On Your Feet Again

From the moment I met him, I didn't like him. He was such a poser. It was irritating. Everything about him was irritating, from his constantly changing sense lack of fashion and that perpetual bedhead hairstyle of his to the way he thought all the girls in school wanted him and the way he believed that his band was more important than anything else...but what irritated me the most was how he treated underclassmen.

I guess all pretty boys are bullies.

"Watch it, frosh," he scoffed when I was trying to go through the door. He ran to push through the door before I could, even though I was definitely closer to the door than he was. He shoved me out of the way, sending my books flying.

I gritted my teeth and knelt down to gather my things, but the bell rang. The teacher made me go all the way to the front office for a late pass when I was barely three feet from the door. On top of shoving me aside, he made me late to class?

Fuck you too, Alex Gaskarth.

---

I was standing in the lunch line, impatiently tapping my foot on the ground. I rushed to the cafeteria because today was pizza day, and if you don't get there in time, you get stuck with the super burnt or extremely undercooked pizza.

But, you know, every time things start to look ok for me, life decides to fuck things up again. So, of course, Alex and his best friend Jack rushed to the lunch line, too. "Bro, come on, we're juniors!" Alex argued, trying to pull Jack to the front of the line with him.

"But I feel bad cutting all these kids in line," I heard Jack mumble, and that made me smile. Not all upperclassmen are total douche bags, I guess. Why couldn't Jack's sweetness rub off on Alex a little bit?

Alex sighed and cut some freshmen a little bit head of me, making me roll my eyes. They didn't even stick up for themselves. Alex was a well known bully, though. "Has anybody told you that your friend is a jerk?" I asked Jack, who stood behind me like Alex should have.

"He's only a jerk to the underclassmen...you must be...what, a freshman? Sophomore?"

"The latter," I replied, and Jack shrugged as we moved forward a bit.

"No offense, but I'm so glad we're not sophomores anymore!" I smiled and chatted with Jack for a while. At least he was kind of nice.

I knew it was natural for the upperclassmen to push around the underclassmen, but Alex took it to a whole new level. I don't think Jack could grasp that. I was holding my tray of food in my hands, walking to the cash register to pay for everything, when, you know, life had to fuck with me some more.

"Shit, forgot a drink," Alex muttered, and he turned around, his own tray of food crashing into mine, making my food spill all over me and the floor. And he didn't even fucking apologize. "Hey, you almost made me spill my food!" He said angrily, holding his tray tighter now.

“You know, you don't have to be the loser kid in high school to be bullied,” I said sharply when I had finished a soft stream of Spanish curse words and after being forced to pay for food I didn’t even eat. Such fuckery!

“That's the lie that all 'loser kids in high school' tell themselves to make them feel better,” Alex sneered, paying for his food and biting into his pizza just to piss me off before flashing me a cheeky grin and walking to his lunch table.

I scoffed and walked out of the cafeteria when Jack caught up to me. “Hey, you – are you alright?”

“My name is Romy,” I told Jack, walking to a water fountain to try and clean up my shirt.

“Here, Romy,” Jack muttered, shrugging out of his shirt. He had another on underneath.

“Thanks,” I sighed, slipping my shirt off over my head, too, since I was already wearing a tank top underneath. Jack was such a toothpick that his shirt fit me fairly well. “I’ll, um, give this back to you at the end of the day…”

“Alex really isn’t an asshole,” Jack said loudly when I began to walk away from him, to my locker.

“I really don’t believe you,” I laughed over my shoulder, waving goodbye as I rounded the corner.

---

The homecoming football game was the only one I ever went to every single year. And this one was the best one yet. See, Alex was a loser kid at some point in his high school career, too…according to some of the returning alumni. “Come on, man, give it back,” I heard Alex plead while I was walking back to the stadium from the bathroom.

“What the hell is this, Fagskarth?” one of the burly male alumni laughed, leafing through a blue notebook while Alex desperately tried to grab it. Two others held him back, though. “Oh, poetry? You're fruitier than ever,” the alumni laughed, ripping Alex’s notebook up right in front of him.

“Don't!” Alex yelled, shaking off the other alumni and grabbing the notebook. I hid behind one of the concrete columns, watching as Alex inevitably caused the notebook further damage in trying to save it. Once he got most of it in his arms, he angrily punched the alumni in the jaw. It looked like he put a lot of effort into it, too, but the alumni didn’t even budge.

“Good to see some things haven’t changed,” he chuckled, cracking his knuckles before proceeding to beat Alex down to the ground. I knew I should’ve stepped in and stopped the fight… I just couldn’t help but feel like Alex was getting what he deserved. “Come on, you guys, we’re missing the game,” the alumni who beat the shit out of Alex laughed, kicking the shreds of paper out of his way before leaving.

I heard Alex muttering curse words under his breath, but he remained down on the ground. I sighed loudly and began to pick up the remains of the notebook. “How does it feel to be bullied, bully?” I asked with a serene smile, doing my best to place the ripped and torn pages back in the notebook. He had some beautiful – I wouldn’t call it poetry – lyrics in this notebook…


“Stop fucking reading it,” he snarled, struggling to push himself off the ground. His nose was bleeding and there was a red mark on his cheekbone, but other than that, he was alright. “Look, you little bitch…”

“Just ‘cause someone’s younger than you doesn’t give you the right to treat them like shit, Alex,” I told him firmly, continuing to leaf through the notebook.

He looked up at me blankly, still slightly panting from the scuffle. “Really, now…well, what do you think?”

“Of what?”

“Of the lyrics.”

I had to blink a few times, unable to believe that for once, Alex was trying to have a semi civil conversation with me. “I –I …really like them,” I said honestly, looking at them some more. Alex didn’t seem to mind, now. He was still just lying on the ground, though, so I calmly continued to read the lyrics in his notebook. “Are you going to stay on the ground forever?” I asked with a soft laugh, kneeling down to brush his sweaty bangs out of his eyes.

“That’s what loser kids are supposed to do – stay down when they get beat down,” he muttered, and that pissed me off. “That’s what you’re supposed to do…and you never do…”

“Because I’m not a loser, and neither are you. Hey, that fucking rhymed!” Alex somewhat laughed when I said that. “Seriously, though. You’re not a loser, Alex.” It felt weird to be giving Alexander William Gaskarth a pep talk. I mean, he was the epitome of popular high school guy. I was always the new kid, never the cool kid. I liked to see that Alex was so insecure about his lyrics, though. I felt like he was finally off his high horse, like I could finally relate to him in some way. “Don’t let those guys get to you. Now, get up.” Alex sighed and closed his eyes. “Do you want me to leave you here?”

“Yeah, and leave the notebook here, too, would you?”

“I’m taking it with me unless you get up.” Alex groaned. “Alright, bye.”

“No, wait!” Alex said quickly. “Uh…what’s your name?”

“Romy. With the long O and E sounds.”

Alex scoffed. “What a weird name.”

I folded my arms across my chest, lips settling into a frown. “Gaskarth is a weird name, too.”

“Is Romy short for something?” he asked in an almost conversational tone.

“It’s short for Romelia,” I told him, my accent inevitably coming out. “It was my mom’s name. She died two years ago.”

“Oh, Romy… I’m sorry.” I stare at him, unable to comprehend what I had just heard. “For…a lot of things. I just…usually get what I want, even if people end up getting hurt along the way. Because I’m Alex fucking Gaskarth, dammit...people don’t say anything because they don’t care if I’m hurting them, they care that I’m making contact with them at all,” he muttered the last part, making me roll my eyes at how narcissistic he sounded. “You’re the only one who’s…stood up to me, I guess. Respect to you…you puny little freshman.”

“I’m a sophomore.”

“Whatever.”

I smiled now, closing up the notebook. “Alex…we all fall down every now and then. But you need to get back on your feet again, alright? Like…now. It’s getting dark and cold,” I said, shivering and pulling my beanie down over my ears.

Alex laughed and rolled over onto his back. "Alright…help me up?” he asked with an irresistible pout, his hands outstretched towards me. I sighed, but grabbed his hands and pulled him up. He took the notebook from me and surprised me by hugging me tightly. “Thanks,” he said softly, breaking the hug and practically cradling the notebook in his arms.

“…No more bullshit from you, alright?”

Alex threw his head back and laughed. “I can’t make any promises, Romy.”

“Alex, come on…”

“Romy, come on,” he mockingly mimicked me, grabbing my hand and pulling me along.

“Where are we going?”

“To my car, to IHOP, to discuss your thoughts on my lyrics,” Alex said with a smirk, throwing his hood up over his head. “If you have any objections, speak now or forever hold your peace...”

His smirk turned into a genuine grin at my silence.