𝐍 𝐞 𝐫 𝐯 𝐨 𝐮 𝐬 | Freddy Freeman

L o n e r

"Billy come on.. this is the third time this week." Freddy muttered, his phone held to his ear as he spoke, his words only slightly muffled by the fries that he had in his mouth. It was lunch time.

"I'm sorry! Something came up, I promise I'll sit with you tomorrow." Billy replied, though Freddy could hear his new group of friends in the background laughing and joking.

"Whatever, don't bother." Freddy spoke and hung up, putting his phone to the side and letting out a sigh as he sunk in his chair. Things had gone well for a while, his siblings would sit with him at lunch and Billy was his best friend for a while. But eventually life had to move on, Billy got more comfortable at school and made new friends. His siblings also had their own friends to get to and their own stuff to do. So now that left Freddy, sitting alone at lunch. It's not like he didn't have any friends at all, he had some friends that he spoke to but he only spoke to them in the classes that he had with them. When he wasn't in class it was like they had no idea who he was. He was beginning to think maybe he was the one with the power of Invisibility, his least favourite of all powers.

The male ate the rest of his lunch and then limped his way to his last few classes before heading home. At home he managed to successfully get upstairs without one of the usual 'how was school?' Talks from Rosa and Victor. Because he wouldn't have anything good to say, he was in the worst mood. He let the two times Billy had ditched him slide and was hoping today he would redeem himself. But no, another no show. It didn't surprise him that Billy wasn't home yet. Probably with his new friends.

Most of his night was spent reading comic books and ranting out loud about how stupid he was for believing Billy would actually bother with him. Eventually Billy came home and headed into their shared bedroom. Throwing his backpack to the side and looking over at Freddy who was purposely avoiding looking at him.

"Hey.." Billy spoke, his eyes over on Freddy. Though Freddy kept his face hidden behind his comic book. Billy didn't say anything at first, he just waited to see if maybe he'd respond after reading the sentence he was on or something. But he didn't. "I said I was sorry.."

"Yeah well, you're not the one that ended up sat on your own." Freddy muttered, closing the comic book and putting it on the bed next to him before getting up and grabbing his crutch from next to the bed.

"I'll sit with you tomorrow." Billy sighed, moving forward and gripping onto the crutch to stop him from moving forward.

Freddy looked at Billy, pulling the crutch away. "You said that yesterday and the day before. I'd rather you just didn't." He continued to leave the room and head to the bathroom. The rest of the night went like it usually did, though Freddy was annoyed the whole time. Eventually the next day came and the kids all headed to school.

Freddy had let the fight between him and Billy slide, as long as he stopped promising to sit with him because he knew he wasn't going to show up and that was more annoying than him just saying he wont be sitting with him.

During his first class of the day which was English. Serena Blake was introduced to the class, though he thought she was pretty, maybe even the prettiest girl in the entire school. He didn't see any point in trying to make friends with her. After all she was beautiful and he was invisible. So he just smiled and looked down at his homework that he was skimming over to make sure it didn't have any mistakes.

The class went pretty slow and he was bored the entire time, he glanced back at Serena who was only two rows away from him. She was already making friends with some of the more popular people. He rolled his eyes, typical. She was pretty so obviously she was going to be friends with the popular groups.

The bell rang and he headed to his next class, science. The class went by quickly, he made a few jokes and then got picked on by Brett and Burke as scheduled every single day. Finally it was lunch time. He sat alone at his table, his eyes scanning the cafeteria as he ate his fries and scrolled through his phone. He was beginning to realise how boring his story was becoming. This was it? His best friend is a superhero. Even he himself is technically a superhero. And nothing in his life seemed to be interesting. Nothing exciting happened for him to even have to Shazam his way into anything. After all, Billy was the superhero everyone wanted to see. Himself and his siblings only came in useful when there was a huge disaster or a 'super villian'. Nothing like that had happened recently and even Billy had slowed down on being Shazam unless something crazy was happening.

His brown hues went over to Serena who walked into the cafeteria, he wondered what super power she'd choose if he was to ask her. Hopefully not invisibility. He hoped maybe she'd sit with him, but he knew it was a long shot. She did glance over at him though and his heart raced, instantly he looked away and when he looked back up she'd walked over to a group of people who had called her over. Of course. 

"Is anyone sitting here?" Billy spoke, smiling as he sat down beside Freddy.

Freddy smiled, his eyes going to Billy. "Yeah, you." His eyes went over to Serena again before his attention was back on Billy. "There's a new girl. She's pretty."

"Oh yeah? Where?" Billy glanced around, but then he spotted her. Since he'd basically met everyone at this school when he showed up as Shazam. Freddy was right, she was pretty. "Not gonna happen." He instantly spoke.

"I know, dipshit." Freddy snorted, shoving fries into his mouth as he said so.

Billy began to eat his own lunch, the two spoke about the usual as well as how boring it had been recently and the fact that they hardly hung out anymore. Billy wanted to change that, it had just been difficult since he'd been trying so hard to fit in recently and then he'd sunk into the whole high school scene maybe a little too well.

The bell rang and it was Freddy's least favourite class. Gym. He never used to hate it, but of course he couldn't join in and it got boring always having to sit out. He made his way to gym and got dressed into the appropriate gym clothes even though he couldn't join in. Instantly he headed over to the bench. Though he was happy to see Serena walk out in her gym clothes; she was in his class.

Serena was tying her hair up into a ponytail as she walked in with one of the other females, her name was Jessica and she was one of the popular girls. She wasn't exactly the nicest girl in school. Not who he would have chosen to be friends with Serena if he had a choice.

Freddy watched as they all ran around, they were playing basketball or even a half assed version of it. He wasn't really paying attention, but he looked over to see who was winning. His eyes going to Serena again. She was so pretty, he couldn't help but look at her. He'd never really been interested in girls, boys or anything around that type of thing. Relationships in general. But she was magnetic. His eyes just kept going to her. Suddenly his eyes grew wider as he noticed something. Her jogging bottoms had a Batman sign down the side of them in long stripes either side of her legs. He didn't know how he'd missed it before. She liked Batman? He looked down at his own shirt which was also Batman and a smile hit his lips.

The coach blew the whistle and shouted for them to have a break, though Freddy was too busy in his own world thinking about how the Serena liked Batman to realise someone had sat down beside him.

"Why aren't you playing with us?" A soft voice hit his ears.

Freddy snapped out of it, his eyes going to the source of the voice. He was so shocked that the word just sort of came out. "Pretty."

Serena let out a small laugh. "What?"

Freddy instantly shook his head, rubbing his hand over his face. He was trying to think of what to say next and that's when he quickly lifted his crutch into he view. "I'm not really capable."

"Oh.. what happened?" Serena frowned, her eyes not leaving him as she spoke which only made him more nervous.

"It's a long story.." Freddy muttered, glancing to the stripe on the side of her leg quickly to check it actually was Batman. He was correct.

"I like your shirt." Serena spoke softly, changing the subject now.

"Thanks, I like your trousers," He was about to ask her if she liked Batman or if it was just a fashion choice but then Jessica headed over.

"What're you doing? Jake's talking about the party he's having on Friday. He's so hot, I want to introduce you." Jessica rambled out quickly as she grabbed Serena's wrist and pulled her away from Freddy and over to a group of people huddled together.

Freddy sighed, watching as they walked away. Jessica was the worst and so was Jake. The typical popular people that shit on everyone that isn't like them. But after he ranted in his mind about Jessica he paused, a smile hitting his lips. "She spoke to me.." He said out loud.

"Who're you talking to dude.." A male who was sat on the bench behind him spoke.

Freddy jumped, his eyes going to the male. "Nobody.."

The male snorted. "Weirdo."