Chapter 7: School.

He entered to the bathroom, stood in front of the sink, opened the cold water, he cupped a little with his hands and put it on his face to wake up, that helped him a little and looked for a towel to dry, he knew that it would not keep him awake a lot of time but it was better that before anything and falling asleep in class. Yesterday the chemistry professor had already scolded him for being distracted in class; he did not want that situation to be repeated that same morning in a different class.

I should never have gone to that party, I'm not strong enough to go to school today but ... I was thinking that if I had not gone I wouldn't have the opportunity to meet that boy with whom I accidentally crashed yesterday a little better, I must admit that the party was not so bad, I made a new friend. I hope to see her again...

Already at school, it was difficult for him to concentrate on classes, and how could it not be difficult to do so if he had spent a large part of the night and early morning away from home? His eyes were half-closed and it seemed that at any moment he would fall asleep in the middle of history class, his mind began to cloud and he no longer listened to the professor, only unintelligible words resonated inside his mind.

"The industrial revolution, as you can see, was divided into two stages. The first occurred between the years 1760 and 1830, it used raw materials such as coal and oil..." said the professor holding the book in his hand while taking notes of what he read on the board.

Everyone was concentrating on what the professor wrote on the board, well, almost everyone, Finn had written half of the sheet of his notebook when his eyes began to close by sleep and his hand was guided by his own stop writing words on the sheet to draw a horizontal line with the blue ballpoint pen.

"Finn Mertens! are you listening to what I said a few minutes ago?" the professor asked scolding him and making him react.

"What?" Finn asked half asleep "where am I? What time is it? I'm not in my home?"

Everyone in the class looked at him strangely and then laughed out loud at the nonsense the teenager was saying while he was asleep. Finn rubbed his eyes to stay awake, looked away from his classmates who were laughing at him and his eyes collided with the serious look of his teacher.

"No, Finn. You're not at home, you are at school and I would appreciate it if you don't fall asleep in my class" the professor replied, the boy did not answer, instead nodded to let the teacher know that he would not fall asleep again in the class.

Later, the bell rang announcing that the first recess began so most of the students left the classroom relieved to at least have a few minutes of rest to do whatever they wanted, some kids walked towards the schoolyard with a few boxes of cigarettes hidden so as not to be seen by the teachers, as soon as he saw the boxes of cigarettes Finn had memories of the party he went to last night, memories that he honestly wanted to erase from his mind but for much that he tried sometimes came images of the green-haired girl and also of the boy he was talking to on the bus while they were on their way to the party came to his mind...Fern ...

He was so distracted thinking about Fern that he did not notice that a group of boys (the same ones who bothered him yesterday in the dining room) passed by him, one of them approached from behind and pushed him to the ground, his backpack was opened and all his stuff came out spilling on the floor.

"Hey kid! look where you walk, will ya?"

"I'm not a kid, I'm sixteen years old" Finn answered a little annoyed at the action his bully had taken.

He tried to sit up recognizing the face of one of the boys who was in the group and it turned out to be the same one who had been bothering him in the dining room, when he finally managed to get away so as not to receive any more intimidation from those guys but a hand took it of the arm and I push him again causing him to fall to the ground again.

"Who told you that you should get up? You're much better on the ground like animals, you're one, and you know that?" The boy commented, nodded to his teammates and they began to distribute blows and kicks all over his body. Finn obviously protected himself as he could but their modes of defense and attack were not very useful, much less being thrown on the ground.

In that moment a girl with red hair like the fire that passed nearby, saw what was happening and quickly came running to help the teenager who was being unfairly beaten by those bullies.

"Hey! What the hell is wrong with them? Leave him alone!" The girl shouted at them, the leader of the group was going to punch her out of her way but she stopped him by holding her fist in her hand "What's your fucking problem? Does it make you happy to hurt the others?"

"No, but if we go to the case, I really enjoy hurting others, beautiful" said the boy with a cynical smile on his face, which annoyed the young woman who released the fist of that bully to kick him in the stomach doing that fell to the ground "ouch why did you do that?"

"You go away from here if you don't want me to call the headmaster" the girl ordered, the boy and his buddies left running from the place, she smiled victorious and then came to help Finn "god, I'm really sorry. They're such idiots" she kneel helping the blond boy to get up, this looking for the place his white hat with bear ears, he found it and put it back on his head "hey, Finn, you know that if they tease you again you can come and ask for help"

"That's nice of you, but I can protect myself, Phoebe" Finn replied laughing nervously but then felt a twinge in his ribs, heavens! Even laughing it hurt.

"Are you okay? I'd better call your mom to come and get you" Phoebe said, she opened her backpack looking for her cell phone to call Minerva, even though the red haired girl was not dating Finn, she still had his mother's phone in case If the boy had a problem, Finn thought it was not necessary, his mother was being very overprotective with him lately "Glob! I forget my phone at home, lend me yours"

"I don't think it's necessary, I'm fine, you don't have to call my mom" Finn answered, trying to convince the girl to avoid calling his mother because of such an embarrassing and shameful situation.

"None of that, you have to go home, Finn. Give me your phone now "said the red haired girl, Finn took his backpack, looked for his phone and when he found it he gave it to his friend, Phoebe looked for the number of Minerva in the list of contacts and dialed waiting for the woman to attend her.

Minerva arrived at school fifteen minutes after Phoebe called her, she got out of the car, went looking for her son and found him with the young red haired girl waiting for her in the entrance of the school, the blonde woman seeing her son hurt, beaten and crestfallen worried, ran to him giving a comforting hug that the kid immediately take it back.

"Finn, I was so worried, lucky that Phoebe called me! Are you Ok? Who did this to you?" Minerva asked, seeing the blows that the teen had received, Finn did not answer, only turned his head down "Finn, I'm your mother and I already told you that if someone was bothering you at school you would tell me, You don't trust me?"

"Um, I'm sorry Finn does not want to talk to you, but if you want I can tell you who caused these blows to Finn" Phoebe said.

"No, it's not necessary, I fell down, mom" Finn answered in his place but his mother did not believe him. How could he make those blows with a simple fall? Something was not right...

"How did you fall? Finn, you already know what happened this morning…"

"Shhh... Shut up, please! Don't make the situation worse" begged the teenager to his red haired friend and returned to see his mother "yes, mom, it's true what I say, I fell"

It was not true what he said, he had not fallen, that same morning after the incident and that Phoebe accompanied him to the bathroom to even wash his wounds, Finn had entered the bathroom being intercepted again by the guys who had just pushed him to the ground and hit him without any consideration.

* Flashback *

Finn was in the bathroom with the open sink, along with water and began to wet his face to wash his wounds and relieve some of the blows he had just received, in that he heard the door of one of the booths open and stay static, he saw through the mirror in the sink that one of the bullies had left the cabin, his blue orbs and those of the boy behind him crossed on the glass of the mirror.

"What do you want?" Finn asked coldly as he continued to deal with his blows "if you come looking for me to continue with your work, forget it, I've had enough with what happened there in the corridor"

He was about to leave but the boy grabbed him by the neck of his blue shirt and pulled him towards him.

"Listen to me, kid. If you get to tell someone that we hit you, we will make you suffer double. Do you understand? When you go with your little friend to see your mommy, tell her you fell down, okay?"

The boy abruptly released the child causing him to fall with another blow, more painful than the previous ones, to the floor; he left there opening the bathroom door with a kick leaving Finn alone in the bathroom with a slight state of shock on his face.

*Flashback end*

"It's okay, Finn, if it's true that you fell I'm not going to insist more on what happened" Minerva said taking the teenager out of his thoughts "let's go home, I have to cure those injuries" turned her gaze back to Phoebe "thank you so much for helping"

"Don't worry, Mrs. Mertens, you know you can always count on me to help Finn with your problems, after all, we're friends and we should be there to help you too, not only should he help us, do not you think?" the girl smiling

"You are quite right" the blonde woman walked away from the building with her son, both got into the car and started on their way home.

On the way home, Finn began to think about everything that had happened to him, rather, what was happening to him, since he had finished elementary school and started high school; most of the boys and girls bothered him. He did what he could to ignore it, sometimes he protect himself by hitting them or pushing him but this time plus what happened in the dining room he could not protect himself properly, he felt like an idiot. Why these things happened to him? He did not understand what he had done to receive that suffering, if only his father was with them, he would probably tell him what to do. He felt his eyes fill with tears, he wanted to cry but he could not do it, he was not even willing to cry in silence, his mother noticed his sadness while driving and when the traffic light turned red she stopped the car to talk to the teenager.

"Finn, is something wrong? Why are you crying?" Minerva asked, looking at her son.

"It's nothing, mom. I'm fine, just... I'm crying because I miss dad, I'd like him to be here with us."

This time, the teen was not lying to her, it was true that he missed his father and wished he could protect him from all those children who bothered him every day, Minerva felt her heart clench when she heard her son speak in that way and remembering her dead husband, she leaned forward a little to hug him in a comforting way.

"Yes, I know, I know that sometimes I deny this but... I miss him too, I would also want him to be with us" the woman said.