Lyric’s P.O.V
The first thing I did as soon as I got out of the library was to go in search of Lydia. It wasn’t all that difficult to spot her; she was talking to one of the psychology professors outside of her classroom when I spotted her. So I waited for her chat to be over and the professor to leave before I came up behind her and took her hand.
“What the-you!” She looked at me with accusing eyes. “What do you want?”
“Look, we can do this the easy way, where you come with me peacefully so we can talk,” I told her calmly. “Or I can just be a caveman and throw you over my shoulders and carry you out of the school building. The choice is yours.”
“Fine.” She gritted out. “Lead the way.”
“Good girl.” I told her with a smile and without letting go of her arm, started pulling her in the direction of one of the labs that I knew would be empty at this time of the day.
Once I had found an empty lab, I took her inside, making sure that nobody notices us and then I shut and locked the door behind us and turned to face a slightly frowning Lydia. Letting go of her had was difficult, but I had to do it anyway. Without saying a word, I took out the papers from my pocket and handed them over to her.
Lydia took them with that slight crinkling of her brows that I’ve come to associate with a frown, but that crinkle cleared out as realization dawned on her, making her eyes widen slightly. Neither of us said anything for a long time, just staring at each other. I was trying to study her reaction but her face didn’t show any emotions. Maybe it was because she couldn’t?
“What were you thinking?” I asked finally, not being able to bear the suspense and also, unsure about what emotional scar I’d torn open. “Did you do it to become a hero?” It was a stupid question to ask, especially considering her earlier predisposition about heroes. But I had to know.
“I didn’t think, period.” She shook her head. “I just saw my friend in the crossfire and I pushed him out of the way.”
So she hadn’t been the target. Somehow, it felt like a huge weight had been lifted from my chest. Although the stupidity of the move made me want to shake her till she did show some kind of an expression on her face, but it made me even madder to think that some shithead had been the real cause of her getting shot. As to who that guy was, I had full intentions of finding that out.
“How did it happen?” I asked her instead, focusing on her rather than my own anger at something that I couldn’t control. “The report says that the boy was mentally unstable but I’m guessing that’s just a lame cover up.”
“Roy was the quintessential nerd of our class.” She started. “Good grades, great manners and a teacher’s pet, who was also constantly being bullied by my friends to get their homework done and help out in assignments. I always felt pity about it but I didn’t do anything…and that’s one thing I’d always regret. One day the jokes just got too far and Calvin humiliated Roy in front of the whole school. I thought he’d bounce back the next day just like he always did, because Roy was one of those people who didn’t show any emotional outbursts, didn’t throw tantrums…but Roy had finally had enough of the humiliation. The next day, he showed up with his father’s gun and pointed it at Calvin and before any of us could change his mind about it, he had already shot the bullet. I thought I could save Calvin before it hit him because I was standing right next to him, so I pushed him out of the way...but it ended up hitting me instead.”
Bullying. So that’s why the guy later killed himself, because he’d truly had enough humiliation to end his life. It was such a shame really, one life lost and another so close to it. What if Lydia hadn’t survived? Even though I felt my chest tighten at the thought, it could’ve happened. Two lives would’ve been lost and the culprit would’ve still been alive and well, if not eating free food in jail. But with the realization of what Lydia had to suffer, it also made me realize something else.
“And that’s why you hated my guts since the first time we met.” It wasn’t a question, just a bone deep realization.
“Not much has changed since I met you. You were the bully, still are if I’m not mistaking.” She shook her head again. “Look, I get that you think you have some kind of leverage against me n-“
“Where’s the bullet wound?” I stopped her in her tracks, not wanting to hear more about how she thought I could now manipulate her and also because I was genuinely curious. “Is it still there? The bullet wound, I mean.”
Lydia looked at me silently for a few seconds, seeming genuinely shocked that I’d ask that question instead of trying anything funny, before she decided to show me and started to undo her braid. Her hair was long once it was free from the braid, not as long as it had been in the pictures I’d found of her, but it reached her lower back and looked as soft as liquid silk. It made me want to run my fingers through them, so I pushed off from the door, making sure it was still locked and walked towards her to stand directly in front of her.
Lydia turned her head towards the left and moved a few strands of hair away from an area about two centimeters above her ear. The area wasn’t hard to notice. There was a tiny round bald spot right in the centre of the parting; about half inch in diameter and that spot still looked a bit sore and pink. I moved her hands from her head to replace them with mine and tilted her head back slightly so I could have a better look. I was right about her hair at least; the strands were indeed silky soft.
I freed one of my hands from her hair and was about to touch it to the spot when Lydia called out a warning. “Careful,” she warned. “Don’t get too excited, the bullet’s still in there.”
I immediately released her and stepped back. “What?” I asked in disbelief. Was she joking with me? I could never tell with her being so expressionless.
“You already know the truth, so there’s no point lying to you.” She shrugged, crossing her hands in front of her chest. “The doctors couldn’t get the bullet out because it was stuck in a no-operating zone. It wasn’t interfering with my normal brain function and if they try to take it out, I might die for real. So they decided not to risk it and left it in my brain.”
“Jesus Christ!” I cursed as I continued to stare at her in awe. A bullet inside the brain? This woman was telling me that she still had a goddamned bullet still stuck inside her brain and she had learned to live with it. I didn’t think it was possible but I respected her a great deal more now than I had done this morning.
You can scare away people all you want, Lyric. It doesn’t just make you strong, it makes you a bully. You can be the strongest person on Earth physically but there are people out there who are stronger than you. People who fight every second of their life, just to stay alive. People who have been through hell and back. People who have been broken far too badly to even imagine, but had come back alive, a miracle and far stronger than they were before. People who know what true fear is.
Now her earlier words took on a whole new meaning. She’d been through hell and back and had come out of it stronger rather than being crippled for life. She truly was a wonderful woman. And it made me feel things deep inside my heart that I didn’t think I could ever feel. She didn’t deserve pity, she deserved my fucking respect and I’d be damned if I treated her any less than how she deserved to be treated.
Still, I couldn’t help that little protective part of me come to roaring life, a part I thought I didn’t have. And it wanted to wrap her up in cotton wool and keep her somewhere safe where no one could touch her. I wanted to wrap my arms around her and never let go. And all these things that I was suddenly feeling confused me…terrified me.
I didn’t do relationships and I most definitely didn’t do feelings. But for the first time in my life, I felt myself being pulled into a direction I’d never travelled before. Did Lydia feel anything at all? I wouldn’t be able to tell but I sure as hell wished I wasn’t alone in this. Because that would be a motherfucking punch to my ego.
So I balled my hands into fists, not wanting to reach for her and then I walked back to the door and unlocked it.
“Keep those with you.” I told her over my shoulders, motioning towards the papers she still had in her hands. “I won’t write my project about you.”
And with that, I left her standing alone in the middle of the laboratory, before I did something that both of us would regret.