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There was someone fixing some of the bad stuff people wrote on Michael’s locker, and desk, and places he would be in general.
Point is, someone was nice enough to wash off most of the slurs people wrote on Michael’s stuff and he had no idea who it was.
He just knew that one day he walked into school, towards his locker which he knew had the f slur marked on since last week (thank you, Rich) and the bold lettering was washed off, only a few small marks and faint lettering remained. Since then he’d been trying to find out who had done it. He wasn’t really sure how he would figure it out but he would!
When he sat down in Chemistry he noticed Dustin Kropp walking away from his desk. He wasn’t really sure why Dustin would be near his desk but he knew that Rich sat behind him so maybe that was why.
He reached his seat and sat down. It was only when he put his laptop on his desk that he noticed the bright blue word “queer” on his desk. That was why, he thought. He could feel someone looking at him from behind, their eyes bore holes into his back and he wasn’t sure if the gaze was judgmental or pitying.
When class ended he quickly dash out of the room and away from the chuckles of the cool kids. He looked behind him for a second and noticed Rich staring at him with a strange expression.
He didn’t look angry, disgusted, or mean. His face didn’t convey that he found the joke funny or if he was in on the joke but it wasn’t apologetic in any way that Michael could see. His gaze was soft but his eyebrows were furrowed slightly. He held his gaze for only a few seconds before turning his head and packing up his stuff. Michael wasn’t sure why but it made him feel a bit better about the whole thing.
The next day when he went back into Chem there was no word on his desk, there wasn’t even an indication that it was there before. He looked around the sparsely populated classroom for who could have done it.
He knew it wasn’t the custodian (the guy was great but he usually overlooked any signs of bullying during his cleaning process), so it had to be someone early like him.
The only people in the room were Chloe, Jenna, Madeline, a few boys he didn’t really recognize, Dustin Kropp, and Rich. Considering the fact that a majority of that list hated him and the minority that didn’t also didn’t know him, he figured that it must’ve been someone in his other classes. Maybe it was even Jeremy!
When lunch came around Michael quickly found his way to Jeremy. He heard the door open and it was as if the same pair of eyes from yesterday were piercing him again. He almost turned around to see who it could possibly be but the feeling stopped a few moments before he would have turned around.
“So, dude, Christine has been talking about this years play since last year in nearly all her classes and I was thinking about signing up. The problem is…” Jeremy trailed off and gestured towards the popular people’s table (more specifically Rich). “I feel like everyone’s gonna make fun of me for even trying but this is the only way I can get Christine to notice me!”
Jeremy hit his head against the table and Michael winced.
“Just go for it! Who cares what anyone else thinks? It’s high school theatre, not broadway!” Michael said.
Jeremy raised his head from the table and it looked slightly red.
“You’re right! Who cares what other people think! The only person’s opinion I care about is Christine.”
“There you go.”
They talked for the next 10 minutes about random things (video games, music, weekend plans, etc.) before Michael remembered the thing.
“By the way, do you know who washed off my locker?” He asked. He didn’t know when Jeremy got to school usually but he was hoping it was earlier than he did.
“Hm? You didn’t just wash it off?” Michael shook his head. “Sorry, dude, I take the bus so I usually get here just before school.”
Michael’s heart sank and he tried not to be too disappointed. There had to be someone who knew who it was! With that thought came an idea and he knew exactly who he was gonna ask.
He didn’t get the chance to talk to Jenna Rolan for the rest of the day as she wasn’t in any of his afternoon classes and he didn’t see her in the hallway. What did end up happening was Rich writing “loser” on his rainbow patch.
He felt so ashamed that he cried in the bathroom until school was over and the second he got home he used sewing supplies to take off the patch. His mom asked what had happened when she saw his face but he could barely speak.
When his máma got back from work he felt a bit better. Well enough to tell them about it especially after they got the call about him skipping his last period.
They demanded that he gave them names but he didn’t want to release the rage of his mothers on anyone, not even Rich.
The next day, at school, he noticed something taped to his locker. That was weird, usually the slurs were written on his locker… these guys were terrible bullies.
When he actually looked at what was in the paper he felt surprised and a bit of happiness. There was a new rainbow patch in the paper along with a short note about how the person was so sorry that anyone did that to him.
He felt his heart skip a beat and that was just typical. Was he really gaining a small crush on one of the only people who treated him with basic respect who he hadn’t even really met? It seemed he was. Whatever.
Nothing really changed in this routine for the following weeks. At least once a week, some kids would do something against him for no reason. Every time it happened, without fail, the mystery person would do whatever they could to cheer him up.
At least with that thought he knew that the person had to be in his Math class, considering what happened with Jake.
The notes were now a regular thing. It seemed that every fix was followed by a sweet note that he may or may not keep a folder of in his backpack.
Rich was a bit less of an ass as of late. Michael wasn’t sure what had happened to make him back off even a little bit but he wasn’t complaining.
The next time there was a new revelation about It was when he finally found out who it was.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rich walked into school at least half an hour before it started. When he was walking through the halls he noticed how empty it was, along with the terrible thing that he had written on Michael’s locker.
He felt awful about it. God, he was such a terrible person. Why does he keep hurting people? A shock in his spine brought him out of his thoughts.
“Richard.” The SQUIP said. Its voice was exactly like Lara Croft’s.
He took in a few deep breaths while walking down the hall. When he got to Michael’s locker he paused.
“What if I… clean it up?” He thought. A smaller shock hit him.
“If anyone saw you do something like that all my hard work would be destroyed.”
“But there’s no one in the hallway right now.”
He could hear the SQUIP sigh (how does it do that? It’s a computer!).
“Fine. But if I even think that anyone is near we will leave.”
“Okay.”
He ended up spending the next 20 minutes scrubbing the locker with nail polish remover. Why he had nail polish remover on him? Brooke and Chloe had a nasty habit of doing their nails at lunch but they always seemed to forget the remover.
When it was almost completely clean he heard some footsteps heading towards his location so he jumped up and ran.
That Thursday, Dustin Kropp (his friend-through-association) wrote “queer” on Michael’s desk just before Chemistry started.
Seriously, why is everyone he knows a terrible person? Is it because of him? They were probably all perfectly fine before he became popular. He should’ve just ended it in Freshman y-
Shock.
Right. He shouldn’t be thinking like that. Everything is fine. He is fine.
He still felt horrible when Michael saw what was on his desk, face carefully blank.
He spent what felt like the rest of the class looking at the Michael with pity.
When the class was over Michael basically ran to the door, looking back for a second.
He stared directly at Rich for that short moment. Rich tried his best to school his expression into a jeering one but the other looked away before he was able to. God, the SQUIP was gonna kill him.
When he got home that day, his SQUIP was scolding him and shocking him for letting his emotions show. He didn’t really care at that point but it still hurt.
The next time he did anything like that was the following week.
When he was passing by Michael the SQUIP told him to write loser on his rainbow patch.
“What? No! Why?” He thought, face scrunching up. He quickly schooled his face into a cocky smirk.
“All of your friends will find it hilarious.”
“But… I don’t want to do that…” He was fine with writing things on stuff that could easily be cleaned but Michael’s patch was not as easily cleaned. Also, Michael had that patch for a really long time, he remembered seeing it on him during Freshman Year.
Unfortunately, the SQUIP took that decision out of his hands. His body moved without his mind. He tried to resist but it was too late.
The damage was done and he felt his face pull into a self-satisfied smirk. Why was he so weak?
He passed by an embroidery shop on his walk home and, in a moment of weakness, walked inside. His SQUIP was talking to him but he was too distracted to make out what it was saying.
He prayed that no one he knew would see him here buying a rainbow patch because he felt bad.
The next day he walked over to Michael’s locker (still having the last few marks on it) and realized he didn’t know how to give it to him. The patch would probably fit through the grate but he didn’t want Michael to think he was weird! That was an odd thought, he realized. But it didn’t really matter.
Instead, he grabbed some supplies from his backpack, wrote a short note (he didn’t know why he felt the need to), and stuck both it and the patch on the locker.
He looked at the clock and realized that he only had 10 minutes left until the first bell. He ran to the cafeteria where he knew that his friends were.
When he noticed Michael wearing the patch that he got him the next day his heart felt a little bit lighter.
The next few weeks were normal. He or someone he was friends with would be mean to Michael, he would try and help/cheer him up anonymously, repeat.
He tried resisting the SQUIP more and it worked sometimes. The SQUIP was also backing off a bit more, secure in Rich’s position in the school.
Someone had, once again, written the f slur on Michael’s locker. It wasn’t him this time but he was going to find out who it was.
When he saw it the day before he already knew what he was going to do before school.
Unfortunately for him, this was the one time Michael came to school early.
He was wiping off the locker, the first 4 letters were mostly taken off. He grabbed the nail polish remover and put some more on the wipe he was using.
He heard a choked sound behind him, almost like a gasp. He whipped his head towards it, very quickly trying to hide what he was doing.
“Rich?” Michael asked loudly. “What are you doing at my locker?!” He noticed that Rich was hiding something behind his back. “What did you write on my locker?” He was deadly calm and it sent a shiver down Rich’s spine. Who knew that a loser could be that scary?
“I-It’s nothing! I didn’t do anything!” Rich defended. Stepping in front of the locker even more. This just made Michael more suspicious.
Michael pushed Rich aside to get to his locker. Considering the fact that Rich was, maybe, 110 pounds it worked like a charm.
When Michael saw that there were no new messages on his locker he noticed that the newest one was already half gone. Did Rich do that?
Michael turned around and saw a very strange sight. Rich was standing with so much tension in his shoulders he thought they might snap, his face was nearly bright red, and he seemed to be mumbling to something.
He pointed towards his locker. “Did you..?” Michael asked hesitantly.
Rich nodded, which looked like it took a lot of effort for some reason.
With that Michael had a revelation. Rich had been the one who was cleaning his stuff and making him feel better. He was also, embarrassingly, the guy that he had a small crush on.
“Thank you,” Michael said happily.
“It wath nothing! Just forget about it! It ithn’t important! I hate you! Bye!” Rich yelled so rapidly that Michael didn’t think he took a breath once. Rich’s face was still red as he stormed past Michael.
It was only until a few seconds after that Michael fully processed what Rich had said.
“Uh… bye?” He waved slightly and that seemed to make Rich even redder.
Well, he knew how he would spend the rest of the year.