Finding The Light

1

Warnings:
-Bullying + physical abuse
-Homophobia + usage F-slur
-Arguing parents + swearing

Reggie's POV

'Look at him, sitting in a corner alone,' Nicky exclaimed, pushing her boyfriend. 'Such a pathetic, little faggot.'

'Imagine being gay and not having any friends either,' her boyfriend answered her, his voice quiet to act like he tried to whisper, but it was clear he wanted me to hear him speak.

I purposely stared down at my feet, but heard their footsteps coming closer to me. Automatically, I pinched my nail into the palm of my hand and felt my heartbeat rising.

My hands started to shake and as I looked at my phone in my hands, I saw two pairs of feet in front of mine. I knew that giving a reply to it would make everything a lot worse, but I was almost afraid they would be able to hear my heartbeat racing.

'Do you genuinely think looking down is going to make us believe you don't see us?' Nicky asked with a laugh, kicking the nose of her shoe against the bottom of mine.

Slowly, I raised my gaze and looked at Nicky and her boyfriend, knowing he would be able to knock me down in one hit. 'Do you like to stare at me, faggot?'

I cleared my throat and breathed out. Nicky continued to annoy me and kicked my feet over and over, but apparently, me ignoring them made their anger burst.

'So you think you have the right to ignore me? You're a pathetic, little fag. Look up and look me in the eyes if you're a real man.'

'A real man?' Nicky questioned, laughing with an annoyingly high-pitched sound. 'A faggot who wants to suck people's dick, I don't call that a real man.'

'Oh, poor thing, are you actually a girl?' her boyfriend asked, kneeling down in front of me. 'I can check for you, if you want?'

'No, I'm okay,' I whispered, pulling my legs up. I wrapped my arms around my shins and leaned my chin on top of my knees. 'Please, just leave me alone.'

'He wants to be left alone, Nicky. Come, stand up and follow me,' he demanded, grabbing me by my arm.

As I expected, he was way stronger than I was and managed to lift me up with one simple motion. I couldn't fight it and felt the piercing pain in my upper arm the harder he pulled me with him.

Nicky was laughing hysterically as I was pushed into the girls' bathroom. Nicky and him followed me closely behind and before I could fight it, I was pushed into a stall down on my knees, a heavily stinging pain as my kneecaps hit the ground.

I was unsure what he was about to do, but figured it out before I had time to fight back. He grabbed me by my neck and with a rough force, I felt the water in the toilet connecting with my face.

I wanted to gasp for air as I expected him to let go of me again, but he pushed me even further, which caused me to choke on the water. I started to kick my legs to hit his shins because I needed to cough when the water entered my lungs.

My face flushed dark red and the lack of oxygen made my body shake. In the background, I heard Nicky and her boyfriend laugh at me, but then I felt his hand disappear from my neck.

'What are you doing?' I heard a loud and angry voice. I lifted myself up and started to cough profusely, unable to breathe well. Between every cough, I gasped for air and heard my own wheezy breath while looking at a boy I had seen before, yet, didn't know the name of.

'There's literally so much wrong with you, assholes,' the voice continued, pushing them aside to sit down next to me. I kept coughing, more and louder. I couldn't breathe, felt an awful pressure on my chest and had the feeling of throwing up.

'You're hyperventilating, I promise you're going to be okay, Reggie,' the boy said, but I was confused how he knew my name. 'I'm Clay, in case you were wondering.'

I abruptly sat up in my bed, sweat covering most of my body. I sighed deeply when I realised I had another nightmare and moved my hand to my armpits. I was more than soaked and groaned, taking off my shirt to escape from the coldness the sweat would give me within seconds.

Tiredly, I threw my legs out of the bed and put them on the cold floor. I leaned forward and rested my elbows on my thighs, my chin on the palm of my hands as I stared into the darkness of the night.

My hand reached out for my phone besides my bed and I raised it, seeing my Lock Screen popping up. A picture of Clay and me, standing in front of the Eiffel Tower during our trip to France. He was genuinely laughing and had his arm tightly wrapped around my shoulders.

The moment brought me joy, that was the reason I decided to put it as my background. Every time I felt like shit, I opened my phone and looked into Clay's loving eyes. My sadness turned into a spark of hope, but at the same time, I also felt sadness because he wasn't with me.

'Get away from my side, bitch,' my father whispered from the room next to me. 'Your fat ass is causing me to be unable to move.'

'Just sleep in the guest room then,' my mother replied with a raised voice, uncaring of their child who was trying to sleep at four at night.

'I'm not moving to the guest room because you're too fat. You're the one who should stand up and move, would be great to burn some calories as well if you finally move your obese body.'

'I won't move an inch for you,' she yelled back, the fights starting again like they usually did. Every night, every evening, every morning, or better said, the whole day long.

'I wish you were attractive like you were before, because you've turned into a turn-off instead. There's no man who you would be able to keep.'

'Do you think I care about your useless opinion? You're worthless to me, the only reason I'm still with you is because of your money.'

Over the years, their "harmless" arguments turned into severe hatred towards each other. Yet, as soon as one of them raised their voice, they seemed to forget they still had a child that existed, but I was rather seen as a challenge than someone to love.

After all these years, I tried to act like I didn't care and likely put on a mask well enough for my parents to believe me, but deep inside, I was more than hurt that they barely knew how old I was...

1160 words