Next time...
1686 Words
Friday at school had claws.
Stacey had barely made it through homeroom before she felt the shift, an almost electric tension humming through the halls. Whispers followed her like gnats. Side glances. Snickering. Something was brewing, and it had Gemma’s sharp, surgically manicured fingerprints all over it.
The Plastics had raised their game.
It started small. A bumped shoulder here. A loud, fake cough as she passed. A comment I wasn’t supposed to hear “Still playing the victim, huh?”, that made my ears burn. Kayla had glared daggers at anyone who got too close, but even she couldn’t stop the way the tension built like storm clouds.
Science had been a blur. I could barely focus on formulas or equations, my notes sloppy from how tightly my hand was shaking. When the bell rang, the room emptied quickly, everyone racing to lunch or their next class.
But I stayed behind.
I needed a minute. One breath, then another. My free period gave me space to catch up on the chapter I'd barely absorbed during class. The room was quiet, The only sounds were the hum of the overhead lights and the scratch of her pen across the page. She liked it here. Alone. Safe.
She thought she was alone.
Until she wasn’t.
I didn’t hear the door open, just the shift in the air. The silence suddenly felt too quiet. Then, the low murmur of voices behind her. A breath. A giggle. The sound of something being dropped, like a bag tossed lazily to the floor.
She looked up.
Too late.
They surrounded her. Gemma at the centre like a queen spider, the rest of them fanned out like polished predators, lips glossed, eyes glittering with venom.
“Aww,” Gemma cooed, tilting her head in mock sympathy. “How you feeling, Stacey? Fainted again recently?”
Laughter erupted around her, high-pitched and hollow. Stacey’s skin prickled. Her heartbeat roared in her ears.
“I” she started, voice hoarse.
But Gemma wasn’t done.
“f*****g attention-seeking w***e,” she sneered, stretching the last word out like it tasted foul. Then, with a dramatic gasp, she dropped into a theatrical faint, collapsing over a nearby stool like she was onstage.
The girls cackled like hyenas.
“Oops,” Gemma said sweetly, straightening like a snake uncoiling. She was suddenly in Stacey’s space, face inches from hers. Her breath smelled like vanilla and venom. “Do you know how much I f*****g hate you?”
Stacey didn’t move. Couldn’t.
“You make my skin itch like scabies,” Gemma hissed. “You ugly bitch.”
Then came the slap.
It landed with a crack that echoed off the tiled walls. Stacey’s head snapped sideways, cheek stinging like fire. She barely had time to register the pain before her knees buckled, sending her to the ground.
That should’ve been it.
But it wasn’t.
The punch came next, harder, aimed low stomach or ribs, she couldn’t tell. The floor hit her side like a shockwave, cold and merciless. The world tilted. Her hands scrambled against the tiles, trying to push up, but a foot slammed down on her forearm, pinning her.
Time stretched.
It felt like a lifetime before it stopped.
Before the laughter quieted.
Before the weight lifted.
Gemma leaned in close, her voice low and sickly sweet.
“I told you,” she whispered, spit landing on Stacey’s cheek. “‘Next time,’ bitch.”
Then she spat.
Right in Stacey’s face.
And they were gone.
Just like that.
The door clicked shut behind them, their laughter fading down the corridor. For a moment, Stacey couldn’t move. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t breathe. Her body was one giant tremor, her limbs not quite hers.
She wiped her face slowly with her sleeve, breath shaking, heart a panicked metronome.
She’d told herself she was ready for school. That she could handle the whispers. The looks. Even the occasional shove.
But not this.
Not again.
And yet... there was a part of her, a stubborn, fractured part, that flared with something else.
Rage.
Not the loud kind, but quiet. Focused. Like the final click of a puzzle piece that had always been missing.
They had crossed a line.
And Stacey was done pretending she didn’t see it.
She sat there on the floor for another five minutes. Letting the air settle. Letting the tremble in her hands pass. She checked her ribs, tender, but not broken. Her cheek stung, her ego was bruised, and her heart was hanging by threads, but she was breathing.
She was breathing.
She reached for her phone with fingers that barely worked and texted Kayla.
Change of plans. Meet me outside early. 3PM. Need air.
Kayla didn’t ask questions. Just sent back:
I’m there. Always.
Later, at the university bar, Stacey would tell Kayla the whole story, with fewer tears than she expected and more steel in her voice. They’d drink cheap ciders and laugh at the DJ’s tragic taste in music, but underneath it all, something new would be growing.
A resolve.
The beginning of something Gemma had never counted on:
Stacey wasn’t broken.
She was burning.
And she wasn’t going to let it happen again.
The clock on Stacey’s phone hit 3:00 PM as she stepped out into the light.
The sun was still high, golden and unapologetic, like it hadn't gotten the memo that today had gone to hell. Stacey had changed in the girls’ bathroom after science scrubbing the blood from her lip and dabbing at her cheek with a tissue until the sting dulled. The bruises were already coming through. Her stomach throbbed with every breath. But her hands?
Steady.
She wasn’t hiding anymore.
The outfit was a statement, not an accident: fishnets she'd stolen back from the bottom of her drawer, black Dr. Martens from the charity tip her mum had found and insisted could "last another decade,” and short shorts paired with a black three-quarter crop top that read Not Your Girl. Her eyeliner was sharper than her mood, and her curls framed her face like a halo made of wire.
She looked fierce.
She felt like fire.
The minute Kayla spotted her waiting outside the gates, her pace slowed. Her brows pulled together, not in judgment, never in judgment, but in a kind of protective, simmering awareness. Her friend scanned her face once, twice, and Stacey saw the shift happen.
Kayla knew.
She didn’t need details. She didn’t ask what happened. She didn’t gasp or rush her into a hug.
She just looked at her. Really looked.
Then, without a word, she turned and started walking.
They headed toward the uni bar in comfortable silence, the city around them buzzing with weekend energy, students laughing, music drifting out of café windows, cars honking lazily in late afternoon traffic.
When they arrived, Kayla beelined to the bar, ordered two ciders with no fuss, and returned with the same calm you’d expect if they were just talking about homework or weekend plans. She slid one across to Stacey.
Then leaned back in her seat, took a long sip of her own, and said:
“Spill.”
And somehow, that one word was enough.
Stacey let the words fall out like broken teeth.
She told Kayla everything, the science lab, the circle of girls, the slap, the punch, the way the world had slowed and cracked open around her. She didn’t try to sound brave. She didn’t dress it up or smooth it down. She told it like it had happened.
Kayla didn’t interrupt.
Didn’t flinch.
Just listened.
By the time Stacey finished, her cider was warm, and her hand was shaking again.
Kayla put her glass down. Quietly. Deliberately.
“You want me to set fire to their lockers?” she asked, not a trace of sarcasm in her voice.
Stacey barked out a laugh, sharp and real.
“Nah,” she said. “I want to make it worse than that.”
Kayla’s smile was slow and dangerous. “Good. Because I’m sick of pretending they’re untouchable.”
Stacey looked down at her hands. The bruises were spreading now, purples, reds, yellows starting to peek through the skin like ugly truths. She traced one just below her ribs through her shirt and winced.
“They want me to disappear,” she said softly. “They want me to crawl into a hole and hide until they forget I exist.”
“Well,” Kayla said, leaning forward, “unlucky for them, you look like a goddamn riot right now.”
Stacey blinked at her.
“I mean it,” Kayla added. “You’re a walking middle finger in combat boots. They don’t know what to do with that.”
Stacey felt it then, something new under her bruises. It's not rage this time, not fear.
Power.
Small, growing.
Not because the pain was gone, but because she’d carried it here and still stood.
“I don’t want to go to the school counsellor,” Stacey said. “Not yet. I just... I want to decide what comes next. Not them. Not some teacher.”
Kayla nodded. “So we make a plan. Our plan. Not the one they think you’ll follow.”
They sat together for a while longer, the ciders finally gone, the sun turning softer in the sky. Music pulsed gently from the speakers overhead, something lazy and familiar. Around them, the world kept moving, students joked, glasses clinked, and someone shouted across the patio.
But inside their little bubble, it was just them.
Just truth.
And fire.
As they stood to leave, Kayla paused, looking Stacey over one last time.
“You really are scary hot right now,” she said, grinning. “If Gemma knew how good you looked after she tried to break you, she’d probably combust.”
Stacey rolled her eyes but smiled. “Let her burn.”
And they walked off into the evening.
Side by side.
Plotting something they hadn’t dared before.
Revenge.
But the smart kind.
The kind where you don’t just fight back.
You win.
- Writer
