Hell's Book of Random One-shots

Play the Game - Spencer Reid

I couldn't figure out why I bothered to show up to this stupid reunion.

I hadn't liked school towards the end of it, my distaste for the place growing once I hit eleven and the people around me seemed to change with it.

Hormones kicked in, clichés became worse as personalities developed and teenage angst filled the hallways like a thick mist. Insecurities plagued every corner and cafeteria food that wasn't nearly as bad as we thought in hindsight.

Not that I knew first-hand, as I either brought food from home or bought some on my walk in so that I wouldn't have to enter the cafeteria and be mocked for daring to be overweight and in an area with food.

As if I had full control over that.

Partial? Sure, I could work harder to shift the weight but there were other underlying factors that they simply wouldn't understand and I only ate around my friends, the thought of eating around others making me feel anxious.

I wasn't the only one, nor was I the biggest, but that didn't stop me from being a target to the jeering.

Even up to the current date I still found it hard to eat in a public area that wasn't a restaurant or coffee shop where everyone else would be doing the same.

People had made comments in the past outside of school, a yell from a passing car as I was walking down the street with a friend, a comment from a schoolgirl as I sat on a wall eating a cookie during an outing with another friend and a rude comment from an older gentleman during a trip.

I regretted never making rebuttals, especially to the latter one.

Unfortunately, mockery is common towards anyone that is different.

Like poor Spencer Reid.

The young super-graduate who had garnered too much attention purely because he was ridiculously smart and skipped more than a couple of grades.

The shy and awkward boy who wouldn't hurt a fly and could barely speak up in class was teased relentlessly and although I hated the reason being used otherwise, I could only put it down to some form of jealousy.

How dare this younger kid be better than me, who does he think he is?

It was sad to witness first-hand and I soon found that he had won a soft spot in my heart almost immediately, the sympathy and kindred spirit mixing into silent empathy.

I wish I had had more confidence to stand up for all of us like some in our ragtag group could.

Even years later, Spencer was ingrained in my memory.

No surprise really, given that he was a very special case, of course he'd stand out among the crowd of bullies and blurred faces.

He found his way on the outskirts of our plucky band of misfits, seeming to choose to keep his distance, which no one argued with, while keeping himself near enough to be within the strange, protective forcefield we obtained as a group.

He never really befriended anyone closely, but we had spent a few lunch periods sat in an isolated corner playing Tetris on my old Gameboy.

I looked around the room, sipping on my chosen drink as the colourful lights flashed and the same music that was played at our prom played, sending me back to that boring night of leaving early and feeling like my parents had wasted money on my custom made outfit.

It was fascinating to see who had changed and who had stayed relatively the same, only a few faces weren't recognisable straight away but for the most part it was still easy to tell who was who and who I wanted to avoid.