Sympathy For The Devil

10. Kicked While You're Down

Passing period had become a scaled-down temple run.

Kevin reached his second class relatively easily, aside from one incident he narrowly missed by grinding to a halt and ducking around a corner when he spotted Jimmy stroll into view up ahead. He knew full well, however, that blind luck would only hold him for so long. The rest of the morning passing periods were a matter of timing, early departures by whatever means available, incredibly circuitous paths through the hallways, and above all, changing directions and tactics at a moment's notice. If he happened to see Eddward, his only real plan was looking at the floor, turning around, walking the other way, and praying that Eddward would neither follow him nor see the look on his face. It barely ever worked. At one point he had come face to face with the three of them, with Jimmy's dark look, Johnny's knowing smirk, and... Eddward, who wouldn't have had to see him in the act to know that their previous "conversation" had driven Kevin to tears.

He hated to let Eddward get under his skin. He had always been able to shrug off whatever the swimmer said, more or less, but this...

This had hurt. What was more, it had yet to actually stop, and all he wanted was for that ache to piss off already. Whenever he looked at Eddward, it returned as fresh as it had been yesterday, renewed again and again. He just wanted it to be over. He'd thought it wasover, but then, surprise surprise, the light at the end of the tunnel was just an oncoming train. Why had he expected anything else?

That... wasn't exactly why it still hurt, he realized as he darted through the peacefully empty hallways at lunch, heading for the relative safety of his friends. It wasn't that he had expected something different, though he had hoped, at least. He had expected a return to normalcy, and while normalcy was pretty awful on its own, at least... at least it made sense and lined up and he was used to it already. The things Eddward gave him crap about were stupid and trivial and in no way warranted the kind of treatment he got, but at least they weren't untrue.

He would have been fine with doing something nice and altruistic and then slipping back into the usual without being seen or acknowledged, and instead he had made everything worse. A fresh stab of hurt accompanied the simple understanding, just as he was turning a corner.

In that moment, he was distracted. That was what cost him.

He was confused and dismayed at first, just as much as he was in pain, when a fist came hurtling into his stomach, just below his sternum. With a gasp - or at least an attempt at one - he doubled over, and another fist crashed down on the back of his neck, flooring him.

Eddward had done a lot of things in the past. He had never raised a hand to him before.

For a moment, Kevin crouched on all fours, wheezing for air and clutching his stomach with one arm, until a kick to the side knocked him over on his back. The messenger bag was torn from his shoulder, probably to be rifled through, its contents emptied all over the floor for him to pick up when they were finished with him. His glasses perched lopsidedly on the bridge of his nose, but he could look up at his attackers and see them through watering eyes.

Oh. The track team had returned, hadn't they? And with them, the three thieves.

The one on the right was holding a piece of paper, and now tossed it toward him carelessly. It floated gently down to the floor and came to rest beside him, close enough to read. It was a physics worksheet, returned and graded, with a 99 in red ink and the name Kevin Anderson scribbled in the top right hand corner.

"Found that in the locker room this morning," one of them said, though Kevin didn't look up quickly enough to see who.

With some difficulty, Kevin managed to inhale. "Cleaned it," he gasped out. Another kick to his side silenced him. His glasses nearly fell off his face completely.