your body is a weapon → brad simpson | ✓

six

The next day, I'm sat in the library during free period. I had just finished my lunch and I had two lessons left before I could go home and enjoy some time alone, most likely watching films.

Brad had gone home after he's confronted me yesterday, and I hadn't seen him since, but I certainly wasn't complaining. I try avoiding conflict as much as I could since I didn't like arguing, so yesterday was a strange event for me.

As I change the song playing through my earphones, I notice a figure sitting opposite me and I look up to see a girl sat opposite. She had strawberry blonde hair, and a smile on her face.

"You're Jamie, right?" She asks as I pull an earphone out, nodding at her. "Awesome, I've been trying to find you for ages."

"Not to be rude or anything, but who are you?" I ask her, genuine confusion laced in my voice.

"I'm Cherry," she juts her hand out and I take it in my grasp, shaking it. "I'm having a party on Friday—not for any particular reason—and I thought I'd invite you since the rest of the year are invited, too. You didn't accept my friend request ages ago so I couldn't send you the invite on Facebook."

"Oh," I say, surprised. I hadn't been asked to go to a party or any type of social gathering for almost five years. "Thank you for your invite, I'd love to go."

I don't know why I agreed to go, I just felt rude declining her offer. I couldn't lie and say I had plans because I had no one to make plan with since my dad was going to be gone all weekend.

"Awesome! Find my Facebook, the address is on there," Cherry says and I shoot her a thankful smile before she stands up. "I'll see you on Friday!"

I wave goodbye awkwardly before I return to my studying. Not long after, the bell rings and I make my way to class, which was Physical Education. I change into my kit quickly, since we had a practical, and I smile at the coach as I step into the corridor where he waited for everyone to gather.

I was surprised when the door opened and stepped in Brad Simpson, his long hair tied into a man bun and a scowl on his face. I hadn't seen him all day, so I didn't know why he had arrived for Phys Ed.

"We're playing football today," Coach Burton says and I follow him and the class outside. "Choose your teams and make them fair, do a little drill between yourselves and then we'll start on the match."

The teams are chosen and it's seven versus seven, Brad on my team. We all huddle close since the early October air was freezing. We sort out positions before we practice a dribbling drill and soon enough the match begins.

As we wait for the team captains to compete against who was going to kick off first, I glance over to Brad who was to my left, both of us midfield.

He was crouching down, keeping himself warm as he pulls on the pink bib that our team had to wear. His veins were prominent in his neck as he looks out ahead of him.

A cheer comes from my team captain as she wins the game of rock, paper, scissors and she decides to let the other team kick off first. She returns to her place in striker position before the game starts.

I make sure to stay in the middle of the bundle of players, sticking to the right side of the pitch. When Brad gets the ball and is swarmed by attackers I yell out for him to pass me the ball.

Instead of swallowing his pride and passing me the ball, he looks me in the eye and lets the attacking player tackle the ball off of him and I almost groan out in frustration. We weren't going to win if we could barely work as a team.

My competitive side comes out and I quickly run to the box and slide tackle the player with the ball, causing the ball to go out the side of the pitch.

The opposing team get it and I head the ball in the opposite direction of their goal as it gets thrown in and Brad retrieves it before the striker and I run down to our goal, both of us shouting for the ball.

Brad passes to the striker and we score, even though he could've passed to me as well. I sigh and the game resumes from the middle, the other team kicking off.

When I finally get the ball, I dribble it down to the other end but it gets taken off of me. I curse out and look to see who has the ball and of course Brad decided to tackle me when I'm on his team.

At the end of the lesson, we all huddle around for some last words off of the coach and I look over to Brad who's eyes were burning holes into me. I roll my eyes before we're dismissed to get changed.

+

My last lesson was social studies and Brad sat next to me in complete silence. His leg kept bouncing up and down nervously as he glanced between his empty notebook and the clock hanging on the wall.

I purse my lips, trying my best not to look at him but it was difficult. He seemed like a walking distraction, always fidgeting with something, making himself known. I wonder if he even knew he was doing it.

The teacher walks around the classroom to help different people with the work and as she reaches the back where Brad and I sit, she looks down at his book and sighs.

"Where's your work, Mr. Simpson?" Miss Collins asks with her raised eyebrows. "You've had twenty minutes to complete the exam questions I gave out, but you've not even written the date and title."

I raise my head from my work and see Brad slowly tearing his gaze from the clock to the teacher in front of him.

"Sorry, Miss," He drawls out, not sounding at all apologetic. "I have better things to be doing than writing about culture, so you'll have to excuse me if I don't want to complete the work."

She raises her eyebrows at him. "Mr. Simpson, I expect you to do the work, even if you want to be doing something else. You're at school to learn, so you better get yourself together if you want to get through your A-Levels."

"You think I want to do my A-levels?" He asks, his eyes burning into her and if I was the teacher, I'd be in a ball hiding from him. "If it were up to me, I wouldn't be in this shitty school, sitting next to shitty people, doing shitty work that shitty teachers have set me."

Miss grabs his notebook and closes it, "Mr. Simpson, can you take your stuff outside and step outside, please?"

He grabs his bag, the fabric clenching in his fist as he stands up. Everyone in the class was already looking, and the scraping of his chair made everyone flinch.

He storms out of the classroom, slamming the door and the blinds covering the window makes a loud noise as the bang echoes through the room, too.

"Can everyone carry on with their work, please?" The teacher coughs out awkwardly as she noticed everyone was looking and turns on her heels to follow Brad out of the classroom. He most likely wasn't waiting for her outside the classroom.

I wasn't sure how I was supposed to feel about his short monologue, considering her threw shade at me since I was considered 'a shitty person he had to sit next to'. However, sitting next to him wasn't a great pleasure of mine, either.

I let out a sigh before diving my head down at my work again.

unedited.