A Promise Gone Wrong

Chapter Five: More

IMAGE OF: DYLAN ABADI

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Chairs tumble and slide across the cafeteria floor while people cheer, gasp, or scream as my friends and I go head to head against guys from the hockey team.

They're bigger but we're faster.

For the record, our involvement came out of self defense after the captain of their team, Mason, came raging towards our table cussing and throwing out insults at Jack.

Mason dragged him from the table and threw the first punch so the rest of us came to his defense and things escalated.

I've just managed to knock one of the guys off of Jack as our gym teacher comes running and blowing his whistle while other male faculty members start pulling us off each other, but the fighting continues until security guards join the scene.

They separate us, sending the hockey guys to the Principal's office and we end up in the library.

"Fuck, stop!" Jack smacks away one of Pat's arms when he presses an ice pack for the third time to a bruise on Jack's neck that's as dark as his tattoos.

They're sitting across from the rest of us while Dylan and Cody are on either side of me.

"If it hurts that bad you should go see the nurse," Pat snaps, and throws the ice pack down onto the table. His lower lip is busted in a corner, but aside from that he seems fine.

"He was just trying to help you, Jack. You should be saying thanks, to all of us. This was your fight," Cody chimes in, leaning his upper body onto the long wooden table as he massages his jaws.
Even with his sandy brown skin tone I can make out bruises on his face, arms and neck, so I'm sure he's in pain as well.

Grabbing the ice pack, I hand it over to Cody and he smothers his face in it.

"What did you do?" Dylan speaks up, narrowing his eyes at Jack who in guilt begins rubbing the side of an arm.

"His girlfriend," he mutters under his breath.

I purse my lips, not surprised by his answer. He skipped our first class today so I knew he was hooking up with someone.

"Why would you want to touch something that Hulk-sized, albino ape looking, tool-box was with?" Pat scrunches up his nose in disgust and slides into another chair on their side of the table as though Jack's  contagious.

Running his hands through his golden blond hair, he leans back in his seat with a sigh.

"I gave her a thigh tattoo yesterday evening at Mikey's shop," he explains, being vague because we already know what that means. "So, when we crossed paths this morning," he trails off, insinuating one thing led to another.

I shake my head, still and forever impressed that his tattooing has landed him in a quarter of the girl's in our class' pants.

They go in to his friend's parlor requesting Jack, knowing if they ask him to do a thigh tattoo it comes with the added service of his mouth and fingers. It's a code he came up with, meaning Mason's girlfriend knew exactly what she was doing.

"Can you not say no to sex?" I question him next, assuming Mason first found out about their hookup this morning instead of her tattoo request. "You knew she was with him."

He rolls his eyes and leans an elbow onto the table, resting his head against a wrist while toying with a rip in the chest of his white t-shirt.

"Maybe I can't, Cameron," he mutters before shifting his guarded gaze to me. "Can you?"