We were never bad kids. We didn't bother anyone, or cause trouble for the teachers. Mostly we minded our own business, too caught up with our own lives to pay attention to the high school drama. But drama came to us. It found us one way or another. It always did.

It was the beginning of the football season when our problems started. Our high school football team had a winning record like no other. At the end of the season, our team was always in the finals, and we usually won. The football guys were the gods of the school. Every girl wanted to date them, the teachers favored them, and the entire school adored them. Well, almost the entire school.

A long time ago, someone must have made an unofficial rule about the pecking order of the school system. The jocks were on top, along with the cheerleaders, then the normal kids who didn't play a sport but weren't weird either, then the nerds, then us.

We were just normal kids. We did our best in school, we minded our own business, but for some reason we were dubbed different than everyone else. Ian Snyder was our leader. He was also my best friend.

We all looked up to Ian. He wasn't a figure of strength, but he possessed a certain confidence that everyone else in our group lacked. Tall, thin, with jet black hair and chilling black eyes, he carried himself with the attitude that said, 'the whole world can drop dead, see if I care'. That was what we liked about Ian. He was himself, and no one was going to keep him from being who he was through and through. I only wish I had Ian's attitude. Instead, I was a shy, quiet, timid, teenage girl. My name is Crystal Sparks.

In our sophomore year, our little group of friends started wearing black. I didn't think it was a big deal: I liked the color black. I think it complimented my ginger hair nicely. We wore black because Ian wore black, just like the cheerleaders pretty much all dressed alike and the football players all wore varsity jackets. It gave our group's members a certain sense of belonging. It wasn't like we were being exclusive either. If someone from another group wanted to hang out with us, we would let them. But no one ever wanted to hang out with us, thanks to the football guys.

Doug Anderson, Tod Kramer, Jimmy Boltz, Blake Hornsby. All of them were the same. Big, tall, bulky, and strong, they were the stars of the football team. They were heroes in everyone's eyes, except ours. They treated us like dirt; pushed us around because we were a little different than them. We weren't athletic, we weren't smart, and we sure as anything didn't have any school spirit. It didn't used to be this way, but when high school started, so did the prejudice. It started in our sophomore year...

"Hey Anderson! Check this kid out!" Jimmy Boltz yelled at his friend from across the hallway. "He's got a new tattoo!"

Ian shut his locker with a bang.

"Oooooh! Tough guy?" Doug Anderson said, coming over towards Ian. "Hey," he said, spotting the tattoo on Ian's shoulder. "An angel? That's kinda girly, dontcha think?"

"Yeah," Boltz said, shoving Ian a little bit. "What are you anyway, Snyder? A guy, or a chick?"

"I know!" Anderson said before Ian could respond. "He's neither! Fag!" He yelled, shoving Ian's books out of his hand and onto the floor. Then the bell rang, and they all scattered, leaving Ian alone to clean up the books.

~ * ~

There's so many things that go wrong in high school. Once the football guys learned that Ian and his "group" were the weak ones, the torture didn't stop. There were fights every day in the lunch room, name calling in the hallway, and threats in classes. And all we could do was watch Ian fight the battle alone. We knew that if we tried to step in, worse things would happen to us.

The girls' side of things wasn't much different. We didn't have physical fights, but the backstabbing and name calling was so much worse. The main culprit? Shawna Miller and her gang.

Shawna was Jim Boltz' girlfriend. She was the goddess of the school: perfect hair, perfect clothes, involved in theatre and sports, and quite friendly. Well, to normal people anyway. And I definitely wasn't normal.

~* ~

Shawna sat in history. I sat in front of her. It had been a particularly bad day. Ian had fought Doug at lunch. He lost, miserably. I had tried to step in and help Ian, but I had been thrown out of the way by Todd. I crashed into some other girl, knocking her over and landing on top of her. It looked bad. Really bad. You get the idea.

"Did you see Britt at lunch?" Shawna was saying. "She got thrown down! I hope she's ok..." she said in her sickening fake sympathetic voice.

"Did you see Crystal?" one of Shawna's friends questioned. "I think she enjoyed that little 'get together' waaaayyy too much!"

My face turned as red as my hair with anger. I couldn't believe it! I was sitting right there! Why would they say stuff like that with me sitting right there?

"You know what?" Shawna said quietly, although I could still hear her. "I think she's a lesbian."

Her friends gasped. "Do you really think so? She seems to like Ian so much though!"

"Well than she's bi! Same thing," Shawna said carelessly, although I could tell she cared very much. "Anyway, ask her. She wont deny it."

I turned around, ready to say something. Then, the bell rang and class begun. I shut my mouth and turned towards the front again.

"See, I told you she wouldn't deny it," Shawna whispered.

"Rumor!" one of the others giggled and began texting.

Embarrassed, I hung my head. I couldn't say anything in my defense. It was a no win situation. I spent the rest of the period thinking about the Iron Curtain of Communism and how I was to prepare myself for the bout of rumor spreading that was about to begin.