Bystander

When I got home, I was immediately confronted with my entire family sitting in the living room. Bill shouted his farewells to Mark and I before their car drove off, Tom behind the wheel.
By six o’clock- exactly three hours later- I had an appointment with a therapist that Friday and if I came home hurt in anyway and didn’t have a good reason for it, I’d have my first warning.
My first warning came with the consequence of not seeing my laptop or iPod for two weeks.
The second warning held the burden of being suspended (I would be so bored).
And the third warning would take me out of school for the rest of the year, or I’d be transferred to Lena’s school. She went to this big private catholic high school; she’d gotten in through a couple of scholarships.
I called Natalie, she picked up on the fourth ring. “Yeah. Who is it?”
“Me,” was what I answered before continuing, “Guess what? I’m going to therapy?”
“No shit,” she gasped, kind of, she was messing around with something in her room. “Seriously?”
“Sadly,” I fell back onto my couch staring at the ceiling with the phone pressed against my head.
“Wow, that blows.”
“I know.”
Over the line I heard an angry male voice shout, “Natalie! Where the hell are you bitch?”
I heard Natalie swallow nervously. I hated hearing her father, he terrified me. Natalie choked out, “I-I’ll see you tomorrow. Okay?”
The line went dead.

The next morning, I was riding with the boys again and I frowned and voiced the question that’d been bothering me the entire night. “Why did Mark and I have to get all disguised up yesterday?”
Today Gustav had told me to bring an extra big sweatshirt, a hat and some sunglasses. I complied.
Bill sort of laughed, “Mark didn’t have to. He just kind of wanted to.” Mark chuckled from the front seat, he wasn’t driving. “We kind of needed you to though.”
“Why?”
“Because,” Tom cleared his throat, “We didn’t want them to see you all beat up and everything. It’d give you all of the attention that nobody would ever want.”
I didn’t say anything, and found all four of them staring at me. I frowned, “What?”
“Aren’t you supposed to be offended or something?” Mark narrowed his eyes at me.
I jerked my head, “I’m supposed to be offended?”
“You aren’t insulted?” Gustav stared at me, slightly shocked.
“No, I’m not.” I shrugged my shoulders. “Should I be?”
“No!” All of them said quickly.
I laughed. “Assholes.”
Mark spoke up, “Can I be offended?”
I poked him in the shoulder, “No.”
He swore.

Natalie looked like shit.
Well, that’s what I’m assuming at least.
She had a pair of skinny jeans on, her Nikes, a long-sleeved shirt, a black leather jacket thing, a scarf a hat, and some sunglasses. The only part of her skin that I could see was her jaw and her mouth. Her lip was large and rather purple. Nobody gave her a spare glance; everybody at my high school got their fair share of bruising.
I didn’t mention her new disguise, “Hey.”
She smirked slightly, “So. Did you have an easier time getting past the guys’ rabid fans?”
“Hey!” Bill frowned, coming up behind us, “They aren’t rabid!”
His twin snorted from behind him, “Yeah! They are!”
I rolled my eyes, “Okay. Stop right now. We all need to agree that the fans are not rabid. They are, instead, dangerous, scary and terrifying creatures. But not rabid.”
Tom chuckled, throwing his arm around my shoulders, “Great description! Ja?”
I shrugged his arm off me, “You are damned heavy! There is no way that I can support your weight!”
“I bet I can pick you up!” He countered, walking beside me as I headed to Physics.
“Bet you can’t,” I retorted intelligently. “Why are you following me?”
He picked me up easily, and then set me back down. “See, you’re a lightweight. Do you eat? We’re going to Phys.”
“I am, you aren’t.”
Tom rolled his eyes, “See, look at my schedule.”
Sure enough, he was going to Physics with me whether I liked it or not.
Fortunately, Tom was entertaining.

When we sat in the back of our class, it had finally started, he got serious. “What’s up with Natalie?”
I lied, “Something’s wrong with her?”
Tom frowned at me, I didn’t respond, so he did. “She is dressed up like a frigging mummy. Her lip is the size of a small country. Something’s wrong.”
I shrugged, “She’ll figure it out.”
He snorted dismissively, “Yeah, and you’ll figure your problems out all by yourself too, right?”
I glared at him, Bystander.
I whispered it, “Bystander.”
He looked at me and asked quietly, “What?”
I looked at him, “Nothing.”
Tom told me something, I didn’t know what it meant. “Zuschauer.”
It was my turn. “What?”
“Nothing.”
Damn that bastard to a thousand deaths in hell.

In my next class, I was with Gustav. I waited until the teacher had started droning on about his subject. I asked him, “Hey, what’s ‘zuschauer’ mean?”
He frowned at me, “Why do you want to know?”
“Tom said it during Phys, I want to know what it means.”
Gustav didn’t talk to me for the rest of the period.
And the next class I was with Bill, so I asked him, “What’s ‘zuschauer’ mean?”
He deliberately changed the subject. I tried again. Same result.
At lunch I glared at Tom, slamming my tray down next to his, “You told them not to tell me!”
He smirked innocently at me, “Whatever do you mean?”
“You told them not to tell me what ‘zuschauer’ means!” I hissed my eyes very angry.
“So what if I did?” He returned to his food.
“I want to know what it means!”
“Here’s a hint,” Tom faced me, “You’ve called me it before.”
I frowned, between riding twenty minutes in the car with them just to get to school, I’d called everyone a lot of names. “Asshole?”
Tom chuckled; I took that as a no.
“Retard?”
Natalie regarded me with awe. “God, Addie. Can’t you just look it up on the internet?”
I felt my eyes light up, “Right! I can do that! But how do you spell it?”
Bill looked at me, “I am so disappointed in you right now.”
Natalie laughed.

Tom, Bill and Gustav came over today.
Gustav had asked me in the car, “Is Natalie coming?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“She can’t.”
“Why?”
“Are you a fricking two year old all of the sudden,” I snapped at him. “She can’t come. That’s it.”
Tom inhaled and I rounded on him, “Don’t you start!”
Bill pouted from the driver’s seat- he was a new driver and was having slight difficulties- “We can’t breathe anymore?”
I sighed, “It’d save me a lot of trouble.”
Mark laughed.
When the guys left, they took Mark with them.
And instead of wondering how I’m going to get into medical school when I’m failing most of my classes, I wondered about what ‘zuschauer’ meant. I pondered and pondered, I went over every name that I’d ever called Tom, Gustav, Bill or Mark. Nothing was clicking. I was confused.
“God,” I glared out a window. “What the hell does this one damned word mean?”