Four weeks passed and I could honestly say that the taunting turned to terrorising. I couldn't walk down the hallways or into a classroom without people whispering or having something thrown at me. The worst one was two weeks before, I'd arrived to gym a few minutes late and everyone had already gone in.

*Flashback*

As I arrived at the changing rooms I heard the usual loud chatter and laughter from the girls inside. I took a shaky breath, preparing myself for the abuse I would be receiving upon walking in. Approaching the door I noticed a large piece of paper taped to it with my name standing out.

"Official petition to keep Mitchie Dyke Torres from changing with us", followed by around thirty signatures. There were only thirty three people in the class including me, Jodie and Alicia. Everyone had signed it. I tore it down in frustration as the PE teacher, Coach Lister, approached with a mug of coffee, talking rapidly to a music teacher.

"Torres, why aren't you changed yet?" She yelled at me when she noticed that I was standing there. I turned around to face her and she must have noticed the tears in my eyes as the hard look on her face softened to one of concern. "Are you okay?" She asked as she put a relatively comforting hand on my shoulder. I shook my head and showed her the piece of paper.

"I am not going in there. Give me detention if you want but I'm not going in, I am not going to put up with shit like that." I told her firmly, standing my ground and thinking of how I could get out of it if she tried to make me. Looking up at her, I noticed that she had an understanding look on her face as she shook her head softly.

"I don't expect you to, go to the counsellor and she'll take care of you. I'll speak to the girls, take that with you and show her." And with that she went inside the room. I vaguely heard her screaming at the girls through the closed door but my mind was so distorted at the time that I could barely make out what she way saying to them.

After that Mrs Goldman offered to call my mom but I told her not to and she sent me home instead, so I went to Alex's and waited for her to come home from school for our regularly occurring half-hour make-out session before work. Coach Lister told me that she made the girls run laps every gym lesson that week as a punishment and afterwards I was permanently excused from PE, I used my newfound free period to text Alex and get ahead on English work; I'd inherited my passion for the subject from my mom which I supposed I was grateful for as I had constant help available to me.

It was the beginning on November, Alex and I had been on eleven other dates when we were both free after the first one and we had planned another one for after school on Friday. I was going to be sleeping at her apartment and we were going to the local ice-rink for couples' night.

"Mom!" I called out to her from my room, it was nearly time for me to leave for school and I was yet to ask her if it was okay for me to go out with Alex. She appeared in the doorway of my room and I closed the door leading to my balcony where I'd just had my morning cigarette. "Is it okay for me to go out tonight and stay at Lexi's?" I asked her hopefully with an innocent smile.

"Okay, firstly, you can't pull off the innocent smile when you smell like an ashtray. Secondly, I'm not really sure. You've been saying you're spending so much time with this girl and I've never even met her, I'm starting to doubt where you're really going." She said as she sat down on my bed. I turned to the mirror and continued to pencil on my eyebrows which I'd been doing before going outside. "Mitchie, I want you to tell me the truth," She began slowly, leaning back against my pillows and somewhat relaxing into the warm comfort that they provided. "Are you meeting a boy?" She asked worriedly. I bit back a laugh and nearly slipped with my eyebrow pencil; turning to face her, I put the cap back on my pencil and shook my head.

"No, mom, I swear I'm just going out with Lexi. We're going skating then we're going back to hers to watch a couple of films and eat." I explained honestly, leaving out the part about it being a date. She eyed me suspiciously, unconvinced. "When she picks me up after school I'll call you and you can speak to her so you'll know that I'm with her." I suggested, that being the best thing that I could think of.

"No need, I'll call you around twelve, you should be back at hers by then, right?" She checked, pulling at the collar of her pale blue blouse and scratching her left leg with her right foot. I nodded and she carried on, "Okay then, you can go."

I grinned at her then turned to check myself in the full-length mirror. The school uniform was still taking some getting used to. I straightened my navy blue blazer, pale blue shirt and black pencil skirt then pulled at my tights to make sure they made my legs look an even colour. Slipping my black stiletto school shoes on, I heard my phone vibrating on my desk and answered it whilst my mom was still in my room.

"Hello?" I asked into the speaker, not having bothered to have looked at the caller ID.

"Hey bitch, I'm outside," Jodie's voice rang through my speaker. Since Alex was picking me up from school I wasn't going to be able to drive there with no way of getting my car home so Jodie had agreed to pick me up on her way. "You got five minutes then I'm leaving whether you're in the car or not."

"All right slut, keep your panties on." I laughed into the phone and earned a disapproving look from my mom. "I'll be there in a few." I told her before hanging up. "What?" I turned to my mom, unsure of why she was giving me the look.

"Language," She warned me, causing me to roll my eyes at her. "Mitchie, I can deal with the smoking and the occasional drink but you know how much I hate swearing. How is Lexi picking you up if she finishes school around the same time as you?" She asked me curiously. I shrugged.

"I dunno, probably forged a note or something to leave early… actually, knowing her, she probably manipulated her mom into writing one for her." I told my shocked looking mother casually. She shook her head and left the room in front of me. I clicked the newly replaced lock on my door and took the key out of it, dropping it into my purse. "See you later," I kissed my mom's cheek then headed downstairs and outside to the impatient Jodie.

At the end of the day Alex was right where she said she would be, standing outside the school gate, leaning against it with one foot resting against it. She was smoking a cigarette and as soon as I caught her eye amongst the crowd of girls she grinned and walked over to me.

"Hey beautiful," she greeted me, pulling me in for a lingering kiss. I felt someone forcefully shove into my shoulder, ripping me from my kiss with Alex and looked up to my left to find Courtney and Ashley laughing hysterically. Alex took my hand and pulled me up from the ground where I'd fell thanks to my unstable heels then turned to Courtney and Ashley. "What the hell was that?" She whispered to me, handing me her cigarette which I accepted gratefully, puffing away at it almost instantly.

"Nothing, I'm used to it."

"Well you shouldn't be!" She almost shouted at me, turning to Courtney and Ashley who were holding their stomachs laughing. "What the hell is your problem?" She shouted at them, walking angrily over to them, balling her fists and getting close to the both of them with me hot on her tail.

"Lexi, leave it." I hissed at her, not wanting any more trouble than I was already getting. She ignored me completely when Ashley answered; clearly it was her that shoved me.

"You two are disgusting, your dirty girlfriend and you both belong on the ground." She replied cockily to Alex. Before I could even register what had happened Alex's balled up fist connected with Ashley's cheek and she stumbled back to the floor, clutching her reddened cheek in her hand. Alex made a hocking up noise and spat at Ashley, her saliva landing in her white-blonde hair.

"You so much as look at my girl again and I'll bury you. Both of you, because I know you're not innocent in any of this," She threatened them menacingly, directing the final part of her almost demonic threat toward the concerned friend of Ashley's. Courtney was too shocked to argue back, it seemed, as she crouched down to Ashley's level to make sure she was okay. "Come on babe, let's go." Alex ordered me firmly, wrapping her arm around my waist and guiding me away from the scene.

"Thank you," I mumbled into her shoulder as I rested my head there. I shivered slightly from the cold November air as we walked the twenty minute distance to her apartment.

"You're more than welcome, baby. Are you cold?" She asked, obviously feeling me shiver against her. I nodded into her neck and she pulled away, taking her blazer off and handing it to me, leaving her in just a thin short-sleeved school shirt. I gratefully accepted and put it on over my own blazer, buttoning it up in an attempt to keep myself warm.

"Now you'll be cold," I stated tiredly, repositioning my head back onto her shoulder.

"I don't mind, as long as you're warm."

"So adorable," I commented as a car drove by and beeped its horn at us. We both giggled and talked randomly as we approached her apartment. I pulled myself away from her before we went inside her home, knowing full well that her parents were still oblivious to the fact that we were dating.

We went up to her room and warmed up, Alex and I got changed and ready for our date, then went downstairs to the living room. It was six o'clock by the time we were ready to leave and the couples' session at the ice rink didn't start until seven. I looked in the mirror on the way down the stairs at what I was wearing; a knee-length ruffle skirt, a pale green tight-fitting t-shirt and a washed-out blue denim waistcoat with black tights.

We sat on the couch whilst Alex's mom messed around in the kitchen, tidying it up and cleaning the dishes. Alex was wearing baggy black jeans and a red and white striped jumper with a light grey jacket, the top of her underwear was showing above the waistband of her jeans and I couldn't resist giving her a wedgie. She yelped out in shock, clearly not expecting me to do it, and quickly pulled it out again. "You bitch!" She gasped at me as I laughed uncontrollably at her having her hand down her pants, frustratedly trying to remove the newly positioned cotton.

"Sorry babe, I just couldn't resist. Pull your pants up; having your superman boxers on show doesn't exactly look great." I winked at her and moved so my feet were on her lap and my head was resting against a pillow. Automatically Alex started to knead her thumb, pointer finger and middle finger into my sore feet. Wearing nothing but heels almost every day since I was about thirteen was finally catching up with me.

I moaned in pleasure as she relaxed the sore parts and her mom looked at us questioningly before turning back to what she was doing.

At some point I fell asleep because I woke up to Alex shaking me lightly to wake me up.

"Mitch, we need to go," She whispered to me. I groaned and focused my vision on the clock that was resting on the wall; seven ten. I quickly stood up and got a slight head rush from standing too fast. I steadied myself on Alex's shoulder and put on my shoes which were next to where I was lying on the orange couch. "Why do you keep wearing stupidly high heels? You're shredding your feet; I could literally feel how much pain you were in earlier." She lectured me the rest of the way to the car, constantly glaring at my brown wedges as if she was waiting for them to jump up and begin stabbing her with an axe. I shrugged or grunted every few sentences to keep letting her know that I wasn't ignoring her until we got in to her car.

We smoked in the car and by the time we'd finished we had arrived at the ice-rink. We went inside and Alex paid, getting two pairs of skates in exchange for our shoes.

The whole time there was loud music blasting and couples kissing whilst they skated round in circles, us being one of the couples. Considering that we were the only same-sex couple there, we didn't receive too many odd looks or discrete whispers.

It finished at eleven thirty and by twelve we were in Alex's bed, I was wearing a pink nightdress and she was wearing an oversized black Paramore shirt with Hayley Williams' stunning face staring back at me. A little after twelve o'clock my phone started to vibrate against the nightstand, causing a heavy rippling sound to project around the cosy bedroom. It was my mom. Before I answered I sat up and looked at Alex who previously had her arms wrapped around my waist and her front pressed to my back. "My mom wants to speak to you to check I'm with you because she's getting suspicious," I warned her. She sat up too and cleared her throat to ensure that her voice wasn't groggy. She nodded to say yes and I quickly slid my thumb across the screen to answer the incoming call. "Hey mom," I said into the speaker. "Did you want to speak to Lexi?" I asked her knowingly, before she even had a chance to respond to my probably too upbeat greeting.

"Please, Mitch."

I put her on speaker phone and Alex said 'hello,' "Hello, I'm Sonny, Mitchie's mom, is this Lexi?" My mom questioned unsurely.

"Yes, ma'am," Alex replied politely. I'd never seen the polite side of her; I almost couldn't help but laugh loudly. "Mitchie and I are back at my house now and I'll drive her home in the morning whenever is convenient for you." Alex told my mom kindly, I was genuinely shocked at this side of her.

"Whenever you're ready is fine, honey. Have a nice night girls!" My mom called into the speaker, she was clearly content that I was actually where I told her I was. "I love you, Mitch."

"Love you too, mom." I replied, boredom evident in my voice, rolling my eyes to Alex who giggled. I hung up quickly before she could ask any more questions and put my phone back onto the nightstand. "Kiss ass." I muttered to Alex as we both snuggled back down under the covers. We got back in to our previous position and she began tracing spirals on my stomach through the thin fabric of my nightdress.

"Kiss me." She corrected suggestively, causing me to turn around in her embrace and press my lips softly to hers.

As her hands roamed up and down my sides, I tangled mine in her hair and tugged at it slightly, causing a moan to erupt from her throat.

After a few minutes we pulled apart, keeping our faces as close together as physically possible without actually kissing and panting heavily due to a previous limit on air. "Be my girlfriend," She murmured, causing my eyes to snap open to meet her dark, mysteriously beautiful ones. "Seriously." She added to dismiss any confusion that may have been present. I didn't even have to think about it before I nodded eagerly.

"Absolutely."