The Street Fighter

Chapter 9

I was walking with Dylan to school wearing some tracksuit bottoms and a hoodie - I couldn't be bothered today.

Dylan let go of my hand to run to Faith, I ran after him but a pain shot up my ribs. I brushed it off and carried on running as normally as I could, hoping no one noticed.

When I got there I noticed Zach was here, what was he doing here?

"Hi Skylar," he greeted me. I noticed some of the parents weren't around us, in fact those parents seemed to be protecting them from something. What? I don't know. I mentally shrugged.

"Hey," I looked up at him, "What are you doing here?"

He looked straight at me, his blue eyes showing his concern before they soon turned to anger.

"What happened to your eye? Did you get hit? Who hit you? When di-" He interrogated me with all these questions before I interrupted him. I was starting to get angry at his prying. It was getting annoying and he has no right to do this. Why is he doing this?

"Why do you care? It's none of your business. Just shut up and go away," I snapped.

He looked at me in shock before anger once again took over.

"I'm just trying to help. You're obviously hiding something and now you show up with a black eye."

He grabbed my arm and I tried yanking it away.

"Let go!" He didn't.

After struggling for a while in his strong arms, I successfully pulled it out of his grip. He looked at me in surprise before it turned into worry as another shot of pain ran through my ribs making me clutch them.

He stepped forward and before I could react, he took my hands away from my stomach and lifted my hoodie and top up. He let out a barely audible gasp, horror filling his eyes. His fingers traced the dark green and purple flesh that covered most of my stomach.

I clenched my teeth, trying to make it seem like didn't hurt and made sure not to make a noise. I stepped back before he could put any pressure on it. Looking around, I noticed we were the only ones in the children's playground. Dylan and Faith inside as well.

He lifted my chin and his blue eyes bore into mine.

"Why won't you let me help you? You're in pain and someone has hurt you. So why?" His voice held concern and a hint of anger.

"I don't need help and I'm perfectly fine. Just leave me alone and keep your big ass fucking nose out of my business."

He seemed like he was having an inner battle inside him before he shook his head and sighed.

"I will find out what you're hiding. If you don't want me to help, I won't. Just make sure you stay out of my way and I'll stay out of yours. That includes my boys as well, we don't want little girls messing up our little group." He snapped, but I didn't miss the pained look that flickered behind his eyes.

"I am not. Hiding. Anything." I seethed. "I am not some little girl and I don't care about your friends. I don't want, nor do I need friends. So tell them to back off as well," I bit back.

"Do you know who you're talking to? I'm the gan-" He stopped suddenly before he rephrased his sentence. "And we don't need you either, for all we care you could fuck off down a little hole and we wouldn't notice. We don't care about you." He walked away.

I sighed in relief too thankful that he left it at that to realise what he said previously before he reworded his sentence.

When I got to school I saw the boys and Zach sitting in the front of the school by their cars and motorbikes. Zach glared at me as he lit his cigarette. The other boys just smiled, oblivious to the dirty look Zach was giving me.