•͟U͟N͟D͟E͟R͟S͟T͟A͟N͟D͟ ͟c͟a͟r͟t͟i͟u͟z͟i͟•͟

XVIII

I looked towards everyone else, who was now observing me view the short video. "Wow, definitely wasn't expecting that." I announced. Amala quietly chuckled.

"Ayo Sy, you made yo ex go lesbo." Sheyaa replied, as Miles hit him on the arm. I laughed, "Maybe I made Jordan a lesbian too." That got less of a reaction than I had expected, as only Sheyaa showed real emotion and laughed, which was rare for him anyways. The group fell silent as Sheyaa's laughs began to fade.

Rakim spoke up, "Well, I'm at least happy for them, and that they are able to do what they want." I nodded in agreement. "Well shit, who isn't? If we bein' real, of course." Miles stated.

"Bih', ion care wut da fuck dey are, jus don't make me no lesbian, aight? Ya know wha' I'm sayin'?" Sheyaa continued. Miles nodded in a sort of "alright, that's better than nothing" sort of way. "Sheyaa, I-" Amala told him, "I doubt that anybody's gonna force you to be lesbian. You've been playin' too much Grand Theft Auto if you for real think that shit's gonna happen." Sheyaa laughed out loud again.

"Girl, you sayin' I play too much Grand Theft Auto? You's the one who's gotta fuckin' Twitch stream for GTA." Sheyaa scoffed.

"Ok Sheyaa," Amala reasoned, "you know rule number one: never hate on the stream. If you do, prepare to be crucified." Sheyaa cut his eyes toward Amala, giving an expression of not giving a care in the world. I looked down at my watch and realized that it would be a smart-ass idea to haul it to class. I told all those who I had just been with a quick goodbye, and tailed it to homeroom.

Once I arrived in homeroom, EVERYONE was crowded around Willow and Robin. "Poor Jaden," I thought to myself, "mans has had to put up with this shit ever since yesterday afternoon." Sure enough, Jaden was sitting in the corner with Caleb Toliver, talking about god knows what.

I made my way into the crowd, where both Willow and Robin stood in the center. Somehow, my short ass made it all the way through relatively quickly. Robin's eyes met with mine, and I walked up to her and gave her a hug, something I hadn't done for at least a year. Surprisingly, she didn't push me away like I was expecting her to do.

"I'm so happy for you guys," I told her, "and I'm really sorry if I ever forced anything onto you when we were a thing." Robin released me from out hug, and shook her head, smiling. "You never did anything wrong, Symere. The only reason I broke up with you is because I started to feel things for other people, and, well, I'm sure you know what kind of people I'm referring to. You were great, Symere, and thank you for everything you did for me; I never properly thanked you for it." she told me. I smiled back.

I then exterminated myself from the crowded circle, and returned to my desk to work on extra school work. I wanted to get into Georgia Tech, and I came to realize quickly that that wouldn't happen if I didn't 100% work my literal ass off, so almost every waking second of my time at school was spent on school work. I would've gone over and spoken with Jaden, because we were at least somewhat close, but the fact that Caleb was over that, and that Caleb was essentially Jordan II, made me a little more nervous than it should have to just go over to someone and talk in a non-flirting way.

Anyways, homeroom was a breeze for me, at least. I probably couldn't say the same for neither Robin nor Willow, who for what seemed like every five seconds, were being bombarded with questions that weren't even important as to the main idea of her posting of that video/announcement. Afterwards, I made my way into chemistry, which is where the real shit started to pick up.

I plopped down into my seat, waiting patiently, as Mr. Glover wrote equations on the board, and a Cochise song played through my AirPods. All of a sudden, Jonathan sat down very violently next to me, for seemingly no reason. It in fact was so loud, that it made me look over at him, about to ask him if there was an issue. I was going to do that if it weren't for the fact that he was giving me some goddamned death stare, like I just shoved his children in the road or some shit. I, as a result, just ended up looking away steadily, and began to write down the equations being written on the board.

Even during class, the staring, while now in brief moments, was still there for certain parts of time. Like, not even kidding, during attendance, he stared. During lectures, he stared. During some weird, nondescript conjugate acid description video, he stared. Even during the time towards the end of class where we were "turned loose" to start the assignments we were given, he still stared. By the time that class was due to end in five minutes, I was done with being stared at by this motherfucker, and looked over to him and asked, "I'm sorry, but do you have some sort of issue with me?"

Jonathan shook his head, and simply stated, "I know what you did, faggot."

My heart dropped when I heard him say that. I knew I had heard something in that bathroom yesterday, but I just chocked it up to be the creaky school. Damnit, he was in there yesterday while me and Monty were doing stuff. "I-I'm s-sorry?" I stammered, the nervousness within my voice embarrassingly obvious.

"Kentrell watched it all unfold from inside one of those stalls, and I never knew that you was into the pretty boys, faggot." he replied. I gulped, not wanting to be in that classroom with him any longer. I quickly looked at the clock mounted on the wall, as Jonathan steadily began to move closer towards me. The bell was just about to ring, and once it did, I pretended to be Usain Bolt, and hightailed my ass out of Mr. Glover's classroom, before he could even tell me what my homework was.

I was booking it towards the lunch room; I was just praying that neither Jarad or Kentrell had gotten to Monty yet. The whereabouts on Kentrell and Jarad weren't kept a mystery for much longer, though, as they blocked me from going any further down the hallway. They pushed me back, forcing me to back up, straight into Jonathan. The anxiety that had been plaguing me for the past two months was kicking into full effect now, as I felt my heart begin to race, cold sweat running down the side of my face, and the collar of my Marilyn Manson shirt I had on that day get pulled by Jonathan and slammed against a wall.

Just then, they surrounded me. I then knew what it felt like to be in Monty's place on those many days when these fuckers cornered him and beat him for just being who he was. That exact thing was happening to me; the one thing I had feared was happening to me in that very moment. I didn't know what they were gonna do, but I really didn't want to find out. But before I could really even think of any ideas as to what would happen, I took a really stiff knee to the stomach. Me being the self-proclaimed sensitive person I am, I fell to the cold floor, as Jonathan's Air Forces kicked at my back.

I won't lie, it hurt like hell, but I continued to undermine myself, thinking, "Symere, you got too lenient with yourself. You knew this was gonna happen at some point or another." So, I sat there and took it, even though me feeling too weak to get up also played a partial role in it. For the most part, it was just Jonathan kicking at me from what I could tell. I even felt like I heard Jarad telling Jonathan telling him to back off at one point, and Kentrell actually pulling at his arm, trying to get him to move away.

"THIS IS WHAT FAGGOTS GET AT LITHIA SPRINGS, YOU HEAR?" Jonathan shouted down to me, as he began to kick at my legs now. All of this came to a quick and sudden halt as I heard a loud thud, and watched as Jonathan fell to the floor that I was on, bleeding from his cheek. I released myself from the small safety shell I had curled up into, and looked up to see why Jonathan was on the floor. There, standing above me was none other than Sheyaa, wearing none other than the brass knuckles he always flexed about owning. On his right was Robin and Monty.

"THIS IS WHAT HOMOPHOBES GET AT LITHIA SPRINGS, YOU HEAR?" Robin shouted down to Jonathan. I smiled up at her as she glared down towards Jonathan, but then, an arm reached out from the left of Sheyaa, extended to help me. "Come on, Sy, lemme help you get up." Jordan told me, flashing the smile that I had missed seeing so very much.