Walking the Wire | PETER PARKER [1]

| 9 |

The game kicks off to a bad start with Midtown scoring twice within the first five minutes. But the underdogs don't give up hope.

Eloise cups her mouth with her hands and cheers when Luis steals the ball from the team in blue. He dribbles it down the field, passes it to Noah, and then Noah sends it flying past the goalie and hitting the net.

"Go Park East! Whooo!" Elena cheers.

Eloise claps and cheers along with the rest of the cheer block. "Go Park East!"

Although it's only one goal compared to Midtown's two, the other team starts to get mad. They play rougher and meaner.

At half-time the score is 2-8, Midtown in the lead. It seems as though the referees are blind to the fouls Midtown is throwing at them.

There are six minutes left of half-time when a posse of Midtown students comes parading over to Park East's cheer block, Flash at the front. He and the other students strut up to them like they're royalty.

"How does it feel to be chronic losers?" Flash taunts.

The boy standing to Eloise's left flips him the bird. "Get back to your side!"

A tall pale boy disregards his call and kicks at the clumpy ground, laughing, "Did you guys not have enough money to pay for better landscaping?"

Joke's on him, they never had any landscaping done; the janitor just comes out here when the grass gets tickles their ankles and mows it with a push mower.

Flash smirks, "Or better players?"

To Eloise's right, Elena fumes. She grabs Elena's hand and squeezes it comfortingly, silently calming her down before she snaps. She is generally a nice and calm person, but if someone insults her brother, she becomes someone else.

Jack Lakeman standing towards the back calls, "Our players are better than yours, asswipe!"

"Yeah," Melanie Thompson adds from her spot beside Elena, "and we don't need no money neither."

"Apparently you don't need no education, neither," a different girl from the Midtown crowd mocks and they burst into laughter.

Eloise's face burns red and her fists clench. She squeezes Elena's hand tighter.

What gives them the right to mock people for not having as many educational opportunities or services as them? It isn't their fault that they couldn't afford to enroll in high-end private schools that gave every single student the attention they deserve in order to succeed academically. It isn't their fault that they have bigger things in their lives than grammar.

Flash turns and gives the girl a high-five. When he turns back, he remarks, "They're thugs; they don't need grammar."

Eloise doesn't even notice Cliff break away from the team's circle a few feet away until he grabs Flash's shoulder and forcibly turns him around, fist raised.

Before his fist can collide with Flash's face, Eloise jumps out from the cheer block and grabs hold of his raised hand. Cliff's hard, piercing eyes flicker to her.

"Don't, you're better than that," She tells him scoldingly under her breath. Everyone's eyes are pinned on the two. "Don't stoop to their level."

Cliff's eyes dart back to Flash's terrified ones, and then to Eloise's. Those who know of Cliff's temper issues and violent outbursts hold their breaths, expecting him to throw her to the side or something.

But his arm falls to his side.

Eloise releases a breath.

Cliff nods to the girl and turns back to his team. The coach grabs his arm and pulls him closer, hissing something about almost getting a technical and suspended under his breath.

Eloise turns to Flash. "Could you at least try to be somewhat of a decent person?" He's really testing her theory of everyone having a beautiful and kind mind behind their exteriors.

Flash scoffs and tries to hide the fear behind his eyes. "Whatever."

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"Hey, wait up Eloise!"

Eloise's head turns as her feet halt, the bottom of her sneakers squeaking against the tile. Cliff, in his normal jeans and sweatshirt, jogs over to her. He stuffs his fists into his sweatshirt pockets and leans against the lockers.

"Hey," Eloise smiles.

His thin lips lift slightly at her in return. It's nice seeing him smile, considering his emotions are always confusing him to no end.

Eloise hugs her books closer to her chest. "What's up?"

"I just wanted to say thanks for calming me down at the game last night," he breathes. "Nobody really knows how to deal with me and people usually just let me be. I don't know. Just, thanks for stopping me." He scratches his closely shaven head. "I would have been suspended and not allowed to play any more games if you didn't."

Eloise's smile widens. Cliff usually never talks about anything deeper than sports, girls, and fights. She knows he has deep thoughts, but she's never heard him speak with any other emotion other than anger or no real emotion at all.

"It's what friends do," she says. "We're there for each other."

He laughs. "Okay, whatever." He starts to step backwards. "See you around, Eloise."

"You too, Cliff."

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Attached Song: Next To Me by Imagine Dragons

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