5 Chapter 5

"And, you see, that's why the Nemean Lion is such a strong card. Not even celestial bronze weapons can pierce his skin. Heracles knew that, so he went for the throat. But you'd think, how? Well, he squeezed it really hard!"

"Uhuh."

As expected, Alex found himself sitting in the cafeteria with Grover… again. He didn't put much effort into his lunch today, just a plain PB&J sandwich.

Weirdly enough, on the walk to school that morning, Coach Hedge (or Officer, depending on where he was) wasn't at the school gates where he usually greeted Alex.

Which, he had to admit, made him pretty bummed out that he couldn't see that jolly old coach. Instead, it was just a couple of construction guys working on the big lion statue in the front courtyard.

To add more spice to the recipe, his ADHD and dyslexia were noticeably worse today. So that was fun. At least he hadn't got short-tempered about something… yet.

It was around halfway through lunch, and in the middle of Grover's strangely detailed explanation of how Hercules choked a big beast or something when Hunter and his posse walked into the cafeteria.

The both of them, Alex and Hunter, had been avoiding each other for the past week, or more like Hunter avoiding Alex, so today he didn't assume any difference. That was until, as Hunter walked by, he dumped his food tray on Grover.

"Awww, my bad, Underwood," Hunter mocked. "You know, I thought you were meant to look less like a trash can."

The rest of the group started cackling. Alex looked around at everyone else who seemed to be doing their best to ignore it, like it was something that happened every day. However, Grover didn't look phased.

"Are you just mad because Alex cleaned your ass out on the obstacle course the other day?" Grover said so matter-of-fact.

Alex almost choked on some peanut butter.

Hunter got flustered. "What?"

Grover continued. "I'm just saying — you play this whole top dog thing with your buddies or whatever and so the one time you are physically bested by someone else you just go around and find someone you deem lesser than yourself to regain some form of confidence from your insecurities."

Gotta give it to Grover, man. He had balls of steel.

Hunter began to stutter, until finally giving up on words and instinctively grabbed Grover by the collar.

"Why you little-"

Hunter's grip on Grover grew tighter, and Alex didn't like where this was going.

Ah, screw it.

"Hey, dude, just leave it alone," Alex spoke up.

The bully stopped, his head turning and eyes glaring straight at him.

"You." Hunter immediately dropped Grover.

Alex stood his ground. "Look, how about we all try to have a nice lunch? We can forget what happened at P.E., you could even join us if you want-"

Before he could finish his sentence, the jock swung at him with full force. Alex felt like he was almost about to get hit until something in him kicked in. It was like a little tug in the back of his mind, allowing him to react quickly enough to avoid the punch. He took a step back.

"Dude!" Alex exclaimed. "What the hell was-"

Another punch came blitzing towards him accompanied by a scream. "Shut up!"

Again, that little feeling inside Alex made him swiftly evade the blow.

"Bro!" He pleaded again. "I'm not going to fight you!"

Hunter snarled something in Spanish as he went for another swing. Alex didn't understand a word he said, but he got the gist. It was like almost everything he said just made the guy more mad.

More and more, Hunter kept trying to land a hit, but that bodily impulse just kept pushing Alex out of harm's way. Everyone was starting to circle around them, some looking for a better view while others just kept chanting 'Fight! Fight! Fight!'. And Hunter just kept coming as if someone flicked the hate switch in his head.

Where were the teachers?

He was tempted to sneak in a hit back but then he heard his dad's voice in his head. 'Raise a fist against conflict, not for it.'

Right. Alex didn't want to hurt him, he just wanted to stop him.

His body kept getting warmer and warmer but his heartbeat was steady, with no unnecessary feelings of aggression so far. He started to think.

Hunter and he were around the same size, but the other was still slightly bigger and being a footballer, he probably had more explosive power. So brute-forcing wasn't an option.

Wait. If he couldn't overpower Hunter's physicality, how about their force against them?

With a new plan in mind, Alex continued to let Hunter come towards him as he waited for the perfect opportunity…

There.

As soon as Alex saw him go for a wild overarching swing with his right arm, he lunged forward. In one smooth motion; he rapidly stepped around Hunter's right side, grabbing his swung arm in the process and using his free hand to push down on the footballer's back, using that forward momentum to take him to the ground.

Alex held him there, locking his right arm behind him.

He'd never done that before and yet… it felt so natural.

"Get off me!" Hunter yelled.

The rest of the students were going wild.

Seriously? Where were the Teachers?

"Are you going to keep trying to hit me?" Alex said, doing his best to put a little authority behind his words. He locked Hunter's arm tighter just enough to make him rather uncomfortable, but not in pain.

"Alright! Alright!" He cried.

Was that a hint of fear in his voice?

After a slight pause, Alex let go of his arm and stepped away. The rest of Hunter's friends tried to go and help him up but he brushed them off. He sort of looked at them with a face that screamed 'Where were you?!'.

The other students, especially Grover, started swarming Alex. Once again, it was high-fives and fist-bumps all around but it didn't feel as good this time.

A few seconds later, the teachers arrived. The first one to investigate was the Maths one, Mr Tigg, who did not look happy.

"What's going on here?" He boomed.

"The new kid kicked Hunter's ass!" a voice cried.

The professor glared at Alex.

"That's not what happened, sir," Alex tried to explain. "Hunter started swinging at me and I only tried to get him to stop."

"Yeah, teach!" Grover backed him up. "Hunter was harassing me and Alex stopped him!"

"I saw it too!" another voice claimed and soon other voices started to chime in.

"Quiet!" Tigg silenced the canteen. "I don't care what happened. You're not babies anymore! Whatever dumb mess you got yourselves into, I want you two to shake hands and walk away. I'll let you boys off but there better not be a next time."

Alex was the first to step forward, reaching his hand out towards Hunter. Hunter just stood there, clutching his arm. He looked at his friends, he looked at the students around him, he looked at Professor Tigg.

It looked as if he was finally calming down… and then he looked at Alex.

Alex could visually see the anger return to his eyes as he spat on the ground.

"Mr Vasquez!" Tigg commanded.

"No!" Hunter grunted, looking Alex dead in his purple eyes. "You think you can make a fool of me, huh? You think you can stroll in here and pretend like you're better than me?"

Tigg spoke again. "Hunter that's enough!"

Hunter continued speaking. "You just got here, Alexander. My dad owns a company. My family can ruin yours!"

This guy seriously needed to shut the hell up. Alex had done everything to be as passive as possible but this anger seemed so volatile. His own nerves started to fire up but he was able to collect himself.

"One more word, Vasquez, and that'll be detention!" Tigg warned.

Out of nowhere, Grover spoke.

"Yeah well, Alex's mom might not be around, but his dad can probably beat your dad's ass!"

Alex looked over at Grover, who had a proud look on his face. He had forgotten he had told him his mom wasn't around. He didn't really need to be reminded about his dad right now, much less his non-existent mother, especially not in this context, but Grover was being Grover.

There were a couple of murmurs among the crowd. In the corner of his eye, Alex saw a smile creep on Hunter's face.

"Alright, that's it!" Tigg interjected. "When I said not another word, that wasn't an invitation for everyone else to start chiming in."

Tigg walked over to Vasquez. "You need to calm down." Tigg looked at Alex. "And I'll speak to you later… everyone else needs to finish their lunch!"

The moshpit of students slowly began to disperse as Tigg and the rest of the teachers tried to restore order.

Then Hunter spoke.

"So, little Alex's got an absent mom, ey?"

Alex didn't say anything, he just looked back at Hunter. His eyes were still filled with rage but this time matched with a toothy grin. Tigg was too busy herding the other students to notice. His tone made Alex feel uneasy.

Hunter continued. "You know, my dad tells me there are a lot of reasons mothers abandon their families."

What?

"I mean, most of what he said sounded like a stretch, but there was one I had to agree with him."

Alex didn't like this.

"He said that sometimes women have conflicting jobs, and feel held back by their kids."

All of a sudden, Alex's blood felt like it was erupting.

"So, it makes me wonder," Hunter continued. "Because your mom isn't around and all, did your mom's job make her leave you?"

The fuck did he just say?

Alex started to feel a thumping in his chest that made its way to the side of his head like someone beating a massive drum. He didn't realize it at first, but his hands started shaking.

"Maybe your father was just another client. One that made a mistake."

All the background noise slowly began to drown out as Alex's chest started to tense up.

"You know what a prostitute is, Alex?"

…

The last thing Alex consciously heard was the laughter coming from Hunter and his friends. The next moments happened so fast it felt like images flashing through his mind. All of a sudden, Alex held one of the food trays in his hand as it made a sickening crunch across Hunter's face.

Next thing he knew, he was on top of Hunter, raining down punches on his face with both of his fists. There was some form of yelling and shoving going behind him, and Alex felt like someone tried to grab him, but he didn't move an inch.

The only real thing he felt was the sensation of blood dripping down his knuckles.

Then a voice; it sounded like his but Alex didn't recall saying anything.

"THE FUCK?! DID YOU SAY!? ABOUT!? MY MOTHER?!"

He heard another voice too, much weaker:

"…please… I - stop…"

One more voice appeared, it was tough and bold.

"We must be strong. We must be better."

Then a final voice whispered in his mind, like a memory.

"Keep your head on a swivel, Alex."

Dad.

Everything stopped, like a pause in time. One by one, his senses came back to him. Alex could feel his breathing, the dryness in his mouth, the sweat pouring down his head. Ringing flooded his ears as quickly as it died down.

His eyes focused as if he had just woken up. He was back in the cafeteria. His knees pressed against the cold floor. Yet, there was no noise, no students shuffling their feet or teachers yelling at them. Then, he felt that familiar sensation once more, the blood tricking from his fingers.

Alex looked down in horror to see a body, blood covering his face, eyes swollen shut and the cheeks bruised to a brutal colour. There was a terrible gash on the bottom lip as a few teeth were missing from their rows.

The face was unrecognizable. Every few seconds a faint wheeze of a breath escaped from his mouth.

Alex couldn't move as he stared at the face and then into his hands.

No… no… no no no. What happened? What did he just do? He didn't mean - he just goes so- this was all wrong. This couldn't be happening.

He regretted looking around because all he could see were the expressions of teachers and students alike in terror. There was no familiarity. There were no friendly eyes. No Grover. No Coach Hedge. Just the faces of people that looked like they had just seen a monster.

What had he done? He just… couldn't keep it together…