Head over Heels || brance

III

Amy threw herself into a sitting position on his bed and they both sat in silence waiting for the door to close. Once it did, Bruce was hit with Amy's angry spiral.

"Mom is so annoying!" She yelled, obviously not caring if their mother heard. "Why can't she just let me live a little?!"

Bruce just sat there, letting her express her anger. But he eventually stared at her red ears, seeing the earrings gone. He was a bit shocked, honestly.

"You took your earrings out?" Bruce said softly. Amy was now staring at her lap, her eyes burning into her jeans.

"No." She spoke, harshly. "Mom did."

Bruce widened his eyes slightly.

"She just walked over and ripped them out. It hurt like a bitch and I'm surprised she didn't rip my earlobe off." She crossed her arms and stared out the window.

"Seriously?"

Bruce thought that was a bit too far. His mother could've hurt Amy and she was so angry over two little studs in her ears that were barely visible.

"How did she even find out you did it?"

"I wore my hair up." She answered. Bruce wasn't totally surprised that she did that, and he knew she did it to flaunt to her mother that she disobeyed. "What did dad want?" She asked. Her voice was calmer now, and she wasn't as angry as before.

"He wanted to tell me that there's too guys at my school who are into each other. He just told me not to hang out with them and... don't get the wrong idea. He told me I need a girl on my arm." Amy laughed a little.

"What an ass." Bruce followed her laughter. "See, this would be the perfect opportunity for you to just... not listen to them." Bruce gave her a confused look as she made eye contact with him.

"What do you mean?"

"Don't get a girl on your arm. Get a guy and just slowly step out of that box their forcing you in." She said simply.

"Amy, I'm not into guys." He answered.

"Yeah, sure, but what I'm saying is, even if it's a friend of yours who you can somehow convince to pretend to be your boyfriend just so you can piss dad off, would be enough. But don't make it some goody-two shoes like you or dad might like him."

Bruce thought about it. Amy was making perfect sense to him. He didn't want to be this golden boy forever, and he definitely wanted to somehow break this never ending cycle his parents are putting on him to be an amazing creation.

"But how would I do that? Half the people in this town already are making fun of those two guys and no one even knows if it's true. Who would actually pretend to be with a guy?" Amy shrugged.

"You'll figure it out." Amy smiled. "And I hope you do."

-

Tuesday morning, Amy's words were ringing in his ears. He wanted to do it. He actually wanted to break a rule his father placed, it was like a burning sensation of giddy-ness that he had never felt before and he kind of liked it.

The only issue was that he didn't have any friends that he trusted or cared for enough to be able to spill this secret and expect them not to get weirded out.

He closed his locker and stared down the hall along with apparently everyone in their school as Finney Blake walked down the hallway. He was alone and his hands were gripped onto the straps of his bag as eyes burned into his skin. Bruce saw his face red with nerves as he tried to look anywhere but at the students surrounding him.

Everyone was treating him like a completely new person. Finney had always been bullied at school and Bruce didn't know if the bullying would get worse because of this or stop because he was rumoured to be dating Robin Arellano who would beat them up for saying anything bad to him.

As Finney reached Bruce, about to continue walking to get to his own locker, Bruce reached out and grabbed his arm. Finney looked at Bruce a bit fearful before his eyes softened.

"You okay?" Bruce whispered. Finney looked away from him to look at the people who were we staring at them. Finney nodded softly. Bruce began to walk with Finney to find his locker. He wanted to ask him if it was true, but he didn't want to seem like he was overstepping. He wondered where Robin was right now and why he wasn't there with Finney to face the school.

As they reached Finney's locker, Bruce leaned on the one beside it, staring daggers at anyone who looked at Finney with disgust in their eyes.

"So...." Bruce mumbled. Finney unlocked his locker, grabbed some textbooks while listening to Bruce. "You excited for the game on Saturday?" He smiled his perfect smile at him.

Finney shrugged. "I don't think I'm going." He answered. He and Bruce weren't on the same team, and they weren't facing each other again, but he knew that Finney's team was playing at the field next to them.

"Why?"

"People are talking shit about me. One of my teammates spit at me when I was walking into school, so I doubt they'd want to play with me." Bruce looked at him with soft eyes.

"Don't let them get to you, man. You have to just... try to ignore them. You love baseball." Bruce stared at him as he closed the locker.

"Yeah, but, you don't understand, Bruce. It's not that easy, people are saying terrible things to me and they guys on my baseball team already said mean things to me before all of this."

"Is it true?" Bruce asked. Finney shifted in his place, fixing the way his bag sat on his shoulder. He looked around them before looking at Bruce and giving a tiny nod.

"Are you going to say something mean to me too?" He asked, his eyes turning a bit cold. Bruce stared at him a bit hurt before shaking his head.

"Of course not-"

"The fuck you looking at?" Bruce turned to look past Finney as he heard someone coming down the hallway.

Robin was walking toward them, ignoring the whispers and stares coming from the students, of course he said some snarky stuff to a few students, but he looked like he didn't care whatsoever.

Robin approached them, standing on Finney's right side. Finney looked to the ground again.

"Hey, Bruce." Robin nodded, his hand reaching around Finney to rest his hand in Finney's back pocket. Bruce could see he really didn't care, but he so far couldn't say the same for Finney.

Bruce smiled at him. "Hi."

Eventually all the states in the hallway were gone when cheers and screams arose and of course they all knew what was going on.

"So... when did you guys..." Bruce felt awkward but he truly didn't mean to be, he was just like that sometimes.

"Last year." Robin smiled. Bruce was surprised. They had been dating for a full year and just now someone had found out?

"How did word get out?" Bruce asked, actually curious. Robin shrugged while Finney just stared at the people around them.

"Someone caught us at the baseball field Sunday. We weren't doing nothing but I guess they assumed and they weren't wrong." Robin smiled at him.

The bell eventually rang and Robin dismissed them as he began walking Finney to class. Bruce watched them as they disappeared from sight. He didn't get why everyone was giving them a hard time, he could tell that that they liked each other and he didn't get why that wasn't okay. He as well hated that his father had judged them even though his father thought Finney was always a good kid, but now his thoughts of him changed all because he was dating a boy.

He looked around him. He was going to skip first period, it wasn't something he had every done, but he knew exactly who to ask to help him get back at his parents.