"We should've pulled him out of that school months ago. I'm just glad we're doing it now."

Friday night, Mrs. Detweiler let out a sigh of relief knowing that the following week, her baby boy would be out of the horrible school. Not having done it sooner, the guilt of that would eat away at her for years, but it wasn't their feelings of guilt that mattered. It was their sons safety and happiness that were their priority. Hopefully home schooling would work out well for him.

In the midst of the conversation between the adults, Sasha's barking was heard. Nothing unusual, she was an active dog and normally barked a little before a walk. But it continued.

"I'll handle it," Mr. Detweiler said, seeing his wife annoyance.

The father climbed the stairs, hearing Sasha's scratching against the door, as well as her barking. He found her in front of TJ's bedroom door, barking, with her front paws on the door. Assuming that she needed to go out, Mr. Detweiler patted her head and knocked.

"TJ, Sasha's gonna have an accident out here if you don't take her out," His father halfheartedly joked. He knocked twice before turning the knob only to find it locked. Sasha's whining didn't help his nerves. "TJ?"

He knocked louder, hoping that his son was simply sleeping, something that he's been doing a lot more of lately. Still getting no response, and having a feeling on uneasiness settling in the pit of his stomach, he moved to force the door open. After ramming into the door twice, the door swung open. The bed was empty, and his son was nowhere to be seen.

He felt Sasha bump into his leg as she ran to the attached bathroom door, barking and scratching at it just as she did with the bedroom door.

"Oh, no. . .no no no no." He didn't waste time knocking and broke open the bathroom door, too.

. . .

If anyone was passing by the Detweiler household, they would have heard horrified, deafening screams.

ZZZ

CJ walked down the sidewalk, heading to TJ's house so they could walk to school together. She and the others were hoping that they could have a movie marathon all together over the weekend, but he was pulled away, by his dad for some family thing, TJ said. CJ didn't know about the others, but there was an inkling of a feeling that something was wrong, but it was easy enough to calm her nerves.

Approaching his house, she saw his older sister trying to open the front door, which was odd because she remembered her boyfriend telling her that she went abroad for college.

"H-hey," she said, coming up the porch. His sister jumped and turned to face her. Her face was red and puffy, no doubt from the crying she was doing and must've done before. "You're Becky, right?"

"Yeah," she sobbed. With her wrinkled clothes and messy hair, she must've been in a rush to get back here. The young woman took this pause to sort through her keys for the right one. "You're uh, his little girlfriend. . ."

"That's me." She gave an awkward chuckle. "Can you tell TJ I'm here? I was hoping we could walk to school togeth- what's wrong?"

At the mention of his name, more tears poured down Becky's face. She wiped them away, but more soon followed.

"I wish I could. I got a call Friday from our parents." Her voice strained as she spoke. "They said that TJ tried to kill himself. . .! I haven't been able to talk to them since then so I don't know if. . ." She choked on her next words.

CJ stood, frozen and mouth agape at what was being said. She didn't want to believe it; she knew something was bothering TJ, but didn't want to push him about what it was. But his sister wouldn't be crying in front of her or lie like something this serious.

"I h-have to get to the hospital," Becky said. She took a few deep breaths to steady herself. After unlocking the front door, she tossed her luggage inside, locked the door again, and headed to the garage where her car was still parked.

"Will you let me know if. . .?"

"Yeah. . .yeah, sure, I'll try," she said as she unlocked the drivers door. "Do you, uh, need a ride to school?"

"No, no. I think I need to take a walk."

Becky nodded, and climbed in her car. CJ watched her pull out and drive off. She clenched and unclenched her fists, feeling her rage bubble up alongside her sadness. She still needed to get to school, but needed to stop back home first.

ZZZ

All things considered, it was just another Monday. Students rolling in to the middle school after the weekend, tired, cranky, for yet another week. The hallway buzzed with the talking of friends and cliques about what happened over the weekend. Completely normal and routine.

So when the front door opened with a BANG that echoed through the halls, everyone jumped.

"AUSTIN!"

The crowd parted like red sea as CJ marched through the halls, clenching her wooden baseball bat in her hand as it dragged on the floor behind her.

"AUSTIN!" She shouted again. The student body didn't know what was happening, but they did know that they didn't want to be Austin at the moment. She marched on, face red and puffy with tears streaming down her face.

"Whoa, woman on a war path," Randall commented as she passed them.

"What's she doing?" Ashley asked as they followed her through the halls.

"AUSTIN!" CJ shrieked. Turning down the hall, she spotted the person, the complete asshole she was calling after. She stomped up to him, tightening her grip.

"That's my name, don't wear it out," Austin laughed. His frineds around him didn't laugh, seeing the baseball bat she was gripping. "What's your deal-"

He barely ducked enough to miss CJ's swing of her bat, feeling the wind of it pass his head. A considerable dent was left in the locker room from the force. A crowd quickly gathered to see what was going on. Randall, Menlo, and Ashley pushed and shoved their way through the crowd.

"THIS IS YOUR FAULT! THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!"

CJ kept swinging, and Austin kept dodging, until she landed a hit on his side that sent him to the floor. Still not enough, she continued to beat into him with the aluminum weapon. She wouldn't have stopped if Randall and Menlo didn't pull her away. She still pulled to get out of their grasp, but as another wave a tears came to her eyes, she was zapped for energy.

"What the hell is your problem?" Austin spat as he got back on his feet. "What have you gone crazy like your boyfriend?"

"Don't you fucking dare," CJ snapped. "He tried to kill himself because of you!"

"Wait, what?" One of her friends asked. Overcome with rage, she couldn't make out which.

"I went to his house to walk to school with him and his sister was there she said he tried to kill himself last Friday!" She screamed. As she spoke, Randall's and Menlo's grip on her slackened and she pulled her arms away. She sobbed, taking a few shaky breaths. "I don't know if he's alive or dead! And it's all your fault, Austin!"

"I didn't do anything, he did it to himself-"

The bat felt to the ground with a clang as she dropped it in favor of using her fists. This time, the two boys in her group didn't hold her back as she knocked him to the floor and proceeded to make full use of what she learned in her kickboxing classes, landing audible hits to his face and chest

A few teachers managed to force their way through the dense crowd and pulled the two apart. By then, Austin was guaranteed to have a number of bruises rise. They were pulled away from each other, lead to the office on different paths to keep another fight from breaking out, but that didn't keep CJ from shouting.

"YOU'RE A MONSTER, AUSTIN! YOU'RE NOTHING BUT A MONSTER! YOU BETTER WATCH YOUR BACK YOU SON OF A BITCH BECAUSE I'M COMING AFTER YOU!"

ZZZ

It was hard to talk, even after calming down, with everything on her mind. CJ shook from anger in her seat, both in the principals office and on the car ride home. It took a while, and only when her parents arrived she was able to steady her voice to explain why she came storming into school with a baseball bat and the overwhelming desire to beat Austin into another timezone.

Her parents took her home. If she got any punishment, she didn't hear it with the ringing in her ears.

CJ tossed her backpack in the corner and collapsed on her bed, crying her eyes out. She wanted to rush down to the hospital and find out if TJ was okay, if he was still alive. She knew it was bad but she didn't know it was this bad. Bad enough for him to see no other way out. Bad enough for him to do that.

Oh God, she wanted to throw up.

No doubt everyone in school would know by the end of the day, if not sooner. She scoffed. As if they cared. None of them cared, they stood back and watched and laughed. As far as she was concerned, they were just as guilty.

It would be hours before school let out, but she had to tell Robert. he was going to be furious and might put Austin 12 feet under himself. She still wanted to get a few more punches in, and she knew an entire kickboxing team that would love to do the same.

ZZZ

The news spread through the school like a plague, taking precedence over all the usual rumors, gossip, and other middle school concerns.

TJ Detweiler tried to kill himself.

The news made its way to the popular cliques, to the athletes, the geeks, theater freaks, and everyone in between. All the way to the JROTC.

A lot of them didn't go to Third Street Elementary, and therefore didn't know of him until middle school started, but Gus wasn't one of them. While they went through their usual training, today it was learning land navigation, he buckled down, focusing even harder. He had to do his part on his team.

Normally the bespectacled boy would have a conversation with whichever team he was working with on that day, but not today. Not when they were talking about that.

He didn't want to talk about it. He didn't want to think about it. Gus just wanted to practice land navigation and win this game with his team, was that too much to ask for? He didn't want to think about one his former friends, the one who showed him around when he first arrived, the one that was, despite being the same age, was like a big brother to him, having tried to kill himself.

"Hey." Gus looked up from the map. The groups were divided in such a way that there was at least 2 eighth graders in each group. The one that spoke to him also went to Third Street two years ago.

"What?"

"Didn't you used to be friends with Detweiler?" He asked.

"Used to," Gus mumbled. "Not anymore."

"So what do you think-"

"I don't think anything about it, alright?" He snapped, slamming his open palm on the table. "We're not friends! We haven't been friends in a long time, so don't ask me about it! I don't know anything!"

"Alright, alright. Geez, don't gotta be so defensive."

Gus took a deep breath, and picked up his pencil again. He wasn't being defensive. He wasn't. He wasn't. He just wanted to focus on this game and help his team.

ZZZ

"I told him that something like this would happen!"

The locker room before football practice was in an uproar with the news, as one of their own was squarely blamed for it.

"And now look, it happened!" Tanner shouted, slamming his locker shut. "I told him he went too far and now that guy might be dead!"

"Okay, we get it, Tanner! This is bad-"

"Bad? You think this is bad? Austin's gonna get the book thrown at him and so are you guys! It's not like any of you tried to stop him!"

"Hey! You were there, too! You're just trying to cover your own ass!"

While they shouted and screamed at each other, Vince changed in the corner, trying to block it all out, but failing. They were there, they were all there, as Austin went after TJ whenever he could during and after school, with no mercy. It wasn't like they, aside from Tanner and Brendan, told him he should stop. Vince know he didn't.

But he did tell TJ how he could not make himself a target and he didn't take that advice. That was his defense but it was crumbling right in front of him. Would it have made a difference? Austin was ruthless, he probably would've kept going at it regardless.

He should've said something to someone. He saw TJ buying all that stuff at the pharmacy, and didn't stop him. He saw TJ cleaning out his locker, as if he was going to leave, and didn't stop him.

And now here they were, with the news that he tried to kill himself last Friday. While they were at a party having the time of their lives, TJ was busy trying to end his own. And no one know if he managed to do it or now.

Vince slammed his locker shut. This entire situation was fucked up, and that was putting it lightly.

ZZZ