Inner Demons

Chapter 6

In the few classes where we weren't in the same room it was boring, except for art class anyway I could never be bored in there. When the last bell rang I headed over to my locker and he wasn't there yet. I started putting my books away when I heard footsteps behind me I closed my locker and was about to turn around when I was grabbed and carried/dragged out the side door where I saw that Cole and Angel and a few others were standing there staring at me. I couldn't yell for help because whoever was holding me had a hand over my mouth, and I was struggling and kicking trying to get away I don't want to be in the middle of this group of monsters, who knows what they are going to do to me! The ones holding me dropped me and when I got up I started looking around for where I could run it there was nowhere, people were surrounding me in a circle the only way I could get out was if I ran through them and then they would just throw me back in the circle- my thoughts of escape were interrupted by the side of my head getting hit and I stumbled back. I saw that Cole had walked into the circle of people and they were all there to witness Ruby getting beat up. I don't know what happened but I started feeling angry instead of scared, I was feeling how I used to feel about bullies like I needed to fight back, the next time Cole threw a punch I blocked it and hit him in the face while he was stumbling back I saw my opportunity to run but there still wasn't an opening. I guess punching back was a bad idea though because Cole recovered faster than I thought and he pushed me to the ground saying, "Oh has little Ruby got the fight back in her well I'll have to fix that," and he started punching me. I could feel the blood on my face and I was going to have a black eye for sure, then the crowd parted for some reason and I saw someone running towards us but my vision was getting blurry and I couldn't see who, then Cole got tackled off of me and I could hear one of them getting punched in the face. This would've been a great time to run away but I couldn't. Cole had hit me so many times that I could barely keep my eyes open, I was losing consciousness. Then I saw a face above me saying my name, it was Ryan but I couldn't form any words, I could see the edges of my vision going black, Ryan called my name again but it sounded so far away. Then everything went black.

I woke up with something over my eyes, when I took it off I saw that it was a cloth that was soaked in water and blood, probably from my nose, and I saw Ryan sitting at the end of the couch that I was laying on, looking at his phone. Wait, couch? I looked around again, where am I? I didn't care about that though because then my face started hurting and I let out a groan. Ryan heard me and looked over, concern in his eyes as he saw me awake. He got up, walked over to me, and crouched by my face and said, "Are you okay? I mean I know you aren't okay, but is anything broken? I couldn't tell and I had to get you away from the school and all those jerks, I didn't know where you lived so the only place I could think to bring you was my house. I beat up that guy that was hurting you and then you lost consciousness so I had to bring you somewhere where they couldn't follow and hurt you again." He was rambling a bit, my head hurts so much I can hardly comprehend what he is saying though. I was holding my head trying to make my brain stop throbbing when I felt a glass being put in my hand I opened my eyes a bit and saw Ryan holding two pills in his hand and he had pushed a glass of water into mine. I gulped down the pills and just laid there for a bit, wanting the pain to go away. Something cool was put back on my face and I guess it was the washcloth and even though I didn't have a fever the cloth still felt great. I haven't even seen the damage to my face yet but I can feel all the bruises forming and turning colors.

After a while of sitting there I started to feel better but I didn't want to chance moving yet, and I heard the door open. "Ryan? How was school?" It was a male, so I guess it was his dad, the couch shifted meaning Ryan got up and went to go talk to his dad. After what felt like 10 minutes they both came into the room I was in and I heard Ryan say, "Hey Ruby, my dad said it was okay if you stayed here if you don't feel up to moving but we would need to ask your parents." I took the cloth off of my face, "Thank you Mr Ryan's dad, and you could try contacting them but they are drunk like they are every night so they won't care where I am." I reached for my phone so I could give them the number. After Ryan's dad, who told me to call him Charles, got off the phone and told me it was okay he started making dinner. Ryan was like my nurse all night he wouldn't let me move unless I had to and when my head started hurting again he went to get more medicine and overall despite being beat up it was actually a pretty good day.