"I'll pick you up after school, kid." My mom said with a smile. "Unless, I get a call telling me to pick you up cause you got in a fight again." I stared at my mom's excitement before shaking my head and getting out, slipping the strap of my messenger bag over my head.

"I'll see you, mom." I said with a wave before she left. I slowly turned back toward my school and took a deep breath before heading into the front doors. The Crefeld School was one of those schools where they pride themselves on being accepting of all applicants, while still keeping a level of academic success in each student. They based it on the average GPA of each student which was higher than most schools in the area. The rumor is that the schoolwork is some of the easiest stuff to ever grace a bookbag and that the faculty is more focused on making money and being prestigious than it is actually teaching students. There were teachers that like challenging students, but they were few and far between on the average student schedule.

The campus itself was large and it allowed for a slew of extra-curriculars from Frisbee team to glassblowing to martial arts. I know that it sounds more like Summer camp then school, but it is a school. The school made its best effort to seem appealing and to look like a school that was all about college preparation, but it was a business through and through. In Eighth grade I made an art project in the glass blowing studio and they sold it. If you're thinking that I saw any of that money, then you're kidding yourself.

Anyway, as I walked into the front doors, the sudden change of environment flooded my sensory. Dull fluorescent lighting in a dull hallway lined with dull gray lockers. Cliques of students already sectioned off and forming unwelcoming social circles throughout the corridor. Unfortunately, my first class was at the end of the hallway. I say unfortunately because as soon as someone saw me, a strange hum swept down the hallway starting at one end and moving like a tidal wave down the hallway to the opposite end.

Faces popped up in the miscellaneous groups all to look at me, the kid who put a guy in the hospital last night. My walk to class became a walk of shame, a certain group of cheerleaders, centered around Carly Dixon, Eli and Robert's girlfriend. You may be confused, but let me explain. Carly has been dating Robert since grade 4, but ever since she got into high school she's been dating Eli. Not dating Eli instead of Robert. I mean, dating Eli as well as Robert. Neither of them now that they have the same girlfriend.

I walked past the JV cheer squad and stared at the ground, trying not to focus on how many people were actually looking at me. I weaved past Little South America, where a high concentration of the school's Hispanic population hung out, and stopped at my locker. Before you think I'm being offensive, it's their name for it. Not mine. Pequeño Sudamérica. They even have a sign and everything.

I opened up my locker and grabbed my Latin textbook and my shop folder, slipping them into my bag. I closed my locker and returned to my walk of shame only to bump into my locker neighbor, Lindsey Blackman. I quickly caught her as she started to fall and stood her back up awkwardly before retracting my hands and trying to not die of embarrassment.

"Uh…sorry." I mumbled before venturing a glance up at her where she looked at me oddly. She didn't say anything or at least I didn't give her a chance too before I left the disaster area and started down the hall again. I had a zone of hushed whispering following me as I moved down the hall. In a way this made things easier because it seemed like no one wanted to touch me. A nice aisle of humiliation formed in front of me, as I walked. I finally reached my Latin class and walked in, taking my seat near the back of the class. I pulled out my textbook and my notebook. I flipped past all of the random doodles and finally landed on the most recent sketch I had been working on, which was conveniently a T-Rex devouring my Latin teacher, Dr. Koorbaum.

"My sentiments exactly." I halted my shading on the dinosaur's tail and looked over to see Freddy take a seat next to me. He was smiling at me and down at my notebook, his curly black hair, pushed down by the fedora on his head, obscuring his eyes enough to make it difficult to tell if he was sincere or not. I looked around the room and found it empty, making me curious why the school mascot was choosing today to talk to me.

"I'm sorry?" I said after a moment, turning in my desk slightly.

"I wish a T-Rex would eat Koorbaum, too. Latin is boring enough as is without him teaching it." Freddy said, adjusting the fedora on his head a little bit down on his head.

"This is kind of a crappy way to start the day, isn't it?" I said with a small laugh before turning back to my notebook. The room was silent except for the hum of the lights. I could feel Freddy looking at me, so I turned back to him. "Do you have this class, too?"

"No. Absolutely not. I already know Latin."

"Then….Why are you here?"

"Oh! I was…I was just coming in to talk to you. I thought that maybe we should get to know each other."

"Hey, you know…I totally get if you're…you know…'wearing a green carnation,' but I don't…"

"What do you mean?"

"Playing for the other team? Hitting left handed? Flying the rainbow flag?"

"Oh, my gods, no. No, no, no. That's not what I meant. I mean, I've got—No." Freddy took a second and a deep breath. "I've seen that you don't really have friends around here, so I thought I'd say hi." My fists clenched a little when he said I didn't have any friends. He was right, but it still hurt.

"What, so I'm some charity case?" I said angrily. "Make friends with the kid, so you can get some brownie points into heaven? Is that it?"

"No, that's not what I meant at all! I just thought that—"

"Freddy, what are you doing hanging out with this kid?" I looked up and saw Jacob Markinson walk in, followed by his band of flunkies. "He bothering you or something?"

"No, man. We were just talking." Freddy said, standing up and looking at Peter. Peter gripped his desk tightly, taking deep breaths. I could feel my body getting hot again, but I reminded myself of what happened yesterday and calmed down a little. "Peter and I are friends, right, Petey?"

"You gotta stay away from him, Freddy." Jacob said, stepping in front of him and ducking down to get in my face.

"I'm not gonna hurt anybody." I said. I wasn't sure if it was to myself or if it was to Jacob, but apparently Jacob thought otherwise.

"You hear this? He's making threats. Like a crazy person." Jacob said with a laugh, standing up and pointing at me to his friends who laughed along with him. "Maybe it's from that mom of his."

"Hey, Jacob, how about you just cut him a break this time?" Freddy said with a nod. So, Freddy though I was unhinged, too. He was claiming to be on my side. My body heated up again and it felt like my fingers were sinking into the metal leg of the desk.

"I'd like to see him try and hurt me. Come on. Try it you little bit—" Before he could finish I had flung my desk against the wall and found myself holding one of the legs, raised to bash Jacob's head in. I opened my eyes and looked into his and all I saw was surprise. Some strange mix of shock and terror. This wasn't me. I was just the kid that no one paid attention to. Bullying glanced off me like bullets did Superman. This wasn't me. I dropped the leg of the desk and quickly grabbed my bag before beating a hasty retreat out of the classroom.

I ran. It felt like I ran for a while. I mean, I wasn't in good shape by any meaning of the word. I was tall and lanky, but there wasn't an ounce of muscle on me and the only exercise I regularly got was walking up and down the stairs to get food and bring it up to my room. When I stopped running, I was on the side of the athletic building. There were four buildings to the campus: The main academic building, where I went Incredible Hulk on a school desk, the cafeteria, the arts and studios building, and the athletic building where I was currently.

I took a moment to catch my breath, putting my hand on the brick building, so I could lean against it. I ran my other hand through my head, but stopped quickly when I felt something strange. I moved my hand against the bricks and heard what sounded like metal scraping against it. I hesitantly moved my hand away and jumped a little when I saw shiny metal stuck to my hand like dripped on melted candle wax that had hardened, making an imprint of my skin.

"Well, this is weird." I mumbled, my eyes like saucers as I started to pull the metal off. My hand underneath was red, but other than that it was seemingly unharmed. My mind swam with images, replaying what had just happened in my head. I ripped off the leg of the desk. But what if I didn't rip it off? What if I melted it then pulled it away? What am I thinking? I can't melt metal with my bare hands. I can't do anything with my bare hands. I wiped my hand off on my jeans then sat down against the wall, staring at my hands. I grabbed the mold of my hand off the ground and looked at it, confused mostly. There was a perfectly logical explanation as to why I was able to tear the leg off a desk, throw the desk at a wall, and have my hand look like it had aluminum foil melted onto it. Whatever that explanation happened to be was a totally mystery to me.

That spot against the wall was where I spent almost all of that morning. Unsurprisingly, no one came looking. I didn't receive any phone calls, not that I would have heard them considering I was playing Temple Run the whole time. I stayed there, alternating between thinking about if I were some kind of freak and this was just my superhero origin story or if I was simply losing my mind.