“Way!”

Mikey's head snapped up when he heard his teacher call his name. He had barely got any sleep last night because he and Gerard had sat up all night competing against each other over who could read the most amount of comics.

The Way brothers had countless comics in both their rooms and sometimes when one couldn't sleep he would go to his brother's room, see whether he was awake before challenging each other over who could read the most amount of comics.

They used to compete against each other on the console that was in Mikey's room, but once they had got a bit too competitive during the night and had woken up their parents at half past one in the morning, on a school night, which had led to both brothers being grounded and Mikey's console being confiscated for a little while.

He had it back now but neither brother wanted to be grounded again so they just stuck to competing with the comic reading during school nights.

“Pay attention if you actually want to pass high school,” the teacher snapped at Mikey which made him nod quickly, a light red colour filling his cheeks. He didn't take too well to people looking at him like practically the whole class was at the moment.

Mikey made sure that he looked like he was paying attention for the rest of the lesson even though he wasn't. It wasn't like he was that overly concerned about whether or not he knew whatever it was the teacher was attempting to teach to the rest of the class.

When the bell went it signalled the end of the lesson which also meant it was lunchtime. Mikey gathered his things up and waited for everyone to leave the room before he slowly made his way out. Despite the fact that he had waited so that there was hardly any chance of him bumping into someone, just as he stepped out of the class someone knocked into him which made him stumble backwards a bit.

The person who knocked into him was running down the hallway, boots hitting the ground with heavy thuds. He was just about to attempt to leave the room again when two boys ran past him in pursuit of the first person. He recognised them as two of the bullies – Mark and Shawn.

Being the nosy person he was, Mikey looked down the way they had all just run and could barely see the brown hair of the person who had knocked into him before it disappeared around the corner. A few seconds later both the bullies rounded the corner too, disappearing from Mikey's sight.

All Mikey could do was shake his head before finally leaving the class that had been empty for the past five minutes of everyone except for him.

Gerard, Ray and Frank were all sitting at the table they normally sat at everyday it was raining. Every other time they would eat outside by a certain tree because it was probably a lot safer place for them to eat.

Despite Mikey no longer being a target in the bully's eyes, every now and again he did get the occasional shove and kick. He never got shoved into lockers though – Frank was the person of the group to have ever been shoved in a locker. He wasn't one to be bullied much either, but there were still times when he was bullied.

Even though Gerard was the weirder one of the group, he was the one that just wasn't bullied. It still confused the boys sometimes but it was just the way that the bullies done it; they'd bully Frank, Mikey and if they ever found an urge to bully him, then they'd bully Ray too.

Just never Gerard.

“Where you been Mikey? You're normally the first one here,” Frank exclaimed when his friend sat down next to him at the table. Gerard and Ray were busy comparing sandwiches.

“Bumped into two bullies chasing someone. Silently thanking fuck that I'm no longer in that situation.”

“You do get that situation sometimes Mikey,” Frank reminded.

He sighed. “True.”

Gerard looked over to the two younger boys. “Hey, Mikes, what did mum put in your sandwiches?”

Even though Gerard was in his last year of high school and Mikey was certainly old enough to make his own lunch, they still had theirs made by their mum. They didn't really mind though because it stopped them having to get up even earlier in the morning just to make them.

Checking his own lunch, Mikey told his brother that he had cheese. “Aww Mikes, mum gave me ham. Swaps?” He even pouted at his little brother to try and convince him to swap sandwiches with him.

It wasn't like he needed to pout because Mikey was going to swap sandwiches with him anyways as soon as he asked – he didn't like cheese that much because it tasted too plain to him.

They swapped sandwiches and Gerard launched into a conversation with Ray about the different types of monsters and which would be best against who. The two younger boys just ate in silence, listening with interest to the conversation happening opposite them.

Mikey's eyes started drifting around the room and they settled on the table three over to theirs. He noticed that the girl who had fallen from his locker yesterday was sitting there, alone. And from what he could see it looked like she had a split lip or something because he could see some red smudged at the edge of her mouth.

And for some reason she didn't strike Mikey as the sort of girl who would be caught dead wearing red lipstick.

“I'll be right back, Frank,” Mikey mumbled before getting up and walking over to the table. As he drew closer to the table he could see that the girl had a photograph on the table and she was scribbling, rather violently, over the objects in the picture. She didn't notice that he was there until he sat on the bench opposite her.

Her head snapped up quickly and she narrowed her eyes at him. “What the fuck do you think you're doing?”

Mikey had never heard a girl sound so pissed off over something as simple as someone sitting opposite them at a table.

“Um..I-I saw you were sitting here alone....”

“So you thought you'd come and talk to me. Get this, I don't want you to talk to me. I don't want any of the pricks that fill this school to talk to me,” she hissed at Mikey which made him recoil slightly.

“O-okay, sorry,” he muttered, standing up from the bench and making his way back to his table. All three of the other occupants were watching him as he did so, and as soon as he sat down they fired questions away at him.

“Why did you talk to her?!”

“It sounded like you pissed her off, what'd you do?”

“Since when do you talk to girls?”

When Gerard asked his question everyone looked at him with a raised eyebrow. He just shrugged before asking it again.

“It sounds like someone really hates school and everyone in it,” Mikey muttered as if that would answer all the questions he was asked. This made Gerard chuckle.

“She's in my Art class. She once drew the school on fire with people inside. Literally, you could see the people from the windows and half of them were on flames. She's really weird.”

“For once, you can actually call someone weird Gerard 'coz she sure and heck weirder than you are.”

“Oh har har Frank, you're so funny.”

Frank smiled boastfully. “Oh, I know.”

Gerard was about to reply but Mikey beat him to it. “Did she actually draw something like that and give it in to the teacher, Gerard?”

“Well, yeah. It freaked him out because he was in the picture as well. He took her to the school counsellor right away." He shrugged.

Mikey's eyes widened slightly before he looked over to the other table only to find it empty. A look of disbelief came across Mikey's face. She had only just been there, sitting by them. How could she have left without him seeing?

“I wouldn't bother with her, Mikey; she's a really weird girl. Hellva weirder than I am, trust me on that.” Mikey did trust Gerard, of course he did, after all they were brothers.

But it didn't stop the fact that Mikey wanted to talk to the girl. Even though she was weird (and slightly scary, he thought) he couldn't help but be interested in her.

If what Frank has said about her was true – that she antagonised the bullies as if she actually wanted to be bullied – then Mikey wanted to at least talk to her and see why she'd do that. Because who in their right mind would do that to bullies unless they well and truly wanted to be beat up?

And Mikey's never seen, or heard of, anyone who has ever wanted to be beat up in his life. In fact, Mikey assumed that probably most of the world would never, ever want to be beat up on purpose.

So this girl was interesting to Mikey and he wanted to know more about her.

Whether she wanted him to talk to her or not, Mikey was going to keep trying.