Chapter 1: The Game of Life

"Blakey, Blake. Where are you? There is no need in hiding. We just want the money." Asher said. He wanted money for not beating him up the day he wasn't here that last week. I came out from hiding to attempt at standing up to him. "Why would you need money Asher, you're fithy rich. What I can give you is less than pocket change to you." I said while trying my best to look and sound brave even though I bet it wasn't working at all. "Oh, is that right. Well than, I bet beating you up even harder than usual will be better, right?" Asher says with a wide grin on his face. "Wait, I didn't mean it like tha-" I got cut off by Asher dashing towards me.

I started sprinting as hard as I possibly could to not get beat up. Usually what he means by beating me a little harder than usual is that he is going to put me in the hospital. It has only happened twice, the principle threatened to expell him if he did it again, but I think that was hardly a small threat to him. As he runs after me, some of his minions come out of no where and tackled me to the floor.

"Well ,well, well, I guess you weren't lucky enough to get away this time, not like you ever were, but still, nice attempt. You were a little faster than usual." Asher yells as he begins to walk down the hall. Once he got to me, his minions got off me and Asher picks me up off the ground by my collor and slammed me against the locker close to us, then he punched me, and his so to the point that I lmy nose was gushing blood. He was going in for another punch when a teacher came out to see what was happening.

"What is happening out here?" The teacher said before he examined the issue. Once he realized what was happening his eyes widened with anger. "Asher, what has all the teachers and priciple told you about bullying people, especially Blake! You know what he is going through." He said while walking towards us. "Oh, I'm so sorry, I must've forgotten. I am so sorry, I promise that I won't do it again." Asher said, but I couldn't help but see that he crossed his fingers behind his back before he put me down.

After Asher put me down he patted me on the shoulder, "There you go." He said like he didn't just almost break my entire face. The teacher walked away, and as the teacher came out of site Asher whispered in my ear, "You were lucky this time. But next time the teachers won't have enough time to save you." He pulled away from my ear, and made a sly grin at me before him and his friends awarded to walk away.

. . . . .

I was walking home from school, I was thinking about a way to tell mom how I got all of the bruises on my face without telling her it was Asher. If he found out that I switched on him, I might not be to get to the hospital in time.

I walked through the door and Mom was preparing dinner. "Hey sweetie, welcome home. How was school today" She looked at my face and immediately changed expressions l. "What happened to your face. Was it that Asher boy again?" She said while examining my entire face.

It took me a moment to gather my thoughts to give a good excuse. "No mom, some guy let me use his grandfather's skate board but it rolled right out from under me and I his my face on the concrete." It seemed like my excuse was good when my mom just looked at me and didn't push me any further. "Okay, if you say so. Now, dinner it's almost ready." She said, completely changing the topic.

When we sat down to eat it was quiet at first but then out of no where, mom asked an interesting question. "So you are almost a senior in highschool, have you thought about your career options? You know that you are going to have to make some choices for colleges." I stop eating for a minute to think. I knew I wanted to help people, but how. There were many ways. There were police officers, fire fighters, doctors, and military. I don't doubt that there is more but I want to keep the options limited for now. "I am not entirely sure at the moment. I will keep looking for the right thing to do."