My Side

13

*Jules*

This girl is like nothing I've ever seen before. She seemed really cold and unfeeling when we first met her, but in these short few days, I've started to see her differently. It had started when she was nice to Jodie even when she was cold to the rest of us. Jodie has a way of opening everyone up with his innocence, yet it is just a way he copes with being around people. At home, he can be quite the opposite of innocent. Kit seems like she's the opposite, she was made to be strong and not at all innocent, yet recently she seems to act like a small child.  

Another time I started to see her differently was when she found out about Jodie being abused. Instead of letting the game move on, she went to his house and set him up so that he'd be arrested for hurting a minor. Jodie had even gone into the station and told the Chief what had been done to him. His father was sentenced to twenty years in prison. 

After that, she'd just done some small things that I know she didn't notice herself doing. She tended to gravitate towards Jamie when she was in the mood for quiet, she went to Jagger if she wanted to do something fun, she went to Jodie when she was in need of cute animal videos, and she came to me when she seemed anxious or afraid. She never noticed when she did it, but we could tell her mood based on who she was standing the closest to. 

In the beginning, she couldn't stand to be closer than four feet to any of us, now she stands right next to whoever she needs in each moment. I never thought I would get to see her actually open up, but today she did just that. Even if it was partially forced by her father, today she's been more like a human and less like a very strictly programmed robot. 

It broke my heart to see her cry so violently. She had just opened her mouth to speak, yet her words wouldn't come out. When the rest of the boys had gone into shock, I found myself moving without even thinking about it. I held her and tried to calm her as she cried. When she had calmed down, I still didn't move. I allowed her to play with my fingers as she told us her story. 

When I heard what her father had done to her, I'd never wanted to kill anyone as badly as I wanted to kill him. He deserves a slow and painful death for making such an innocent girl so emotionless and afraid. I know the other three boys can agree with me on that one. 

Something else they can agree with me on is the fact that we are all developing feelings for this girl. The way she's been patient with Jodie. How she's talked about books with Jamie. When she listened to music with Jagger. How she snuggled up to me... It's made each and every one of us develop a soft spot just for her. 

Before, I had thought only my boys would have a place on my soft side. Yet, within a week, she has wormed her way into that side of me as well. I know that if she ever left us and became just a memory, we would all be destroyed and would likely not trust anyone besides each other. That has happened once before. Yet she changed that. 

A year ago we met this other boy. He was only slightly taller than Jodie and he acted like an innocent boy. He was a lot like Jodie. He got bullied a lot as he was a new student, and we took him in. He became one of our group. We all had opened up to him within two days of meeting him. After two months, he was a part of our relationship. One of our rules was to not date anyone else without our permission. We may have been poly, but we weren't open. A second was to not tell anyone about us unless we had all trusted the person to not tell. 

He broke both of those rules. With that, he had broken our hearts and our trust. It's been just a little over a year since that had happened, and since then we hadn't allowed anyone into our friend group. When Jagger had texted us asking if he could bring the new girl to our table, we were all reluctant. That was how the thing with that boy had started. 

Jagger had texted us asking if he could bring him to our table the same way he'd asked to bring Kit. Although we didn't fully trust it, it had been a year and that was the first time since that Jagger had asked to bring anyone over. We were willing to test it out, but we had made no promises. We had fully intended to keep our guards up, but attempt to not scare her away. 

When she'd gotten closer to us, seeming like it was her mission to follow Jagger, I knew something was up, even if I hadn't known that it really was her mission to follow him. I was even more aware that something wasn't right when she'd looked over all of us with that calculating gaze. What had surprised me, was how when she'd first heard Jodie talk, her eyes had softened and she seemed imediately protective over him. 

When we had realized that she was protective over him, we had set up a way to show us just how far it ran. We were going to tell her that Jodie was talking to a teacher so he'd be late to lunch. What he was doing, was finding his old bullies while he was alone and acting scared. We knew they'd try something and that he could easily get away, but the plan was for him to run in crying. We agreed he would run to Kit so we could see how she'd react to him like that. 

Once he had told her what they had done, she was livid. So were we for that matter. We thought they'd just hit him or threaten him, we never thought they'd try to touch him. Once we realized that's what happened, we also realized he wasn't fake crying and he definitely hadn't remembered the plan. He was truly comfortable enough to run to Kit. 

With the realization of his tears being real, Jagger had lost his temper and got up, all of us followed closely behind as I took Jodie from Kit's arms so she could do what she felt the boys deserved. That part of the plan didn't go well either. 

The boy had opened his mouth and said things that could make even tough people sob helplessly. Yet only a single tear fell from Kit's eye. That was all Jagger needed to be pushed over the edge. 

After our plan had failed, we agreed to never make one like that again. We knew she was protective of Jodie, just like we then knew Jagger was protective of her. 

We had been really worried the day that she'd sent us the message that said we needed to talk and that we were to come pick her up. Only something really bad would have made her decide against her father's wishes and come to us for help. My theory had been proven correct when she had sobbed out the words 'He has Leo'. 

Now, I'm finally getting to see the real side of her, and I have never hoped that we could be what she wants. 

What she needs.