Lunch was coming to its end, which meant that me and The Misfits were all crowding around Erion's locker. Erion was a nice dude, he was always wearing proper clothes, such as turtlenecks, suit-jackets, knitted sweaters and so on. He had glasses, dark brown hair that was always swept over his head in a fancy manner, and had overall a mature feeling surrounding him. We were located here since it was time for the daily "gum pause" as Odd had started to call it. Since Erion and Manfred were the only ones that bought chewing gum, they were the ones attacked by the others at the end of lunch. Every. Day. Manfred hadn't had the time to buy new gum, so Erion became the victim.

Speaking of Manfred, he hadn't stopped giving me worried glances since we left the bathroom. I appreciated that he didn't continue questioning me, but his mother-hen way of acting was grating on my nerves. I pulled on my sleeves again, it felt like they were crawling up my arms, wanting to expose my bandaged wrist to the world. Manfred was already too worried, he shouldn't have to worry even more.

The bell rang its shrill sound once again so we bid our goodbyes and split up. I looked at my schedule, only litterature left. I sighed heavily. Eric hadn't showed up, and he hadn't texted me since friday, before the party. Dragging my feet after me, I walked towards the classroom. For one reason or another the architects thought it was a good idea to make the school so big, that some classrooms were located several minutes away from each other. Which made me believe that they thought PE wasn't enough for us students. I passed the courtyard, and couldn't help but look if Eric was there. He wasn't. Sighing once more I kept on walking.

Suddenly I felt someone grab me by my hair, tucking my head in between the arm and the ribs. My hands instantly flew to my head, grabbing the hands as to prevent them from ripping the hair off my scalp. I glanced up, and to my horror I saw Joseph. One of the jocks that just loved to cause me pain. It suddenly felt useless to try to fight back. Monday were the day that I had most subject, which meant that my bag was extremely heavy. I stumbled after him as he dragged me out of the school, not stopping until we were far away from teachers and students. He pushed me into the brick wall. The one that would probably be covered in my blood by the end of the day. I hit the wall, hard, my arm instantly began hurting, again, from the impact, and it had just started to stop hurting too.

"Whaddup, faggot," Joseph's disgusting voice came from behind me. I snorted unintentionally. Faggot? How original.

"What the hell did ya say, ya faggot?!" Oops... did I say that out loud? He grabbed me by the collar and slammed me into the wall again. This time my head took part of the impact, and I could quickly feel the dizziness. I groaned loudly as he let go. Lucky for me, my bag wasn't only heavy, it made me heavy; handy-dandy if you got bullies. He was glaring daggers... no, falchions at me. Some time ago I learnt that by talking you earned more hits. Did that stop me and my stupid mouth? No.

"Well, faggot is such a cliché word. I mean wouldn't people use "sissy" or "bitch" or something along those lines?" I asked innocently. The air disappeared from my lungs as Joseph's fist connected to my solar plexus. I sunk down on my knees, wheezing, trying to catch my breath. The pain wasn't immediate, but it didn't take long before I felt it in my whole body. That would certainly leave a bruise.

Joseph was at the moment staring at me with a disgusted expression, my head felt fuzzy so I couldn't read his expression. At least not until the words left his mouth.

"I guess faggots have rough nights. Lemme guess, your ass still hurts?" I stared at him, horrified. That's when I remembered. The hickeys! "I bet you like it rough, lemme give you a punishment," he said, smiling wickedly. He punched me once, then twice, the third time I fell to the ground. Although he didn't stop there. When I was on the ground he began kicking.

Kick,

after kick,

after kick.

I didn't know how much time had passed when he finally deemed my "punishment" complete, but I could taste bile in my mouth. I was no longer just sitting on the ground, I was laying on my side, holding my arms over my face for protection. At least it was only Joseph. Usually it would be at least five other guys with him, all taking turns in beating me.

From the corner of my eye I saw him correct his blazer and walk away. I remained unmoving. Not that I would be able to move much either way, my body hurt too much. I only had I remembered that Eric was in that class.

I didn't want to see him today.

-----------------

The day after was... eventful. In math I saw Joseph with a large black-eye and a busted lip, and then at lunch I noticed that Manfred had a bandaged hand. Yay, twins! Tor, the genderfluid scandinavian with turquoise hair, smiled innocently when Joseph hurried past us.

"What did you guys do?" I asked warily as I sat down. The whole table beamed at me. Manfred answered, cutting Odd -who had opened his mouth to answer- off.

"We overheard fuck-face over there talk with his friends yesterday. Boasting over how he "fucked up" your face. I'm glad that he didn't touch it. Art is not supposed to be tainted," he winked at me, making me blush furiously. Don't get him wrong, he is not actually attracted to me, he just loves to flirt. A small quirk that makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Usually he would be able to befriend them either way, but not without the warning of random flirting or innuendos.

As you may have noticed, The Misfits aren't bullied in any way, apart from me that is. Mostly because they usually stick together in a group of seven, but there is another reason behind The Misfits lack of bullies, easiest said with three names; Manfred, Robert and Tor.

Let me tell you about them. Starting with Manfred, he is a very open homosexual. This would usually attract a lot of bullies, but in Manfred's case... he is too popular. At least with girls. He is open-minded, strong, quite tall with nice features. Girls are attracted to that. No shit sherlock. Guys are intimidated by him, but the last person that tried to attack him ended up in hospital with a broken nose. Well, Manfred is 2nd dan in aikido, so I guess the guy had it coming. His aikido abilities is why people avoid fighting him. He could take a person down in less than a minute. I know, I've seen it.

Robert is another person that people try to avoid. Although, he is probably the least violent person out of all of them. He is a so called "gentle giant". Over six feet tall, broad as a doorframe, always wearing a leather jacket and a white tank-top. To say the least; he is intimidating. He loves the gym, but he hates to fight. But other people don't need to know that. As far as I know, he has never hit another person ever. I don't doubt that he would kill someone for us though.

Ah, and then we have Tor. A beauty in our group of weirdos. Although they might as well be one of the weirdest. They are gender fluid -not the weird part mind you-, pretty, tall, have glasses and is overall charismatic. They always wears stilettos, and the school was reminded not to mess with them when they punctured some guy's balls. No, this is not an exaggeration. The poor guy tried to harass them, mostly because they wore a skirt that day, and got a not so pleasant footjob.

And then we had the rest. Erion, Sean, Odd, Sam and I. Let me give you a short introduction.

First, we have Erion, the one we attacked for the sake of gums. He is the gang's basic bitch. Too arrogant for his own good. Before he hung out with "the popular" kids. His saltiness and his weird habit of squealing about K-pop groups eventually made them kick him out though. That's how he joined The Misfits. Basically, Manfred found him, fed him, and adopted him.

The guy responsible for my PJ sandwich disaster is as you know Sean. The emo. He is one of those emos that really want to be sad and act depressed, but he can't. He is literally filled to the brim with unicorns and rainbows. He loves colorful ponies, small fluffy animals and absolutely adores anything that relates to goats. Okay, that may be slightly satanic. He is cool though.

Odd is the twat in the gang. The one with offensive humor and blue hair that I mentioned earlier. He is the shortest one in the group, way shorter than me at only 5'4. He makes up for his height with his personality though. He is quirky, quite a fighter and way too "punny" for anyone's liking. Slim and quick on his feet are also traits of his that one should be aware of.

The tallest one in our group is Sam, also known as 'the green giant'. At 6'88 they are easy the tallest person in school. They are nonbinary and asexual which makes a lot of people weirded out. In all honesty I find being "sexual" way weirder. About three months ago they colored their hair green, and not just any green; harlequin green. It was easy to find them in a crowd to say the least.

And then there's me. Lil' ol' me. 16 years old, freckles, and no sense of balance whatsoever. Okay, enough with unnecessary introductions, on with the story.

"Okay, so you overheard them talking about me. What happened then?" I asked, not fully understanding how it all played out. This time Odd answered, but not before elbowing Manfred hard in his side.

"Manny just walked up to them and punched the guy in the face. Then of course I kicked him in the balls, bringing him to his knees and saving the situation," Odd said with a bright smile. Manfred rolled his eyes and muttered something that sounded an awful lot like "yes of course you saved us". Odd ignored him and continued with his story. "And then, ooh, you should have seen it! Tor fucking gave him a wedgie." Tor, who had been sitting quietly and eating their sandwich let out a chuckle. At any other day it would sound fancy and cool, today I found it creepy. Especially as they didn't change their expression, at all.

I shivered as the whole table started to smile eerily. Well, all except for Robert. His smile was nice and calm. Manfred patted me on my hand, that was on the table in front of me. His smile was some weird mix of eeriness and warmth. I blushed, not out of embarrassment, but out of happiness. The Misfits were the best kind of friends a bullied guy could ask for.

"Lucas, can we talk for a second?" A familiar voice was heard behind me. I tensed up. Manfred was looking behind me, wearing an expression filled with both thought and resentment. I turned around and came face to face with Eric. As always he looked fabulous. His hair was messy, but the good kind of messy, his clothes were wrinkle free and of course he smi-no, he wasn't smiling. That made me weirdly insecure.

"S-sure," why did my voice have to sound so afraid? I rose from my seat, not without noticing Manfred's worried eyes. I gave him a small smile to reassure him that I would be fine. He didn't seem convinced.

I followed Eric through the school until we reached the courtyard. Deja vu. He stopped right in front of me, making me crash into his back. Deja vu, again.

"Eric what the-"

"I'm sorry!" I blinked. Once. Twice.

"What?"

"I said I'm sorry! It was a real douchey thing I did, walking away, not contacting you, and I am so sorry Lucas! I just freaked! I can barely remember anything from that night, but I shouldn't take it out on you of all people," he rambled, tugging at his hair and pacing back and forth. It made me smile.

"You know... you can always make up for it..." I began with a teasing smile. He immediately stopped dead in his tracks, and looked at me. His face had lit up like a christmas light, which made me grin wider.

"How?"

"You could always take me to the arcade."