David laughed. He couldn’t stop. It was so perfectly Will.
38
Will stood in the center of the quad. The rest of the school watched from around the edges, waiting for the show. Will felt the singe of every stare. People were hungry and volatile. The sun had set, but the exterior flood lamps were on. The generator was on its last legs and chugging. The harsh spotlights surged bright, casting sharp shadows, and then faded nearly all the way out again, like a drunken strobe.
“You’re gonna die,” Nelson said from behind him.
“Not helping,” Will said.
“I said, you’re gonna die!” Nelson shouted at the top of his lungs.
“I heard you! Everybody did.”
“Oh… sorry.”
It didn’t matter that the crowd heard him. They were already thinking it anyway. They all came to watch him lose, badly.
Every gang was there. If Sam didn’t kill him, there was a good chance that the Freaks might.
“I just hope David’s still alive,” Nelson shouted.
Will had to push that out of his mind. If he thought about all the holes in his plan, he’d be sunk. He just prayed that Sam would come soon. He was already late.
Will had no backup. Nelson was against the whole idea, and the rest of the Loners stood in the far corner of the quad. He would have liked them behind him, at least as a show of support, but they had lost faith in him after the debacle at the library.
Will understood. They had already joined in on one of his crazy plans, and it got them ambushed, injured, and demoral-ized. None of them even believed the exit was real anymore.
This was on his shoulders, and he would have only one chance to get it right.
A Freak in the crowd wore black sunglasses. She grinned at him and slowly drew a finger across her neck. Will swallowed hard. He was thirsty. His chest felt tight. He looked back to Nelson, whose teeth were gritted like he was watching a car accident in slow motion. No matter what bullshit he’d told her, Will wished Lucy was there. He secretly hoped that she would be, so she could see him at his bravest.
The crowd came alive. All heads turned as one. Varsity had arrived.
The Freaks moved aside so that Varsity could enter the circle of gangs. Varsity wore full pads and uniforms like it was a Friday night game. They jogged onto the quad and took a regimented formation across from Will. There were a lot of them, and the other gangs looked like packs of starved dogs in comparison. Varsity was well fed and at full strength. Sam stepped through the front line.
He knew he had a fight coming his way. That was the whole point, but somehow he didn’t ever have this bad a picture in his head. If he did, he probably would have never gone this far. Sam was fuming. He seemed repulsed by the sight of Will.
He pulled off his jersey. Sam’s upper body bulged and flexed.
He was huge. Will felt like the idiot everybody thought he was.
Will clenched his fists and raised them. His fists were trembling, and there was nothing he could do to hide it. Snickers rippled from all around him.
He wanted to run, but he didn’t think he could. He didn’t feel in control of his body anymore. He was all nerves. His mind was plagued with visions of all the ways he was going to screw this up.
Two burly Varsity guys broke through the front line. They were holding David up between them. David’s toes dragged on the ground behind him. His head hung down. His clothes were stained brown with dried blood. The crowd gasped at the sight of him.
“All we did was slap your brother around a little, and look what happened. You sure you wanna go through with this, little boy?” Sam said.
If Sam wanted to get inside Will’s head, it was working.
He saw David’s foot move. His right toe fumbled forward until he laid his foot flat on the ground. Then the other one.
His legs locked straight, taking on the weight of his body.
David raised his bloody and swollen head. It looked like a white eye patch was tied tight around a purple water balloon.
David’s one eye wandered up until it found Will. David smiled. Will couldn’t believe it. It was a broad, genuine smile.
His inflated face looked even uglier with the smile, but it was irrepressible. Even after such a terrible beating, David was still defiant. It filled Will with pride, and he smiled back. A calm came over him.
“Well?” Sam shouted for the crowd’s benefit. “What’s the matter? Did you swallow your tongue?”
Laughs echoed across the quad.
Will flipped Sam off.
Sam charged him. He was upon Will in seconds, and he buried his fist in Will’s stomach. Will crumpled forward. It felt like Sam punched a hole through him. With Will bent over, Sam tried to knee him in his face. It connected with his chest instead. Will fell backward, and his feet scurried to stay underneath his weight. He barely stayed upright before Sam kicked him in the bladder. Will fell to the ground and landed on his ass bone.
No tussle at a drop, no scuffle in the halls had ever hurt like this. Will couldn’t tell which pain belonged to what. He was losing control. Will struggled to breathe. Things were happening too fast. Sam came at him. Will winged a wild punch at him first. It dinged off Sam’s shoulder like a pebble off a car window. Sam grabbed him by the shirt with one hand. His other hand was a fist. He drew it back, winding up to deliver the final strike.
Then, Will seized.
His body stiffened. His eyes rolled back in his head. His feet kicked out from under him. Sam held him up by the shirt as he hung there, rigid and convulsing. Sam let him go. Will dropped like a sandbag and knocked his head against the ground.
There were laughs in the crowd. There were just as many gasps.
Through fluttering eyelids and jerking vision, Will saw Sam towering above him, colossal. Drool fell out of Will’s mouth.
His body shook. All pretty convincing. Will had gotten plenty of practice from all the times he faked seizures to mess with David.
He rammed his foot up into Sam’s crotch, and Sam crashed to the ground. Will pulled himself up. The crowd’s laughter stopped. Silence. Will wound his leg back and soccer-kicked Sam in the balls again. Sam bellowed in pain. Everyone stared in disbelief, including Varsity.
“Listen up, hungry people!” Will shouted. “All of Varsity’s fighters are here. No one is guarding the food!” The gaunt faces in the crowd turned in the direction of the gym.
“The food belongs to all of us!”
The crowd barked and whistled and hollered in agreement.
Will could feel the tension bristling all around him.
“GO GET IT!”
It was a stampede. The Freaks, the Nerds, the Sluts, the Skaters, and the Geeks, all dashed toward the gym at once, like they were trying to catch the last train out of hell. Varsity tried to block them, but the momentum was too great.
Varsity’s formation was smashed apart. The two Varsity guys holding David cast him aside to go protect the gym.
Sam got to his feet, holding his crotch. For a second he looked at Will like he was about to kill him. But he stumbled backward, suddenly scared. Will was peripherally aware of someone behind him. He turned to see the Loners standing in a semicircle, staring Sam down. Sam yelled out of frustration and ran after the riotous mob.
The generator finally gave out, and all the lights died. The quad was overtaken by darkness.
