Querencia- A Ryden Fanfiction

Chapter Four: Stories

 I close the drawers, and walk out of the bedroom door. “Are you leaving?” Brendon's sister calls behind me.

“Uh, yeah.” I run outside, and shove the computer and charger in my backpack. After shutting the door behind me, I walk back to the hospital.

~

“Here, Brendon.” I say.

“You forgot the Cheez-it's.” Brendon laughs.

“Oh, um, s-sorry.” I stutter.

“Are you okay?”

“Uh, yeah, um...”

“What happened? Did my sister scare you?”

“No, she's adorable. Um, I-I sort of looked through your drawers, and, well, I sort of saw these weird notes--”

“Why would you look through my drawers?” Brendon looks irate.

“I'm sorry! I was curious!”

“You cannot just look through people's drawers.”

“I- I know, I'm sorry.”

“Are you really?”

“Yes!”

“I could actually turn you into the police.”

“Would you really do that?” I roll my eyes.

“No. But I could.”

“What were those notes?”

Brendon sighs, and scratches the back of his neck. “Um, not much.”

“They looked like death threats.” I suppose now is not the time to tell Brendon that I also looked through his email.

“Yeah, just from this guy.”

“Noah.”

“How did you know?”

“They were all from the same person!”

Brendon breathes in and out, and I watch the pace of his breaths. In, out. In, out. “Did you look through my email?”

“What?”

“Somebody left my email open, and I always close it.”

“Sorry.”

Brendon shakes his head, closes his computer, and asks me to shut the door. “Would you sit down? It's a long story.” I sit on a nearby chair. “Are you sure you want to hear it?” I nod. “Well, there was this guy at my old school. His name was Noah, and, well, school wasn't a parade. He would rough me up every day, and--”

“You said that you had gotten beaten up before.”

“Quite a few times, Ryan. It got horribly worse, to the point of death threats, and all this other crap. You said that you were really low at one point? So was I. I missed so much school, and there was nobody there to tell me to get up from my bed.”

“What about your parents?”

“My mom died about three years ago, and my dad left us when I was four.”

“Oh.”

“Anyway, there was one day that was so bad. I was actually crying by myself in the school's bathroom, and Noah sort of, well, walked in on me crying. He had beat me up before, but he had called me all these names, and they were flooding my head, and I almost fainted.”

“Almost?”

“Some teacher heard him and walked in as well.”

“Oh.”

“Noah managed to convince her that there was nothing wrong, and the teacher believed him. God, teachers are so stupid. So, she walked back to her classroom, and I actually did faint. Nobody noticed me, and I was suspended for 'ditching school.'”

“What? Why would they believe that you ditched school?”

“Because I did. I left about an hour after Noah had left me lying in the bathroom. The school never even noticed that Noah had done anything, so I transferred schools.”

“Did you ever know why Noah was harassing you?”

“Not really. I started to blame myself, after a while.”

“Why would you blame yourself?”

“I couldn't tell you, Ryan.” Brendon shakes his head. “It's why Brent really isn't affecting me. I've been through it before, and it's almost as if I don't feel anything.”

“Brendon--”

“Anyway, thanks for the computer. It was quite a day at school today, no? Fritos, then Brent, then Chemistry, then MORE Brent, then the hospital, then my life story.”

“It's the most eventful day in a while.”

“You're a really good friend.”

“You've only known me a day, Brendon.”

“I can tell. Hopefully, you won't just stop hanging out with me because you've gotten tired of me or something. It's happened a lot.”

“I wouldn't do that.”

“Okay.”

I grab my backpack, and pull out a bag of Fritos. “I wanted to return the favor.”

Brendon laughs and takes the bag of chips. “You don't owe me any favors.”

“I forgot the Cheez-it's!”

“You didn't forget to take me to the hospital.”

“I'm not a saint for doing the right thing.”

“I cannot wait to get out of this paper-mache hospital gown! It's very cumbersome.”

“I imagine. Tomorrow, right?”

“Yes, just in time for school.”

“That sucks.”

“Not really, you'll be at school tomorrow, right?”