Page 17 of Everything That Kills Me
Zeph turned to look at him. “Who said I didn’t like you?”
The air between them seemed to crackle.
“I’m glad you came.” Zeph gave him a shy smile.
Something lurched in Jack’s chest. “Sure about that? You didn’t look pleased to see me and for the last week and a half, you’ve gone out of your way to avoid me.”
“Not you. Scott and Rufus. Not you! Though…”
“Though what?”
“Nothing.” Zeph looked away.
“Tell me.”
“I was trying to save you. They’ll pick on you too if they think we’re friends.”
Jack was shocked that Zeph would try to protect him. “I can handle myself.”
“I don’t want them to hurt you. It doesn’t have to be something physical. They’re sneaky.”
“In what way?”
“They might put something in your bag that would get you into trouble—and then tell on you. Claim you racially abused Scott because he’s black. Wet all your clothes while you’re doing PE.”
“Is that what they did to you?”
“They’ve tried lots of things. I told a teacher they were bullying me and it made everything worse. The latest ruse is claiming that last term I promised to sponsor them for some charity football thing and never paid them. It’s not true. They might have put my name down on the form but I wouldn’t have signed it. I suspect they’ve been made to pay the money themselves.”
“So they’re dickheads.”
“Yep. The teachers know Scott and Rufus’s reputation but Rufus’s dad is a governor and on the local council. The school doesn’t want to piss him off. I don’t think the pair would go too far, but…”
“I’ll have your back.”
Zeph shot him a look that melted something in Jack’s chest. “If we’re seen together all the time, they’ll spread another sort of rumour. But I need to stop hiding. I can’t spend the next two years being scared of them and what they might do. I was hoping they might have changed over the summer, got bored of tormenting me but they haven’t. If I thought giving them the money would make them stop, I might have, but it won’t.”
Jack knew how he’d have dealt with them, but Zeph didn’t have his skills.
“How come it’s only your sixteenth birthday?”
“I skipped a year when I was seven.”
“Because you were brilliant?”
“At least 1,600 lumens.” Zeph grinned and Jack chuckled.
“The first assembly sort of told me that. Full marks in three subjects!”
“You’re smart too.”
“I struggled with the latest physics homework.”
“Question four?”
Jack nodded.
“Me too. I worked it out in the end, but it was tricky. Which school did you go to?”
