• It was simply an average winter day. The sun was obscured by heavy clouds, and snow fell in a light blanket over the city of Detroit. Thought it was chilly, it was the first snow of the year, and everyone was excited.
    Students had thrown snowballs at each other on the way into school, laughing like children half their age; even the teachers were grinning throughout class, the jolly spirit of winter replenishing the stale air. Today couldn't be a better day.

    Except for Nate Collins.

    He was an average teenager - he stood about five-foot-ten, with short-cropped, nearly buzz cut brown hair that curled slightly at the tips. Although he was a scarce 148lbs, he wasn't skinny by any means. He was very fit, and ate healthier than almost anyone his age, though most didn't know that. Dressed in a pair of slightly baggy blue jeans, and a dark brown hoodie, he trudged into school that day, barely awake. Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, he groggily grabbed his books and stalked over to his first hour - Japanese class. 'Nngggh...' he thought, eyes not leaving the ground, as he didn't have the energy to lift his head. 'Stuck with the Great Beast for first hour.'

    You could use many words to describe Nate; health freak, social reject, punk... but one thing you could never say is that he was mean. He had a rigorous Catholic upbringing, and it was practically embedded into his brain. He would never say something bad about anyone - unless he felt they really deserved it, and even then he would downplay it so no one's feelings would be hurt.

    He entered the classroom just before the bell rang, slowly sinking into the cold seat, balling up further into his hoodie. This was one thing he hated about the winter months - the school had to cut the heating bill down, so they stopped all heat during the weekends. Now, Monday morning, in one of the classrooms near the corner of school, it was nearly freezing. Nate could faintly see his breath drift away into the air, which made him shiver.

    And, finally, entered the dubbed 'Great Beast.' Five-foot-two, at least two hundred fifty pounds, he guessed. An old, pale-blond, cranky lady who attempted to sound Japanese - which is traditionally high-pitched - and blasted away ear drums with a croaky "Ohayoo!"

    Nate winced as she spoke to the class, going into a long and uninteresting lecture of grammar and the use of adjectives. He briefly considered paying attention to the class, only to dismiss the idea moments later. 'There's no point,' he reasoned, reclining further into his seat. 'I take notes, I study hours for the test, and I barely scrape by with a D. Listening to this... thing isn't going to help.' After a few minutes of enduring the frustrating harpy, he laid his head down in his arms, trying to catch up on lost sleep.

    Twenty minutes later, he woke to a piercing pain exploding on the top of his head. He sat up sharply out of his arms by reflex, snapping nearly to a military rest position, to see the Beast's face right in front of his own.

    "Nathan-san! You should know better than to sleep in my class!" She half-shrieked, while most of the class was giggling at his expense.

    Nate simply bit his lip angrily and held off a scalding retort, and slouching deeper into his seat as the Beast returned to her lecture.

    'I hate that b***h,'     he thought, opening his notebook and attempting to write out the nonsense she was babbling about. 'She makes this class so difficult, even when I stay awake, I can't make heads or tails of what she's telling me!'

    He sighed, and agreed to stay quiet and be the perfect student. Hopefully, the Great Beast would give him points for participation, maybe boosting his grades a bit. He resumed taking notes until class ended, at which point he quickly grabbed his things and bolted out of the classroom door. 'Any longer in there and I would have lost my mind,' he mused. He waved to a few classmates that he passed in the hallway, before stopping briefly at his locker to switch folders.

    And next, Global Ed. Ah, one of his favorites! The teacher, Mrs. Bearrow, was really... well, if any word could describe her, it would be spirited. She was laid-back, but a good teacher, and gave very good lectures on politics, history, and such. Whistling a jaunty tune, he strolled into the classroom, sitting in a seat at the back of the room.

    "Good morning, students! Ah, please take out your, ahm, notebooks, as we'll be reviewing the section on the Civil War," she exclaimed, as the classroom opened into a flurry of sound.

    Nate grabbed his notebook and started to write what was on the board, until a bright red glare shone in his eye. He winced and turned away from the light, only for it to blind him once again. Now annoyed, he glared across the classroom at the source of said light - Jack Sparton, the class comedian, holding a laser pointer that was concealed from the teacher, laughing at the sight of Nate's enraged look. He had a tall, skinny build, which accentuated his pearly white grin and his attitude. He was dressed in Hollister clothes today, with a nasty-looking buzz cut and an infections grin - unfortunately, he'd never been known to put that gift of humor towards the right causes.

    Growling, and waiting until the teacher's back was turned, Nate gave Jack a one-finger salute, mouthing the words "F*** you." He quickly put his hand back into his notebook before Mrs. Bearrow turned around, and Jack simply chuckled harder, now joined in by his own personal gang of groupies, who sat around him. They talked amongst themselves, gesturing across the classroom at Nate, before bursting out into laughter.

    Mrs. Bearrow turned from her notes, irked by Jack's laughter. "Jack, what is so funny that you have to interrupt my lecture? You should be taking notes," she stated kindly, although thinly veiling a threat beneath her words.

    "Oh, nothing, Mrs. B," Jack replied, trying not to laugh. "Nothing is making us laugh, because Nothing is nothing." Although Nate didn't see the humor in that insult, Jack smirked arrogantly again, and his surrounding groupies broke out into fits of laughter. Mrs. Bearrow, thinking that it was 'just another moment of teenage immaturity', and unaware of the insult, turned back to the blackboard. In response, Jack pulled out his laser-pointer again, this time setting the power on High.

    'Figures. I hate this guy,' thought Nate angrily as he fiddled with his pencil, once again blinded by the red light. He was sick and tired of this Jack-a**'s taunting! His knuckles gripped white on the pencil, snapping it, as he took deep breaths and settled down. 'He's a class-A idiot, a real piece of work. He's got his posse with him all the time, he's popular and funny, and he's got a sharp tongue, too... man, this sucks! I can't do scrap to him, here or anywhere else, and he knows it.'

    After biding his time, and resisting the temptation to cross the classroom and punch Jack's face in, Nate sighed in relief when he saw that there were only ten minutes left in class. He couldn't wait to get out of here! However, these hopes were dashed, when Mrs. Bearrow called,

    "Group Assignment!"

    Nate sighed and joined his assigned partners - Jack, and one of his 'groupies', Nikki. She, like Jack, was very... unfriendly, and had openly stated earlier that year that she hated him, for what reason he wasn't sure of. She stood at about five feet tall, and was always wearing huge amounts of eyeliner, nail polish, and jewelery. Not only that, she was about as ditsy and air-headed as girls come - at least, in Nate's opinion. They both wore smug grins of superiority, and sat down together at adjacent desks, chuckling to themselves.

    Nate hesitantly approached, pulling up a seat as well. "Now, I know we don't get along on the best of terms..." he started, watching as Jack's eyes practically dripped with malice, "but, I thought we could at least get along on this assignment. I don't like you, and you don't like me. Fine. Let's postpone it until later," he reasoned. Nate really wasn't in the mood for any of Jack's games. In fact, he was ready to call Jack out, consequences be damned...

    And, of course, Jack was there for the follow-up. "You got that right, I don't like you! You have no friends, you're an idiot, and you don't fit in here." Nikki chuckled, her high-pitched voice carrying across the classroom like someone scratching their nails across a chalkboard. Many heads turned in our direction - sadly, Mrs. Bearrow had left the room, so hers was not among them.

    Nate felt a sinking hole deep in his chest as those words were spoken. He could try to think up a comeback and deny the horrible thought that was worming its way into his head - but, as was the case, Jack was right. Very few, if any people talked to him, whether it be in class or outside of it. Often times, he did feel like an idiot; he didn't have a good sense of humor, he made the worst jokes, and he was always 'out of the loop' with what the others were talking about...

    He didn't show his emotions to Jack, but silently hoped for him to stop. And, of course, no such thing would happen, same as usual. "Honestly, who do you think you are? You have a big, empty head, and no one wants to talk to you!" He exclaimed, poking an unresponsive Nate in the chest. "You don't have your own friends, so you just walk around and bug everyone else! Get it into your thick skull, that no one wants you around!" He continued, laughing as he did so. Jack's nearby posse joined in with him, adding insult to injury. Though Nate wished it would settle down, the laughter didn't, and he felt like curling up in his hoodie and dying somewhere.

    Finally, the bell rang, and Nate's classmates left quickly, the occasional student laughing at him on the way out, saying things like "Hey there, Nothing!" or "Get out of the way or I'll kick you, you lost puppy." He was the only one remaining, still sitting in that same seat, stoic and silent as the grave. After a few moments, he quietly gathered his things and walked emotionlessly to the cafeteria, his brown paper lunch bag not carrying enough to make him feel 'full'.


    ((Author's Note: The events in this story are entirely true. Everything written in this story is coming from my perspective. There are only slight differences: last name changes, and occasional wording changes. I don't have a photographic memory.))