Eric, had spoken with Nick and the kids, making minimal to none laces of friendship with them. Eric thought he was being left out by his only current friend Nick.
Throughout the rest of the school year Eric couldn't focus in classes again, not being able to unsee him being replaced by two new "randoms" Nick had just met.
A wave of sadness and disgust fell trough Eric in one of his classes and he had to go to the bathroom in order to throw up. Eric wasn't well, it was clear.
School gave him one week off. And on the first day, after wandering around the house doing nothing Eric had an epiffany:
He'll become stronger, in order to gain respect from everyone he wanted. People would fear going against him and he'll no longer lack validation.
Eric started like every kid who wanted to become stronger would: he secretly did pushups in his bedroom, but slowly became more open about his wishes to become stronger and started going around the house carrying and lifting weighted sacks and would always be eager to go get his mom's groceries, which meant more carrying.
Even after his "break" from school was off and he came back, he managed to maintain his routine, now spending much less time writing on his notebook. Eric managed to have enough free time to exercise.
Every day after school he'd be exited to go home to exercise again. After a few more weeks of repeating the same process Eric decided to finally go back to the local library to read about philosophers, this time he stumbled across an article about how Socrates, the great philospher said:
"No man has the right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training. It is a shame for a man to grow old without seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable"
After reading this, Eric got motivated even more, and he stacked up courage to ask his mom for a gym membership, which, after some convincing, which is what everyone needs, agreed with Eric and signed him up for a gym.
Little did Eric's mom know that Eric, who already found school pointless would now find it even more. After "losing" his only friend and having bad grades, in his view, Eric had no reason to go to school and not to the gym.
So Eric did what every teenager who goes to the gym thought about doing: Skipping class to go to the gym.
And Eric did this for about 3 months before these things started catching up to him. Letters written from the school to his mom, who later decided to put a stop to this and suspend Eric from the gym.
Eric was now only able to go to the gym on weekends, days off and holidays. but those four months of exercising already made him somewhat notably different. Although not enough to go face-to-face with those who revolted him.
Eric went on the rest of school year, always eagerly waiting to go to the gym and become stronger. But Eric had a problem. His morales only weren't enough to justify all this exausing work... he had to do it for something, for somebody, for someone...
Thats when he decided to grab his notebook and start scraping up ideas... ideas of a new "thing" that agreed with everything he stood for, someone who's words and morales mattered more than anyone else's around him.
Thats when... at age 14, Eric made something new. Something that barely any teenager his age has done. A God. Or, a concept of it, at least. Eric didn't fully understand what it meant to worship a God, yet.
As he's always been against submitting himself to a religion, as he thought it was time wasting and he never quite found one that truly resembled him.
Thats until he made his own. Eric's god wasn't himself, it was another being, not living, but human, who demanded no specific payer nor praying stance like some other religions/gods.
Just say what you want to say to your inner self (as Eric didn't wish to be called crazy for actively worshipping a God he had made up) and vent to your innser self.
After some time of Eric devoting himself to his religion, Eric understood that the only validation he needed was his own. Needing no other to validate him in order to feel good. This made Eric more confident and willing to stand for his own beliefs and thoughts.
This, combined with Eric's upcoming strenght made him become able to defend anything that was thrown against him.
And to start of well with putting his beliefs and thoughts to work, he had to meet some old acquaintances...
Eric, at a random time of the month was supposed to go to class, but instead he took another route.
After taking said route Eric ended up at the adolescent's house. Although they were all at school Eric knew the time one of them came to this house would come.
So there he was... back at the adolescent's house, acting alone this time, not to throw eggs and not to get thrown himself. But he was there for a greater purpose this very time...
As Eric was waiting for time to pass he took a look at the house and what he had gone through there. But he also remembered the time he went with Nick there, the one who taught him revenge.
Eric missed Nick, but "you reap what you sow" was what Eric mumbled to himself, at the thought of acting up with Nick.
"Maybe one day we'll reunite again"
Time passed and Eric meditated alone in a park near the house, he needed to be mentally prepared as he never actually tested himself.
School was over and Eric saw the adolescent coming to his house, Eric followed a few steps behind him...