And Chapter 12, a bit longer than my regular ones. Also, if anyone actually has any criticism on this I'd happily take it :).
Again, I am not the copyright holder of anything mentioned in this story.
Chapter 12
The day was slow, I was uninterested in lessons and I found myself watching the window as if it were some grand puzzle to spot any possible pursuers. No one came and all I achieved was seeing every shadow as being a massive, seven foot figure ready to jump me, only to find it was a nearby tree or locker casting light onto a neighbouring wall. The overcast sky didn't help matters, the looming black clouds made the dim light ominous and the creeping shadows plenty.
Having to write with a broken arm was also a pain, I never had flawless handwriting in the first place, the arm only added to that.
Eric approached Damien once more, only to be glared at by the crimson eyed teen and surprisingly Eric left it at that, he didn't strike out or even spit angry words. That left a worrying feeling, he wasn't angry, instead he just gave a smug smile.
"Fine."
"Fine?" Replied Damien, casting a glance in my direction, only to be rewarded with shrugged shoulders.
"Yes, fine. You don't want to be associates, I see, you want to side with French. I see." His smug smile grew wider "Be seeing you." Was all he said before he turned and left, his two friends (who Eric had introduced to Damien as Jack and Ryan, he didn't say who was who though.)
"What was that?" Damien asked.
"No idea."
He smiled slightly, a bright glint in his eyes "See, I'm sure he's secretly scared, remember, we're the kings!" He said as he patted me on the shoulder "I don't know why but I think this will be good."
"I don't know."
"When can you? I only guess."
"How often are you right?"
"I've never been around long enough to find out."
"Well, doesn't that just bode good feelings?"
He slipped to his more common sombre tone "I guess you're right, let's just hope I am."
I was on edge, more paranoid than before with the fear of Eric lashing out around; it was hard to predict Eric.
Nothing much else happened though, at least from Eric, at math I found myself awkwardly silent as Kenneth glanced towards me every now and then, a question on his tongue.
For the entire hour we both held our words to ourselves as the teacher, who had next to no self awareness, talked on and on, boring the class from the start to the end. No one had high hopes on succeeding in math.
When the lesson ended Kenneth stood outside of the hoard of leaving students, beckoning me to follow him to the class's side.
"Did you find anything about that Damien guy?" He whispered as we tailed the thinning group. Damien was out of sight.
"Um… Well, I'm sure that he's not… um… against us."
"Why do you say that?"
"He's uh, had to deal with this for a while."
"What, psychopaths following him, really?" he said, his disbelief as thick as oil.
"Apparently, and I uh, don't want to upset you but I don't think he's with them. I mean… What do you think?"
"I think I need to have a sit down at the back of the school, care to join?" He said. Even I knew that he meant he was going for a smoke.
"I um, I won't be having any."
"I didn't expect you to."
"Oh, Uhh ok, fine by me then."
The feeling returned when we walked, single file through the corridors, the feeling of watching, spying, and invisible eyes.
It wasn't possible for them to be in the school though, there wasn't security because the teachers would have seen someone unusual in the school and sent them away.
'Is it actually the teachers, is it everyone who's following me… watching me.'
"Kenneth, o'l chap" I whispered. "Do you feel as… as if someone's watching us?"
He retorted with a raised eyebrow. "No, don't worry, if someone is, they won't get anything from it." he smirked and sarcastically continued "Oh no, they know where me and the emos that carry knives around hang out… by god."
"I guess you're right."
"Yeah, don't worry, although if it is true, you're probably the only guy to get a fan club this fast. Congrats to that; it's only sad that your fanclub is a bunch of stalkers."
For the duration of the walk the ever present watchful orbs bore their burning gaze into my back. My hairs stood erect and gooseflesh riddled my arms. I felt as if it were not a man behind me, but some psionic creature that was attempting to break my mind and my will. That assumption was the maddest one yet.
We quickly reached the back of the school's main building, it was mostly a road for deliveries to be driven down to the Cafeteria but its infrequent use had made it a prime target for the social outcasts who hated both society, and themselves to wallow in self pity.
There were six people at the schools back, I had not the slightest inkling to their names but they all were dressed in 'edgy' black clothing that would make them a living sauna if a summer's day were to ever be warm. Their hair was either dyed a dark black that went unfitting to their artificially painted white skin or an equally unfitting variety of dark colours. Kenneth didn't say anything and they glared but after a minute or so they ignored us.
I found it funny that Damien's eyes invoked more occult terror than the Goths hours of vain preparation.
Me and Kenneth sat on the opposite side of the road, on the small amount of concrete that made an abandoned pathway. From his backpack he brought out a red and white packet that read 'Marlboro' on the front. It wasn't the cigarettes that surprised me (They were easier to find than blades of grass) it was that he brought out a golden flip lighter that shined against the sunlight. It looked authentic, not 24 carets but somewhere close. It seemed eons away from his or his family's price range.
For a second he let the lighter stay lit before he turned it off in conversation of the fuel.
"They weren't there yesterday."
"The… The Fanatics?"
"That's a good name for them."
"Why um… weren't they there?"
"Hell if I know, but I didn't see them, and trust me I looked." he smirked "Had my dad's gun with me as well, who would've guessed the day I was prepared was the day they decided to leave me alone."
"You're… Y-You're dad's gun?"
".45 automatic handgun, stupid prick doesn't know that the model of handgun you own should not be your two digit peice of shit lock."
"Oh, you… you weren't going to use that… right?"
"Right? Fuck that, if they got a step towards me or Karen they'd be missing a fucking lung!" He exclaimed, taking a drag of his smoke and glaring at the ground For a second or two, as if it were the face of one of The Fanatics. He turned back to me and continued "So Damien's cool?"
"Yeah, he's uh… yeah, cool, he's good."
"I'm taking you on that." He took a glance at his phone, a model that would be considered archaic to some. "Also… I guess I'll be seeing you on Thursday by the way."
"Thursday?"
"Remember, tutoring on math?" He said with a wide smile that was entirely genuine and happy. I didn't enjoy the remainder of my lie though. "And it's the only day I'm not occupied" He continued, knowing his reputation I presumed it was mostly of a sexual nature.
"Oh right, that, I almost forgot."
I felt the eyes again and whipped my head around to see the goths glaring at me.
Kenneth placed his hand on my shoulder.
"Don't worry about them Pip, this has got you really fucking jumpy hasn't it? They'll fuck of eventually; you're just a new conformist… I still have no fucking idea to what that means."
"Right o." I replied only to be answered with a snicker.
"You're never going to stop those aren't you?" Said Kenneth.
"Oh, I… I can stop!"
"Don't! Please don't. it's, damn it's fucking cute."
"Pardon!?"
"I said it's fucking cute, livens up the fucking depressing atmosphere, it's like Kyle going on and on about random bullshit." He laughed, the goth's glare hardened, they were probably just unhappy that Kenneth was finding something funny. "Speaking of Kyle, I've got to catch up with him, wanna join; maybe we'll find Damien on the way."
"S-sure."
He raised and dropped the butt of his cigarette to the ground and stomped on it to extinguish the last of the red embers.
"Thank fuck for natural charisma."
"Natural charisma?" I asked.
"If it were anyone else you probably would have declined, but thanks to my good old natural charisma you agreed."
"Oh, right." I still didn't think he was… entirely sane, but who was?
"How else do you think I get in bed with so many people, it isn't only good looks, you've gotta have something else otherwise you're never getting any." He said. I'd have been embarrassed thoroughly if I'd said that but from him it sounded like he was joking.
"I… I guess that makes sense… Um, may I ask but, where actually are we going to go?"
"Yes you may ask." He said with a smirk "We're heading to Mr Hedgesons room; he lets us hang there without interruption. Mostly for Kyle to study though."
"Oh… I never knew that."
"Hardly anyone does, it's why Kyle's so good at not getting pissed at the fat-ass."
"Oh, well thank you for taking me-" I said but stopped as I felt the eyes once again. The third time in break alone. Although my pursuer was seen as I turned sharply to find Damien walking towards me from the other end of the hall.
"Told you we'd run into him."
We met up with him halfway across the hall, having to keep to the side to allow other students to pass.
"You're Kenneth, right?" asked Damien.
"It's Kenny, Pip over here can say it but two people's a bit too much."
"Right, Kenny." He turned to me "Where are you going anyway, I didn't see you out of math."
"Yeah, we were just organising the tutoring thing." Kenny explained, a calm and inviting smile on his lips. "Sorry for pulling him away from you. We're heading to the room that me and my friends hang in, wanna join?"
"Got nothing better to do, Phillip's pretty much my only friend here, although we only have like, five minutes."
"It'll be good to know where it is." Kenneth said.
"Makes sense." Damien Replied.
'He does have that natural charisma. Or he's just a really good liar.'
"It's… uh, Mr Hedgesons room… The man we have for English."
"ah, cool, what do we have next?"
"English." Kenneth replied comically.
As we walked Damien dragged me a few steps behind Kenneth.
"I see you've got a new friend. Maybe I'm right, maybe things are getting better?"
"Uh, it's, uh, pretty much thanks to you." It was, if he hadn't brought The Fanatics with him, Kenneth wouldn't have talked with me.
"Do you think it's… safe though, with… Ya know, them?" He said, spitting the final word like a disgusting food.
"Yeah, I know he… he can look after himself well, he uh… didn't grow up in the nicest part of town."
A flash of recognition beaming in Damien's eyes.
"Ah, good."
Not much happened for the next two lessons, in English me and Damien shared whispered conversations and in Spanish I found myself silent and Ignored.
At lunch I made my way to the room, and realised that even when walking with a limp and a broken arm, the need to mock still fuelled some. I counted three whacks to the back of the head, two trips and a glare and a few threats from Trent, who still felt the need to intimidate me further.
When I got to the room It was lit up but only one person was in there: Kyle Brofloski, sitting in the same spot he did for English, right in the center of the room. He was reading a large textbook that I couldn't define from so far away.
I knocked on the door a few times and he was quickly brought out of his concentration. When he caught my look he motioned me to come inside.
It was strange to see the room so desolate; I was used to seeing it with people in. So when there was only two people it seemed like an empty church in comparison to its normal appearance.
"Kenny said you'd be here, come in and sit down. It's good to get someone different. Is your arm ok?"
"Yeah, it's fine." I said as I placed myself in my seat and Kyle got back to his book. Much like everyone else he retained the same look of his childhood, same green ushanka and coat, the only real difference was a shorter hair cut and some thin spectacles that rested down the bridge of his nose that he kept pushing up with his middle finger.
"So where's my other favourite homosexual." Kenny declared, quickly pushing open the door and catching me by surprise. He had his arms spread like he was ready to hug the air and the same wide smile. Damien was behind him, looking curiously over to me.
"Fuck off." Kyle instantly retorted as if this was a daily routine. It probably was. "Either getting food of pleading to Sprite." He continued "I'm never going to know why he took Geography."
"Isn't it her time of the month?" Kenneth asked, sitting next to Kyle as Damien did the same with me.
"Probably, wouldn't surprise me." Kyle said.
"Who?" questioned Damien.
"Miss Sprite, the Geography teacher, massive bitch." Kenneth answered.
"Oh, I've got Miss Sheffield."
"Lucky bastard." Said Kenneth.
"I guess she's ok."
"At least you've got the hot one."
"And I quote 'I'd plow that any day'" Kyle said, rising from his book to look flatly at Kenny.
"That was before we realised she was a massive bitch." Kenneth answer only to be met with rolled eyes. "Anyway, you're free to hang here any time, be it you don't interrupt the two homosexuals make out session-"
"Fuck. Off. He's lying about that by the way." Kyle interrupted.
"Got it." Damien said.
"Whatever, interrupt them if you want to, they'll be the ones complaining."
"There will be no reason for people to complain, and, Pip, I hear you're giving Kenny tutoring. Thank you, he might actually learn something."
"Hey, I can learn things."
"Sure." Kyle said with a smirk.
"Bastard."
Kyle gave a short, stifled laugh before moving from his book to me and Damien once more.
"Sorry if this is not as exciting as you may have thought but it sure beats the hell out of the cold."
"That's true." Damien smoothly replied' "Then again, pretty much anything does."
"Very true, just wait till Stan's here."
"Because we all know he's just the life of the party." Kenneth replied sarcastically.
"What? And I am."
"No, I am."
"Whatever." Kyle said, finishing the conversation to flip a page and move on to more revision.
Kenneth leaned back in the chair and turned to us "So how are you enjoying the fair school?".
"I'm not." Replied Damien.
"No surprise there, then again-" Kenneth was cut off by Stan who quickly entered the room, slamming the door behind him.
"What'd the bitch do?" Kenneth casually said.
"REDUCED THE TIME TO GIVE IN MY DAMN HOMEWORK."
"Well, that fucking sucks. Isn't that like… Illegal?"
"No. But a mean move." Added Kyle.
Stan's eyes fell on us two and he quickly sobered from his anger like he'd been shot.
"Oh, hey, how are you doing?"
"Good." Damien said. "What homework was it you had to do?"
"I think it was on… landmarks or some really easy thing like that."
"Why the hell didn't you do it then!?" Said Kyle.
"Because… Because I lost the sheet." Said Stan, rather embarrassed as Damien began rifling through his bag and Kenneth began laughing a long and resonating laugh.
"When have you got to have it in by?" Asked Damien.
"Next lesson." Stan replied and Kenneth laughed harder.
"Here, I think Miss Sheffield gave us the same task. I'll get another sheet when I see her next."
"Jesus, thanks man." Said Stan as he gladly took the sheet of paper. "When have you got to hand it in?"
"Next week, but like you said, it's easy, so it's fine."
"Seriously, thanks man, I owe you one."
"Not a problem. Really."
Stan smiled, wide and toothy. "Seriously, you have no idea how much she'd bitch next lesson if I didn't have this."
"Again, it's no problem, it's not like it's a loss to me."
The rest of lunch was rather uneventful, even though we were in the same room me and Damien were mostly by ourselves and Stan and Kyle conversed with themselves while Kenneth seemingly split to either conversation whenever it suited him. It was calm though and was much better than hiding in the shadows from Trent or Eric.
When the day ended me and Damien left the school together to head to Damien's house and await Lucas's arrival.
When we entered his house it was to a rather well
furnished living room, with two red sofas facing a large flat screen TV, a stairway upstairs to the far right with a door to the basement underneath and at the far end of the room was a door to what I could guess was the kitchen. The cabinet that held all sorts of electronic devices, I could only recognise the cd player and dvd player. I think there was also a VHS player behind some of the piled electronic boxes.
"Not what you'd expect is it?" Damien said as he began walking up the stairs. "Everyone expects inverted crosses and goat's heads. But dad keeps all that stuff to himself. Thank god is what I say."
"Why?"
We had moved up to the second floor which was in the shape of an inverted L with three doors to the long end and one to the short. Damien led me to the last on the left.
His room was rather barren, painted a pale blue with a red carpet, there was a simple wardrobe, a bed in the room's center with draws and a TV to the bed's right. There was a game console hooked up to the TV that held a thin layer of dust. To the opposite side was a desk and computer. On his bed was a laptop left on the green sheets.
"How long do you think until your dad will get here?"
"Two hours or so."
"Will we be ok until then?"
"Probably, the most dangerous of them have been in jail for a long time."
"How… I'm sorry but how dangerous have they been?"
"It's no problem. You know this?" He said, moving his neck to the side so that the 666 marking on his neck could be seen.
"Yes. Yes I do."
"It's not a tattoo; The Psychos burnt it on me. It never got fully looked at so it's stuck looking black for some years."
"They burnt it on you! Jesus!" I exclaimed.
"Yeah, wasn't fun, this was back when it all first began. Happened just before they dragged me out of our burning house. to tell if I was holy or not, apparently… It hurt. Really hurt."
"Oh… I'm sorry."
He looked down at the ground "It's fine, don't worry, it happened." he sighed "things happen."
"I'm still sorry that it had to happen."
"There's no need and anyways, it turned out good for you… at least in some ways."
"What do you mean?"
"Well if it hadn't happened then you wouldn't have met me and… well I don't know what that would be like. I've found myself quite liking you."
"Oh… well certainly you had better friends. Didn't you say that the ones you used to have were loyal?"
"Yeah, but who knows what they're like now, at least I know you're not a complete prick."
"Wouldn't it be better if they didn't come after you though?"
"Well yeah but who knows, maybe it brought the best thing in my life?"
"It brought you to this town; it definitely didn't do the best thing in your life."
"You've stopped me there."
"I'm sorry."
"It's no problem."
We were quite for a long while after that, an awkward quiet that made me wish for the feeling of watching eyes to reapear just so I'd have a conversation topic.
Then I remembered.
'Bugger, what about Kenneth!'
"Hey, Damien?"
"Yes?"
"What do you think the police are going to do about this?"
"Probably station a car around the house to make sure no one tries to kill either me or you."
"Oh… um… cool."
"Why?"
'I can trust him.'
"Kenneth came to me a few days ago…" I whispered lowly.
"You're not telling me that?-"
"He said he was being watched.-"
"FUCK!" Damien quickly shouted at the top of his lungs, falling backwards onto his bed and gripping onto his hair. "You're not shitting me are you? No. No you're not. Fucking Hell."
"Damien?"
"Do you know how to get a hold of him?"
"I know where he lives."
"That's good enough."
"Pardon?"
"We've still got two hours." He gave a small, fake smile "How many people am I going to accidentally drag into this shit. We're going to have to get him." He said before we left the house.
