Chapter 2: The First Meeting

In hindsight, picking a fight with four guys three years older than them was probably not the smartest move they’d ever pulled. Between them, they had a combined twelve years on them. Six each. Matt looked aside. Will could probably take on a twenty-one year old, as proven by the fact that one of the seniors was wheezing up a lung against the wall, clutching his groin. As he’d told Matt once, the point of fighting wasn’t to score points with a judge, it was to win. When you get close enough to the dust, dirty fighting is just fighting. 

Anyway, that was Will’s strategy. Matt’s, apparently, was getting tossed around and being a distraction to keep the others from ganging up on Will too badly. The first had taken a shot to the crown jewels and had gone down like a wonky ladder. The next one was now circling Will, who was jeering the older boy on, dodging his occasional grabs. The boy was clearly wary of Will and his tricks now, and knowing Will, he had a couple more. The girl in the jacket was essentially pestering the third by making it clear that ignoring her would get him kicked in the back of the leg, but also that she was absolutely faster than him, and would race out of the way with ease. That left one more for Matt. The tall one. Of course it was the tall one, with the red face and short hair. The kind of guy who fucked off at eighteen and came back a year later going “Oo-rah” despite never having left boot camp. That guy. 

Currently, That Guy had Matt lifted against a concrete wall, a vein on his forehead throbbing so aggressively it was taking Matt active effort not to stare at it. 

“I’m going to tear you in half, Porter,” the guy growled, and Matt felt a very weird and misplaced sense of guilt. Here he was, getting his ass beat by someone who should really know better, who knew him by name well enough to growl threats, and he couldn’t even remember the guy’s name. 

“You couldn’t handle -- oof -- two of me,” Matt said, trying to come up with something more clever than that. “Besides, you forgot one thing…”

“Oh yeah?” Forehead Vein asked, looking almost cartoonishly suspicious. If only Matt had access to comically oversized hammers. “What’s that?”

Matt gave his best smirk. The kind he’d seen Billy make before kicking someone right where it hurts. “You’re standing really close,” Matt said, and kicked as hard as he could between his opponent’s legs. Or rather, he tried. His foot hit thigh. 

“You really think I didn’t think you’d try that, you little shit? Do you think I’m stupid?”

“I mean, do you really want me to answer that?” Matt said, and immediately regretted it. He was lifted away from the wall and slammed back against it, knocking the air out of his lungs. This was going to get so much worse once he was actually getting his shit kicked in. Will didn’t seem to be having a great time of it either. He was being held from behind by one of the goon squad, but was kicking so hard at the other they hadn’t gotten to actually doing the punching part, yet. 

“I’m gonna fuck you up, Porter.”

“Buy me dinner first,” Matt coughed, and got a fist in the stomach for it. Yup, there it went, that feeling of half of your body telling you to breathe while the other filed its fingernails and went “No can do, chief, shift ended one punch to the gut ago.” He was about to try something brave and heroic, like finding an appendage and biting down on it, when the wall next to his head made a really loud cracking sound. Well, if luck persisted, maybe the whole building would come down on them and people would think he went down fighting, at least. It was only because his assailant turned around that Matt realized that the sound had been the impact of a thrown rock. Six inches to the left, and it would have hit Tall and Angry on the back of the head. 

“Franklin, really,” a gentle voice said, “going for a headshot? I expected better from you.” Matt was dropped unceremoniously, like a sack of potatoes, and between the senior’s legs he saw the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. The boy that had been addressed, Franklin Watts, was, like, the platonic ideal of a high school heartthrob, and next to him was Wendy, who was just, well, the high school heartthrob. It was like looking into twin suns. Franklin looked almost offended, and then Wendy’s arm went in a wide arc and Matt’s erstwhile opponent went down, all doubled over and squeaking like a screen door. “If you hit them in the head, they can show their parents.”

“I wasn’t trying to hit him, Wendy. I just wanted his attention!” Franklin said. “This is hitting him.” He didn’t even seem to look as he threw a fist sized rock at the boy and hit him right in the stomach. The first boy one Will had accosted was up by now, though still clutching his groin, and the second had tossed Will aside like a bag of potatoes, who seemed almost offended at no longer being the center of their attention, although he didn’t immediately make a move to change that fact. The third senior, having given up on his chase after the girl in yellow, turned to face the new arrival, leaving space for Will and the girl to hurry over to Matt, pulling him up by the arm. 

“You alright?” Will asked as the big guy was starting to get back up on his feet. The rock had hit him hard, but this shithead was fueled by testosterone and suburban pride. That kind of arrogance took a bit more than that to take down. 

“I’m gonna be shitting funny for a few days,” Matt joked, but he did pat himself down for a second. He’d been around Will after a fight enough to know that a bruised rib was supposed to really fucking hurt, and there was none of that, at least. Just the nausea of being gut-punched, then. Well. It wasn’t nothing, but it could’ve been a lot worse. 

“What the fuck,” the big guy said as he got back up, “are you two doing here?”

“You’re really going to have a go at a couple of kids, Lee?” Franklin said, taking his jacket off. Jesus Christ, he was only a year older than Matt but already clearly jacked. Proper quarterback physique. That’s what Matt figured, anyway. He didn’t actually know, because he’d managed to avoid football by being so terminally bad at it he had managed to avoid participation for most of the year. He’d always been put off by overly masculine sports. “Pick on someone your own size.”

Despite the fact that he looked almost like a comic book character, in an overly tight white shirt, Matt had to shoot him a dubious glance anyway. People didn’t actually talk like that, did they? 

“What are you going to do about it, Watts?”

“What does it look like I’m going to do about it?” he said, and squared his shoulders. Wendy, looking remarkably unbothered, bent over and picked up another rock. Matt looked between them and the four guys slowly approaching them, then at Will, and then at the girl. 

“Well,” Will said, “we have to, right?” He looked tired, and already had a black eye. Despite that, he looked absolutely ready. The girl just responded with a big grin. Her short hair was tousled, and her face was caked with dirt from running circles around the goons. 

“Let’s fucking go, pretty boy,” she said. Will seemed to immediately be flustered, confusing the fuck out of Matt. She slapped both of them on the back, and quickly ran to stand next to Franklin. Not to be outdone, Matt and Will ran over too, skidding to a halt with the others. 

“You guys should go,” Franklin said. “They know they can’t cause too much damage, they’ll get in trouble for it.” Nobody made a move to even take his self-sacrificing gesture seriously.

Will scoffed. “Yeah, right. Not on your life, Watts. I’m not going to run when you stay back. I’ve got a reputation to keep.” Matt had always looked up to him, but next to Franklin, he seemed almost small. Not that Franklin had that much height on him. He just had a way of standing tall. 

“Besides,” the girl said, “I’m not letting you have all the fun.”

“You little shits,” the boy said, the one Matt was now pretty sure was the leader. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? I’m not looking to fight you, Watts? I just want to learn Porter and the other qu--” With the sound of a wooden spoon hitting a saucepan, a small rock hit him right between the eyes. It went -pok-.

“I thought you said not to hit them in the head, Wendy,” Franklin said with a smirk. 

“Yeah, but did you want to hear him talk more?” 

“Not really,” Franklin said with a grin. “You gonna run or you gonna fight, Lee? Pick one, but if you’re just here to yell shit, you don’t need us for that.” The four larger kids started to close in again. “Come on. You might even make it out of this in one piece.” He winked. “Maybe. But maybe not, right? There’s only five of us.”

“Syke!” 

With all of the energy that comes with being fourteen and very stupid, the kid over which all this had started leapt through the air. Matt realized he’d completely forgotten about them. It’s hard to focus on things like that when you’re staring down the barrel of an angry eighteen-year-old. Apparently, they’d found a way to climb up on top of a nearby container used by the construction crew, and they’d found an even faster way back down. That way being knees-first, aimed at the back of the Lee guy’s head. 

For a moment, everything seemed to slow down. Everything was quiet as they looked up at this plucky kid, the most joyous grin on their face, as they sailed through the air. Then their knees hit Lee in the face, he folded over backwards like a cheap laptop, and crashed into the dirt. The kid rolled up to their feet and sprinted over to Franklin and the others. “Come on!” they shouted as they ran right past everyone. There was a moment of dumbstruck quiet, and then Matt, Will and the others turned tail and ran away before Lee and his cronies could recuperate and figure out what happened. 

The six of them jumped through the hole in the fence. “Y’all, I gotta run to make it to class! Come here after school!” they said, before sprinting off. The girl in the leather jacket just ran after them. Matt had to presume they were, if not classmates, then at least went to the same school. 

“Fucking bonkers,” Will said with a laugh. Then they heard footsteps from the other side of the fence, and the four of them sprinted off. They came to a stop just around the corner from the school. Franklin looked at his watch. 

“Holy shit,” he said. “Two minutes left, didn’t think we’d make that.” He stood up straight and stretched, then crossed his arms. “That was really dumb, you guys.” 

Will just shrugged. “I’ve done way dumber.” Matt nodded. He absolutely had, and Matt had followed him into hell and back through it. Still, he didn’t really want to disappoint the tall boy. Franklin Watts was not quite a local celebrity, but the school wasn’t that big and most kids knew who he was. He was cool, but not in that rebellious kind of way. He was cool because he was the kind of guy to pick a fight with four seniors because It Was The Right Thing To Do, without a hint of irony. 

Wendy nudged Franklin. “What were they going to do, call an adult?” Matt blinked. He did not expect Wendy fucking Carter to agree with them, let alone take their side. She gave Matt a look that made him feel like his ears were on fire, but, like, in a nice way. Like she could tilt up his face, look him in the eyes and tell him… something. Anything, really. “You two did good, standing up for them. Kids like that don’t get a lot of it. Really cool of you.”

Will looked mighty pleased with himself, but Matt just felt a bit weird. “What do you mean, kids like that?” Wendy glanced at him thoughtfully, and Matt died a little. But, like, in a good way. One day he’d figure out why she had the effect on him that she did, but for now, it was really hard to even think straight. And she seemed to notice, too, which made things just so much worse. 

“Kids that are different,” she said. “Like them. Maybe like you two, yeah?” Will laughed just as the school bell rang, and they had to break into a run to make sure they made it to class in time.