Me and You Against the World

That morning I couldn’t help but stop and stare at that sad excuse for a high school that I attended. I didn’t want to be here, nobody else wanted me here, the only reason why I’m still here day after mind-numbing day is my mum. She is a strong believer in education. She thinks that if I go to school and get a job, settle down and have a family that all my problems will disappear. Even though I know no matter how hard I try I can’t escape my past, I don’t exactly want to completely fuck up my future either, although I’m doing a pretty good job of that so far. In any case, it would break my mother’s heart if I dropped out and school has taught me something. I’ve learnt how to survive in this world without having to rely on someone to be there to catch me when I fall and most important how to hide what’s on the inside so that no one sees who I really am.

As I walked down the hallway I noticed a small gathering of jocks and a guy lying on the floor getting beaten up. All of a sudden I found myself standing between Daniel James, the schools quarter back and his unfortunate victim.

“Get out of my way faggot!” he screamed at me.

I must be crazy if I think I can take him on and get out alive.

“Go fuck yourself Danny Boy”.

I knew he hated people calling him that. The last guy that was stupid enough to call him Danny Boy ended up in hospital with a broken nose and a missing front tooth.

He grabbed me by my shirt and slammed me against a wall. Lucky for me Mr. Peterson, the coach of the football team showed up. He was the only person in the school that the jocks listened to and respected.

“Ok boys, break it up” he said rather calmly.

It was perfect timing considering I was inches away from being beaten to a bloody pulp.

When they left I realised that the guy they were beating up was still lying on the floor, his books had been taken out of his bag and thrown across the hallway.

“Are you ok?” I asked as I helped him off the floor.

“Yeah, thanks” he said as he looked up at me.

He had beautiful amber eyes.

“Your nose is bleeding, come with me and I’ll help get you cleaned up”.

I picked up his books and took him to the boys toilets.

“I’m Gerard” he said as I wet a hand full of paper towels and wiped the blood off his porcelain skin.

“I’m Frank, but please, call me Frankie”.

The whole time he never once took his eyes off me.

“So, what brings you to Jersey?” I asked, focusing on what I was doing so that I didn’t just stand there and stare at him like an idiot.

“My parents got a divorce. I moved here with my mum and my brother Mikey stayed with my dad in New York”.

“Oh… that must be tough”.

I felt sorry for him. I was an only child so I didn’t know what it was like to be separated from your brother like that.

“It’s alright” he smiled.

God he was so beautiful, he looked like an angel.

“There you are” I said, wiping away the last few drops of blood.

“Thanks Frankie”.

He picked up his bag off the bathroom floor.

“So, what classes did you take?”

He handed me his class schedule and I was excited when I saw that he had the same classes as me, the only exception was he had art when I did music.

“So, you think you can show me around? I’m kind of lost.” he laughed.

“Sure!” I said, trying not to sound too eager.

As we walked to class I had a feeling that today was going to be worth my time.