Bloody and Bruised || Open
Liam had run back into the school to grab his sketchpad from his last classroom, berating himself for forgetting it in the first place. This was the last place he wanted to be aside from his house, but this was the agreement for him wanting to get more time out of the hospital. He needed something to help him assure them that he could handle himself in the bigger world. So far, things were going alright.
But he knew it was only a matter of time.
“Oh look, the little thing’s come back~” cooed a poisonous voice from the corner. The voice made Liam stop, his blood running cold as three bodies stepped toward him.
“P-please, guys, I-I don’t want any trouble,” he stuttered, clutching his bag tighter. But then he saw the largest one carrying a sketchbook, his sketchbook. He pointed at it as their laughter reached his ears. “Th-that’s mine,” he mumbled.
“That’s mine,” the other boy squeaked mockingly before taking a few steps toward him and switching back to his deep voice, “Why don’t you take it from us then, huh? Or are you too much of a girl to do that?”
That struck a chord and tears sprung to his eyes before he could stop them; he jumped for the sketchbook, but was stopped by a hard punch to his gut. He went down, but was yanked up by his hair roughly, forced to look at their sneering faces.
“Oh look,” another said, “She’s crying.”
“I’m not a g-” his protest was cut off by a hard right hook to his jaw. But Liam wasn’t going to give up that easily. He knew what they wanted and knew what could probably happen, but he would not back down. He tried to protest again, but was just met by another one of their fists.
“You wanna try to say that again, girlie?” he asked, getting his face extremely close to Liam’s own. Without hesitation, he spat in his face. “That’s it!” the boy screamed, and slammed Liam’s face into the lockers behind them.
Liam tasted blood and before he could do anything, a knee connected with his face and his head met the floor with an audible smack. Kicks to his ribs and groin made him curl up on himself, arms raising to do everything he could to protect his face.
Liam was on the verge of blacking out, just wanting the pain to end when he heard a voice shout from down the hall. He heard the three boys run off, but he was in too much pain to move from the fetal position. He heard footsteps rushing to him and a soft voice, but he couldn’t understand any of the words they were saying. The blood roared in his ears and he couldn’t stop apologizing constantly.
