𝖎 𝖑𝖔𝖛𝖊 𝖞𝖔𝖚, 𝖆𝖑𝖜𝖆𝖞𝖘 | 𝖘𝖙𝖎𝖈𝖐𝖘 & 𝖘𝖙𝖔𝖓𝖊𝖘

☄

I sat in English class, hitting my pen on the fresh white lined paper, I glanced around the room. My eyes met with Joey Finley's, a boy a knew, not personally but he was in a few of my classes. He seemed a bit flustered, I gave a warm smile as did he before looking away. 

He and his friends, Mouth, and Book, were in this class too. They tried to make it subtle but it was obvious their listing to some kind of sports broadcast. I'm guessing baseball, I always see them playing after school. 

School was fine, not my favorite thing in the world but not my least favorite. It was something I was good at and I knew it made my dad happy that I was doing well. He never put too much pressure on me when it came to school, he helped me whenever he could and said my best was enough. I knew I got lucky with a dad like mine, but he wasn't around too much. My dad left the house before I did and got home when I was already asleep. 

On my walk home I was trailing behind the three boys from English when Billy Hayse approached them. It was a commonly known fact at this school that Hayes is an asshole, never to me though. He and I grew up together but as we got older, he got colder. Our dads go to the bar together, so if he left a mark on me and my dad saw, Billy would get hell when he went home. 

I watched as the blonde pushed Mouth to the ground, I decided to intervene. "Hey Hayes, back off, will you?" I said as I walked up to him, "You wanna do this right now Natalie?" "Do what? Tell me, Hayes, what is it that you're exactly going to do?" I asked, he let out a frustrated sigh then walked away. 

The three boys looked at me in awe, I let out a soft laugh "I'm guessing he doesn't leave you alone that easy huh" Mouth got up off the ground, "Depends the day, thanks babe" he said with a smirk, I raised my eyebrows at him, "Not your babe, buddy" I spoke, I watched as his expression changed to more flirtatious which confused me, "Nice, I want what I can have" I rolled my eyes, "Shut up Mouth" Book hit him in the arm. 

I turned to face Joey, "Thanks, Natalie," he said with a smile, "Yeah of course and you can call me Nat, see you around," I turned around and made my way home.