When the Bell Rang

I stared at the crowd and told the biggest lie of my life.

And the best part was: everyone believed me.

I saw the faces, shocked in horror around me. The classroom was now just a large huddle, and I was at the end of it. There was a bruise above my top lip, and a scar on my left cheek. My knuckles were bruised and red. My uniform was dirty.

I did what I had to do.

Three months earlier…

Transfer students usually kept to themselves, but I knew from the moment I saw Damian that this wouldn’t be the case. There was something about his eyes that made me feel like things would change for the worse.

Jay had started to act a little strange since he decided to befriend Damian. He wouldn’t answer any of my calls, and he wouldn’t say hi to me in the halls or at the tutoring center after school. It’s as if I never existed and we never had been friends. I felt so hurt.

Damian must’ve told him something about me to make Jay act this way.

I wouldn’t let him get away with this.

Two months ago…

When I saw Jay’s bruise on his right cheek, I couldn’t take it anymore.

I went up to his desk one day during our break between classes. His head was down. “Jay,” I said. I tapped his shoulder. He slowly lifted his head and looked up at me. I took in a breath when I saw his face. Anger pent up in my throat

“What’s going on with you two?” I asked, my voice coming out quieter than I thought it would. I pointed to his bruise.

Jay looked down at his crossed arms on his desk. “I fell-”

“No, you didn’t. Don’t lie to me.” My face started to get hot. “Stop hanging out with Damian.”

“You don’t know anything,” said Jay.

“Then tell me,” I demanded.

“I-” Jay suddenly stared straight ahead towards the front of the classroom. I followed his gaze.

Damian. I walked right up to him. “What’s your problem?” I said getting close.

His dark eyes bore into mine. He didn’t say a word. Instead, he pushed past me and walked towards Jay. I turned around and followed him, but he just walked past Jay and sat at his own desk at the back of the class.

I stopped at Jay’s desk and turned my head to look at him. Jay’s eyes stayed down. I was about to pick up my feet to confront Damian when suddenly, a noise disrupted my dark thoughts.

The bell.

I sighed and sat back down at my desk. I noticed something on the floor at the bottom of my backpack.

A note.

I turned around. Damian stared straight ahead as if I didn’t exist.

I read the note again.

Meet me at the lockers. Lunch. - D

~

“We need to talk,” said Jay when the three of us met in the hallway between the lockers. I didn’t expect Jay to talk to me, and I wasn’t going to let this opportunity go.

“Yes,” I replied, looking into his hazel eyes. “We do.”

I could see Damian was about to speak. I held my hand up to silence him. I didn’t want to hear it from him, I wanted to hear it straight from Jay’s mouth.

“I can’t be seen with you,” said Jay as he looked at his feet.

My face started to sting. I had done nothing! I looked at Damian.

“This isn’t Damian’s fault,” Jay said.

“Well, ever since he transferred here you’ve been acting like I don’t exist!”

“I have to!” said Jay. He sighed and closed his eyes.

“Milo,” said Damian, his voice lower than I expected. “We don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Oh, just like you hurt Jay?” I pointed to Jay’s bruised right cheek.

Jay put his hand on his bruise. “It’s not what you think-”

“I saw you! Both of you! In the alley!”

The two of them stood there, silent. That’s right. They didn’t expect me to have been there.

I’ll never get it out of my head. The day I saw Jay’s bruise, I instantly knew how he got it. It was a few days back. He was with a couple of kids from Caligo High School, a school up north. Damian was also there. They were in a dark alley in our neighborhood. Things sounded heated. I couldn’t make out what they were saying, and when I tried getting closer, I accidentally slipped on a rock and ran away so I wouldn’t be seen.

“You got the wrong idea,” Damian said, crossing his arms.

“Then explain it to me,” I snapped. I looked at Jay. “Who gave you that bruise? Why were both of you meeting with kids from Caligo? You know their reputation.”

Six weeks ago…

Jay had told me he was going to skip the tutoring center after school, so I had to walk home alone that night. Apparently, Damian was helping him with something, and I wasn’t allowed to know what it was. All I knew is that kids from an entirely different school were somehow involved. I never knew Jay had connections with kids from Caligo High.

What wasn’t surprising was that Damian transferred from Caligo and got Jay mixed up in some drama.

I felt guilty for not protecting Jay from Damian. But, Jay was the one who befriended him.

I walked through the dark alleys. It was around 7pm, which was usually a quiet time in the neighborhood.

Suddenly, I heard grunting. I froze. It was coming from a dark alley up ahead. I walked towards the noises and realized that the grunting was coming from about five people, one of which was a huddled piece of flesh on the floor. My eyes widened.

It was Jay.

I ran towards the group of boys that were kicking him and pushed through.They stepped away from Jay. I got a glimpse of their school uniforms.

Caligo High.

I scanned their faces. Damian wasn’t here.

I kneeled down to Jay’s limp body and tried to pick him up. He moaned in pain.

“Come on,” I whispered, my heart reaching my throat. I made him stand up and got his backpack. When I turned around, the four boys were already gone.

We limped out of the alley and onto the sidewalk.

I heard the four boys running away in the distance.

The next day, I had to sit alone at lunch. As I grabbed my plastic water bottle, I saw Damian sitting with his group of friends a couple tables in front of me.

I closed my eyes and held my water bottle tighter.

When I was with Jay at the hospital, I asked him about the attack, and about everything. He finally told me that he was being threatened by a group of boys from Caligo High and this was going on for a couple months. Apparently some bullies from Caligo tried to use Damian to get to Jay. Damian instead stayed with Jay to try to solve everything.

I didn’t believe a word of it.

The doctor told me that Jay’s injuries needed another week to heal.

As I took a sip of water, I saw Damian look straight at me.I caught him staring in the corner of my eye. After drinking my water, I put the water bottle down and screwed the cap back on.

I must’ve held the bottle too tight because it exploded.

Five weeks ago...

I was getting sick of seeing Damian in the hallways at school. He wouldn’t say or do anything to me, but his dark brown eyes always pierced mine, telling me that there was something he wanted to tell me.

When the bell rang after math class, I turned around to look at Damian. He was going through the items in his backpack. I stood up and went over to his desk. He must’ve sensed me coming; he stopped rummaging through his bag and looked up at me.

I stood there, my hands balled into fists.

We stared at each other for about three breaths. The tension in the room caught everyone else's eye, and they all started to whisper to each other and watch us.

“How’s Jay?” Damian managed to say.

I stared into his dark eyes. Before I could say a word, the bell rang for English class. I gave him one last look and went back over to my desk.

This wouldn’t end here.

~

After the tutoring center, I walked home at night through the dark alleys. The sound of my shoes hitting the concrete floor echoed around me.

I passed by the alley I had found Jay in. I took a couple steps back and stared down the alley.

The sounds of the four boys from Caligo High and Jay’s cries played in my mind. I went to the scene and knelt down. I saw dried blood on the floor.

I could hear the sound of footsteps behind me. I stood up and turned around.

There he was. Exactly where I told him to be.

He started to walk towards me. I stayed still.

Damian’s brown eyes looked almost black tonight. “Why’d you call me here?” he asked.

I stood up and stared at his sorry face. “You know why.” I took off my backpack.

“Tell your friends from Caligo that I’ll be meeting them very soon.”

Present day…

Today, those bullies don’t stand a chance. I don’t see them here today in the crowd.

And now here I am, telling them the worst news they could ever hear. Some of them looked hopeful. They thought that they would never be bullied again because of what I just told them.

They think I was the one who created the mess in the hallway right outside this classroom. But I didn’t have to do much.

I just pit four friends against each other, just like what had happened to me a couple months ago at my old school. I lured them into the locker hallways and watched them unleash their anger towards each other. I got in the middle of it and the next thing I knew, I was being thrown across the hall. Just like I wanted.

I escaped the quarrel and let them do whatever they wanted to each other. What happened to them now wasn’t my concern anymore.

When I returned to the scene at the hallway, I found out the four friends were all in the nurse’s office. The worst they got was expulsion from the school.

They will never be heard from or seen again. They’re lucky they all survived.

This wasn’t the case for my old friend Jay.

I knew Damian was evil when I first saw him.

So I did what I had to do to get transferred.

I picked the best students to target, the worst bullies. They were also there that night when Jay was attacked. I’m glad they didn’t recognize me.

Now, here I am, telling my new classmates that I was the one who caused the damage in the hallways, and that I was the one who got those four expelled.

Well… I kind of did.

But I never hurt anyone.

Transfers usually keep to themselves. I decided not to.

My fellow classmates at Caligo High now believe that they can’t mess with me, or any of my friends ever again.