My R [TordEdd, High School AU]

Chapter Four

The video up there serves no purpose to this chapter. It is just the Dreams animation meme and I like it so yeah.

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Edd woke up with a start. He took in a deep breath and looked around to clear his senses, since he always woke up from those dreams that way, with an odd echo in his head.

He got his stuff for school and began to walk there, as he wanted to avoid his friends as much as possible. He couldn't let them know what happened.

When Edd arrived at school, he noticed his friends in their usual meeting spot. He hid in the crowd so they couldn't see him and call him over. Praying that they didn't see him, Edd went to the east side of the school to make sure his friends didn't suspect anything. The good thing was that neither Matt nor Tom were at school yet, so they couldn't call him out.

Edd waited for the bell to signify that school was starting. The loud yet familiar ear-piercing ring of the bell filled the air, and so started his mission. Avoid friends. It should be easy enough, right?

All throughout the school day, Edd made sure to take different and hard-to-memorize routes to all of his classes. He sat outside at lunchtime despite the weather which was slowly turning from fall to winter, where everything would freeze over and make everybody happy at first, then immediately pissed off because winter would hold into spring and that would bring no joy to anyone. (If you can't tell, I live in a cold place.)

In any class that he had with any of his friends, he always sat in the back of the class to avoid them. Every day that week, neither Tom nor Matt heard from him. Not a message, not a call, nothing. To say the least, they were concerned to a the highest level humanly possible. It was almost as if they were Edd's parents.

On Friday though, that's when they decided to confront Edd.

It was the end of cheer practice and Matt was waiting at the exit that Edd used to leave, Tom by his side, concern written all over his face. They had to wait in uncomfortable silence, or Edd might notice them and take a different way out.

After at least five minutes of waiting, they saw Edd approaching the exit. Somehow, he noticed their presence and the mix of concern and anger on their faces, so he quickly pivoted and ran in the other direction.

"Edd, you're not getting away this time!" Tom shouted and dashed after the short brunette. Matt followed as backup in order to catch him.

Matt was certain that they scared him so much that he was having a panic attack, because when he saw that both of his friends were chasing after him, he fainted immediately. This heightened the tension between the group of friends as Tom caught up to him and tried to wake him up by dumping a nearby pail of cold water onto his face.

The short boy woke up with a start, soaked and scared. He glared at both of them but sighed heavily as to give up and he began to speak.

"Why did you do that?" Edd glared at his friends, fear edging into his tone.

"Edd, you've been avoiding us all week. We want to know if you're alright and still functioning." Matt answered, the concern clear in his eyes.

"I'm fine." He answered, looking a bit pissed off that Tom had poured cold water on his face. "Just leave me alone, I don't want to talk."

"Just know that we're always here if you need us." Tom called as Edd walked away without looking back at them.

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Edd was still in his cheerleading outfit, which was a sports bra and a short skirt, due to him being on the girls team. He wasn't too worried about being mocked for it, he was only worried about his father abusing him if he didn't get home on time.

Instead of going on his regular route home, he went around the side of the school to avoid anyone still lingering around. Boy, was that a mistake.

To his surprise, Edd was pinned up against the hard brick wall by someone significantly taller than himself. He squeezed his eyes shut, but opened one a little bit to see who was keeping him down. It was one of Tord's friends, Paul, with his nicer, more passive friend, Patryk, behind him, being a bystander as per usual. Edd saw him mouth 'I'm sorry' with regret gleaming in his eyes.

"What's a girl like you doing out this late?" Paul held Edd against the wall by his neck.

"One: I'm not a girl. Two: I have cheer practice. We all know that, whether you know me personally or not." Edd argued, but he hissed in pain as Paul shoved his head against the bricks. Patryk gave Edd a pitiful look, knowing that he couldn't do anything about it.

"I beg to differ." Paul narrowed his eyes, an evil smirk crossing his face. "I heard from a little bird that your transgender. And I don't think you want that information getting out to the entire school, do you?"

Edd gasped. Who told him that? No one at the school knew about his transgender background. No one. All they knew is a girl named Edelle had to move to Sweden in second grade with a boy named Edd taking her place. Just that. Nothing special.

"How do you know about that?" Edd demanded angrily, attempting to kick the taller male away from himself.

"Ah-ah-ah, I don't think so. Well, how I know isn't important right now. If you want to keep this a secret, then I recommend you listen to the deal that I'm proposing." Paul pulled his phone out of his pocket and showed him the school's website, where kids were allowed to make post anonymous messages.

"I'll keep it a secret if you do as I say and what I request. If you don't," Paul pasted something into the post section of the school's website. "Then I'll be forced to send your secret to every single person in this school district."

"That's blackmail!" Edd shouted.

"It's what I do." Paul responded coolly, an icy edge to his voice. Edd knew there was nothing he could do to fix the deal.

Edd held his breath and glanced back at Patryk. His eyes were pleading him to just agree to the deal. Since Edd didn't want to cause harm to the tall boy, he reluctantly agreed.

"Good choice." Paul flashed an evil smile. "Now add your contact into my phone so I can contact you whenever I need."

Edd did as he was told, earning a sad and pitiful gaze from Patryk.

"Goodbye, Gold!" Paul grabbed Patryk's arm with such force that he winced as they walked away.

Poor Edd.