Winter Swan

Today's biology class involved frog dissection. When Silje entered the lab, the smell of chloroform greeted her. On the tables were dead frogs, beakers, and microscopes.

Silje couldn't focus on what her teacher was saying. She just held the scalpel in her hand while the kids around her were quietly laughing at her.

"Look at her!"

"If I were her, I would just cut my wrist with that scalpel and be done with myself, haha."

Silje just shrugged her shoulders at the cruel comments.

Whatever.

She calmly stared at the frog in front of her. The other students followed the teacher's instructions and started to dissect their frogs.

Silje was just like the frog to them. The kids did whatever they wanted to do to her. The only difference was that the frog remained still while Silje fought back.

When class was almost over, a paper airplane hit her head from behind and fell onto the table. Inside were the words: "Die Yellow Monkey" in bright red ink. Beside it was a drawing of Silje hanging like a hangman and her tongue sticking out.

Horrible things were written in red about her all over the piece of paper.

Silje was furious, but she smiled and murmured, "When will kids grow up? Hmm?"

She grinned, crumpled the paper, and threw it on the floor.

"Did you see that?"

"She read it and threw it away. Freak."

They laughed again and Silje stopped herself from sighing loudly. Could they be any more immature? When will they stop bullying her?

Silje mumbled to herself, "…I guess seeing that cat was a bad omen."

Maybe that cat was staring at her because it needed to warn her. She had a bad feeling about today, like something nasty was going to happen.

Silje shook her head. No matter what, it didn't matter. She was going to fight against whatever was coming for her.

She was going to fight till the end.

The bell finally rang and Silje packed her bag nonchalantly while the kids continued to smirk at her.

She was about to leave the lab when a couple of big guys stopped her.

"Silje Kim Pettersen."

They spit out her name with a sneer and grabbed her hand.

"Let me go!"

Silje tried to resist as they dragged her away. She punched one boy in the face and attempted to escape, but the others captured her again quickly.

"You better let us take you. No one's going to help you and if you run, everyone in this school will be happy to help us get you."

And with that, they took her to an isolated classroom. Random students followed them with interest; they clearly wanted to watch what was going to happen to her.

People surrounded her and the boys locked the back door to prevent the teachers from coming in.

If it was anyone else, they would've screamed or cried in fear, but Silje was used to this. She looked around calmly.

"…"

Among them, Silje saw Brigit and her friends in yellow cheerleader uniforms. She also saw the odd-eyed boy, Felicien.

When Silje looked at them in silence, Felicien gave her a nasty smile.

"What the hell are you looking at? Bitch."

The large boy walked towards her and continued, "What? You think someone here is going to help you? Keep dreaming."

Felicien glared at her and yelled in anger.

"I just don't understand why Kail wants to hang out with this stupid Asian girl. Dammit! This won't do. He has shamed us all! Of all the girls, why this bitch? WHY!"

He looked around for support.

"You saw what Kail did for her in that storage room, right? I can't take it anymore. This bitch needs to go!"

Brigit, who had her arms crossed surrounded by her friends, nodded in agreement.

"Totally! Kail has lost his mind. That is the only logical explanation as to why he fell for this stupid girl."

Brigit had been jealous of Silje for a very long time, and she finally exploded.

"Felicien, kill her! Make sure she can never come back to this school! I don't want to ever see her face again. Whenever I see her with Kail, I feel like I want to kill myself."

Brigit's friends agreed loudly.

"Yeah, kill her!"

"Get rid of her!"

All the other girls were also jealous of Silje for receiving unusual attention from Kail the king.

The guys watched in delight. However, despite everything that was happening around her, Silje looked cool. Slowly, she opened her mouth.

"Aren't you guys tired of all this?"

She sniggered at them and continued, "Just when will you all grow up? Don't you get tired of it?"

At her sharp criticism, Felicien walked toward her. He swore at her loudly and slapped her face.

"Shut up, bitch! Who do you think you are!"

He punched her face hard. Silje gasped in shock at the unbelievable pain. Was her jaw broken? She became breathless as Felicien continued to scream at her.

"Bitch! Kail was just toying with you. You should learn your place and keep your mouth shut. Since the beginning, I was worried that Kail really did lose his mind."

He glared at Silje and added, "Today, you will learn a lesson you will never forget."

With his words, the boys came at her and started to beat Silje.

It was the worst one-sided beating she had ever gone through. It was so violent and raw that Silje thought she might really die today. She bit her lips until they bled.

She had to endure it. Her pride wouldn't let her give up. She came this far, went through so much, and if she surrendered now, it would be all for nothing.

Silje clenched her teeth so she couldn't moan or scream.

"Why do you keep coming to school!"

"You need to quit school right now! You make the entire place smell like monkeys."

"You make me sick!"

The boys punched and kicked her. When she fell to the ground, they grabbed her long hair and dragged her around like a dog.

"Now, bark for us like a dog! Woof woof!"

"Haha, she has been annoying me for a while now, so this is about time."

Even with the severe beating, Silje wouldn't make a sound, which only made her bullies even angrier. They continued to kick her and stomp on her back. Tears rolled down her eyes, but Silje laughed, "I feel sorry for you all. How pitiful. I just can't understand why you people live this way."

Ignoring her mocking words, they continued beating her up.

The girls pointed their fingers at her and laughed.

She had to get up. She couldn't lose to them now.

Silje tried to stand up, but every time she tried, the kids kicked her down.

Suddenly, Silje started to cough uncontrollably. She was dizzy and at some point, Silje started to believe that perhaps this was just a nightmare. It hurt so badly that it didn't feel real. This situation seemed so unbelievable and ridiculous that Silje started to laugh again.

'This can't be real. Something like this would never happen inside on school grounds, right? So I must be dreaming. It… hurts so badly but maybe that's because it's a dream…?'

Ironically, her mind was becoming clearer and clearer.

This wouldn't do. This wasn't like her to get beaten without a fight.

'If this continues, I might really die.'

She had to get out of here. With everything she had, Silje somehow got up and started to run.

"…!"

The kids didn't expect her to be this strong. Silje pushed away the boys and ran towards the door. Thankfully, one of the doors was not locked and she was able to escape.

"What the!"

"Get her!"

The boys screamed and ran after her.

Pant, pant!

Barely breathing, Silje ran.