Chapter 11
“Most of this is trash,” Lily declared rummaging through what was once her temporary locker.
“Why didn’t you just go through and clean it out when you did yours? You know everything I would have wanted to keep.”
“You never know,” Malaya said smoothing her hair out as she looked around the nearly empty hallway. Lily fished though a pile of papers for anything she wanted to keep, and then handed the rest of the stack to Malaya for her to throw away in a nearby trash can.
“Hey I didn’t know you got your cast off,” Landon said appearing seemingly out of nowhere.
“Last Monday,” Lily answered shortly.
“Congrats.”
“Thanks.”
“So how’s your first day back at school been?” He leaned casually against the beige lockers with his arms folded across his chest.
“Pretty good mostly,” Lily responded nonchalantly, not even looking at him.
“So why wasn’t it all good?”
“I was disappointed at what happened in the cafeteria at lunch.”
“Yeah, Dean’s a real idiot sometimes,” Landon said looking at the floor.
“He’s not the one I was disappointed with,” Lily remarked, finally looking him straight in the eye, so her message was clear.
“Who, me? Why are you disappointed in me? I didn’t do anything!”
“Lily, he wasn’t even at the table when it happened,” Malaya said jumping in the conversation.
“But you were there at the table afterwards, and didn’t even say or do anything to persuade Dean that he was wrong to trip him.”
“How do you know?”
“Never mind, just forget it,” Lily said collecting her things so she could leave. She was tired from wobbling around on her crutches all day, and she didn’t want to fight someone who she knew wasn’t really going to change, no matter what she said.
“Wait,” Landon said quickly trying to stop her. “I probably should have said something to him, but it never came up. I mean what was I supposed to say to him anyway?”
“That he shouldn’t trip innocent people who haven’t ever done a thing to him in all his life. That he shouldn’t torment people who are weaker than he is. Anything to try and convince him that he was wrong and shouldn’t do it again,” Lily spat out exasperated.
“Nothing I say will do any good. At the very beginning I tried to do that. I tried, but they don’t listen. They just tease me for it, so why should I bother?”
“Just forget it.”
“No, I won’t forget it,” Landon said firmly. He rubbed his forehead with his fingertips and glanced at Malaya and Lily standing together in the now deserted hallway.
“If it’s that big a deal to you, I’ll try again,” he said relenting. Lily wasn’t sure what to think. She wanted to believe him, but she just wasn’t sure that he would follow through when the time came to stand up to those creeps.
“I need to get home. Let’s go,” she said to Malaya as she began to hobble toward the exit.
“See ya later,” Malaya said smiling brightly at Landon.
“See you later,” Landon replied, watching Lily limp down the hall on her crutches.
***
The two girls made their way down the hallway to their lockers to put away the stack of papers and notebooks from the temporary locker. Lily had just slammed the locker door shut when she heard a voice.
“I’ll teach that little slug to get in my way.”
“Did you hear that?” Lily stopped walking to listen.
“What?” Malaya was busy digging through the front pocket of her forest green backpack.
“That voice. I think it’s coming from down the hall on the left,” Lily said as she hurried her wobbly stride towards the voice.
“Take that,” the voice said as Lily rounded the corner. Lily could tell they were getting closer to the voice. She tried to go as fast as she could, but it was so hard to get around on the crutches. They rounded the second corner just in time to see Montana standing over a freshman cowering against the cold, metal lockers. Blood trickled down from his lip as the freshman tried to escape his tormenter’s grasp on his shoulder.
“Don’t you ever get in my way again,” Montana howled at the freshman, spit flying past his furled lips.
“Hey,” Lily shouted down the hallway. “What do you think you’re doing?”
She wasn’t sure what possessed her to do it. She wasn’t exactly in the best position to be standing up to bullies at the moment. Her crutches gave her a distinct disadvantage. Normally she would have run for a teacher instead of trying to deal with Montana on her own.
“What’s it to you, cripple?” Montana turned his attention to Lily and Malaya without letting go of his victim.
“Let him go,” Lily yelled. Lily pushed Malaya back in the direction they had come. “I’m sending my friend for the nearest teacher, so you better let him go now, or you’ll get caught.”
“What’s going on here?” Mr. Turnbow appeared from a nearby class room. By the look of his face, he already knew exactly what was going on.
“I was just, well, uh,” Montana stammered. To a freshman, he may have looked big and tough, but in reality he was a weak coward.
“I think you better have the school nurse look at that lip before she leaves for the day,” Mr. Turnbow directed the grateful freshman. The moment the injured boy was gone the teacher turned to Montana.
“There is never a good reason to hit someone. It shows a complete lack of discipline and self-control, which are qualities I consider essential in any real man. This time I will let you off the hook, because I know things have been rough at home lately, but if I ever find out that you hit another human being again, I will make sure that you pay the price for it. Do you understand?” Montana nodded somberly and shuffled down the hall towards the exit sign. Mr. Turnbow sighed as he watched him leave the school and then retreated to his classroom. Lily noticed that up until Mr. Turnbow had delivered his lecture, she had heard every one of Montana’s thoughts, but afterwards she heard nothing. It seemed that as soon as someone was apologetic, she could no longer hear their thoughts. Ever since she had come out of the, coma she had been wondering if her gift applied to both good and bad people, and after the day’s events Lily finally had her answer. She now knew that she was able to hear all wicked thoughts, regardless of whether the person thinking them was truly a bad person or not. She had heard many of Dean’s thoughts, because he was truly horrible the majority of the time. Robert was a nice guy, but was treated badly and sought revenge because if it, which is never good. Lily figured that Robert should have forgiven Dean regardless of what he had done to him, and because he didn’t, she was able to hear his desires of retaliation. It seemed to her that Montana was not as bad a person as she had thought, but was easily influenced by his friends, and not having a good father figure at home was taking a toll on him. Lily was surprised she hadn’t heard Landon’s thoughts yet. She was so sure she would have. He really was what he said he was, a nice guy who went along with what his friends were doing to avoid ridicule and banishment from the group. She still was irritated at him for doing nothing about the Robert situation. Landon was one of Dean’s best friends, and so he was in a position of power that very few people were in. She understood that he was afraid of losing his friends and went along with the crowd, but at what cost? Every time a student was bullied, they were paying the price Landon wasn’t willing to pay. People were suffering because he was protecting himself. She wasn’t sure if he would ever change, even though she still hoped he would. Only time would tell