at me, pointing to his fist and then pointing to me. This first day back was not going well.

Registration finally ended and everyone got up out of their seats. Alex and I went to the front desk where Miss Clark was situated.
“Hiya Miss Clark, sorry about my absence...” I started to say but then she interrupted me.
“It’s fine sweetie. I heard about what happened. If you need to talk to anyone about anything, I’ll be here to listen.”
“Thankyou.”
“I assume you’ve done all your coursework?”
“Yeah, it’s all here in this folder.” I placed the folder on the desk and she smiled.
“Cheers, saves me a lot of hassle.”
“It’s alright.”
“Now, you best head off to your next lesson before you’re late.”
“Thanks Miss.”
“It’s no problem.”
“Bye.” Alex said as we walked out of the room.

We started to walk down the hall when suddenly a group of people headed towards us. The first few people bashed shoulders with us both and then stopped us in our tracks.
“I’m gonna smack your bitch up.” Some coloured dude hissed.
“Oh really?” Alex laughed.
“Yep. She’s a slut. Haha!”
“How would you know that? You know fuck all about her.” Alex hissed. I didn’t like where this was going.
“We all know what happened. Little whore lead our friend on and attempted to have sex with him yet he said no.”
“Oh, and who’s your friend may I ask?”
“Big ol’ Josh, init.”
“Haha. That dick.”
“He’s no dick. Nothing compared to your bitch.” He pointed at me and Alex turned around. He squeezed my hand and let go. My face fell. Immediately, Alex slammed the guy up against the wall.
“You know NOTHING, about her so I’d shut your mouth before I leave you with one inch of your life left.” Alex hissed. The guy was starting to gasp for air. He tried to rip Alex’s arms from his throat but failed. The other crew-members started to back up and showed faces of utter fear.
“Let…me…go.” He choked.
“Alex…” I tried to stop him but he wasn’t listening.
“I’ll let you go on one condition. You leave me and my girl alone. If you ever cause a problem again, I will make you fucking beg for your life, are we clear?”
The coloured guy nodded and Alex moved his arms from his throat and left him gasping for air on the ground.
“Sorry about that. I don’t think you’ll be getting any more problems from now on.” He put his arms around my waist.
“You really meant it.”
“Meant what?”
“That you’d get anyone who starting to harass me.”
“Of course. You don’t deserve the crap and I don’t take shit from noone.”
“I can tell.”
“Anyway, we need to head to French before we’re really late.”
We walked hand in hand to French. I didn’t care who saw us, I was still mesmerised by what Alex had just done. That was the first time a lad stuck up for me.

We arrived at the French block and stopped outside our French classroom. Alex put his hands on my cheeks and kissed me. After he broke away, he opened the classroom door and gestured for me to take his hand. We both hurried inside to our desks just whilst everyone was still getting their equipment from their bags. Alex looked around for some desks for us but could only see 2 spare at the back by a dark-haired lanky kid. I quickly ran up to the desks and placed my hoody in the seat next to the walkway and sat in the middle seat. The dark-haired kid was staring out of the window. I didn’t know whether to speak to him, he didn’t seem like he wanted to talk.
“Hey, is it alright if I sit here?”
He turned round and nodded.
“Thanks.” I smiled and he smiled back, very weakly.
Alex sat down and smiled over at me and then looked over at the guy next to me. He looked back at me and shrugged.
“Hiya class. We’ve got a new arrival to our course guys. His name is Jack, please make him feel welcome.”
Everyone, once again, looked round for Jack and the guy next to me smiled at everyone. Once the teacher had set work for us all, I decided to speak to Jack.
“Hey, so your name’s Jack?” I smiled.
“Yeah. Jack Barakat.” He smiled back.