The bell rang and Daichi immediately got on his feet.
"Yo Shu, let's go. Cafeteria gets packed if you don't get there early and the good stuff sells out in like five minutes."
"Alright, give me a sec."
He pushed his chair back and stood up, grabbing his phone off the desk. He was about to step into the aisle when his foot caught on something and his whole body went forward before he could even react.
He hit the floor face first and his nose took all of it, the pain hitting so hard that his eyes watered on impact.
He could hear a gasp from somewhere in the room and a girl saying "oh my god" while something warm was already running down from his nose to his lip.
He touched his face and looked at his hand and it was covered in blood.
"What the fuck?!"
That was Daichi, already rushing over.
"Shu, you good bro?! You're bleeding man, you're bleeding a lot-"
The room was getting loud around him. People were standing up from their seats and crowding closer while a few girls in the front row looked genuinely freaked out.
"What happened?"
"Did he trip?"
"His nose is gushing, someone get a teacher-"
"It was an accident."
That voice came from behind him. Shu turned his head and saw Mura still sitting in his seat with his leg stretched out into the aisle, not even trying to hide it.
His two friends were next to him and one of them was holding back a grin while the other was looking off to the side pretending he didn't see anything.
"He wasn't looking where he was going, I guess he didn't see my leg, my bad man."
'I got hurt and his response is "my bad"?'
"That's bullshit, your leg was nowhere near the aisle before he stood up!" Daichi pointed at Mura with his whole arm. "I was literally looking right at-"
"Chill out man, it was an accident. Right?" Mura looked at Shu with this lazy smile on his face. "No hard feelings?"
'Calm down.'
The blood was dripping off his chin and landing on the floor in small drops. His nose hurt so much and the taste of blood was filling his mouth.
'Calm down, it's not worth it. It's your first day, you don't want to start shit on your first day. Just let it go, get up, go to the nurse, and move on with your life.'
He pressed the back of his hand against his nose to try and stop the bleeding while staring at the floor.
'Calm down... calm down calm down calm down.'
But it wasn't working. He could feel himself getting angrier and he knew exactly where this was going because it happened before at his old school and it nearly ruined everything.
'Don't do it. You promised yourself you wouldn't do this anymore. You moved to a whole new city so you could leave this shit behind, so just get up and walk away.'
Mura laughed. It was a short little laugh, quiet enough that only the people nearby heard it, but Shu heard it clearly.
'...Fuck it.'
He got up, not slowly or dramatically, he just stood up and walked straight toward Mura. The two guys sitting next to him barely had time to react before Shu's hand was around Mura's throat, lifting him out of his chair and slamming his back into the wall behind him.
The entire room went dead silent.
Nobody moved or said a word. Even Daichi who was mid-sentence just stopped with his mouth still open.
Shu was holding Mura against the wall with one hand, his fingers locked around his throat. His nose was still bleeding a lot, the blood getting onto Mura's shirt.
"Why did you do that?"
His voice came out low and cold, which was the scariest part, everything else about him right now looked like he was about to snap.
Mura's hands were gripping Shu's wrist trying to pry it off but it wasn't moving, not even a little. He was pulling and twisting but Shu's arm stayed exactly where it was.
"I- it was a joke man, it was just a-"
"Do I look like I'm laughing?"
Mura's feet were barely touching the floor. His face was going red and his eyes were wide, darting to his friends for help, but the two of them were frozen in their seats.
One of them looked like he wanted to stand up but his legs weren't cooperating. The other wasn't even looking at Shu, just staring at the floor.
The whole class was watching. Some of them were pressed against the far wall while others had their phones halfway out like they were thinking about recording but were too scared to actually do it.
Airi had her hand over her mouth and even the girls who were talking to him earlier looked like they were seeing a completely different person.
And honestly, they were. This was the side of Shu that he spent every single day trying to keep locked away. This version of him does not care about warnings or consequences until after the damage was already done.
He hated it. He really, genuinely hated this part of himself.
But right now, with blood running down his face and this asshole's throat in his hand, he couldn't bring himself to let go.
'It's over. Every single person in this class is going to remember this moment for the rest of the year. The quiet transfer kid who seemed chill just choked a guy out on his first day. That's my reputation now, that's what they'll whisper about when I walk down the hall.'
'The girls who were being friendly are going to avoid me, Daichi is going to keep his distance, and I'll be right back to where I was at my old school except worse because at least there people knew me before they were scared of me.'
He could see it in their faces already. The way they were looking at him wasn't curiosity anymore, it was fear, and he knew exactly what fear looked like because he saw it enough times before to recognize it instantly.
'I know what I look like right now. Blood on my face, hand around someone's neck, and I haven't blinked once since I grabbed him. I look insane, the exact kind of person I told myself I wasn't going to be anymore.'
But knowing all of that didn't change anything. His body wasn't listening to his brain and the anger was sitting right at the top of his chest refusing to go anywhere.
'I can't stop. I know I should but I literally can't make my hand open. What is wrong with me? Why am I like this? Every time I think I've got it under control some asshole pushes a button and I just...'
He tightened his grip and pulled Mura off the wall just enough to slam him back into it again. Mura's head bounced off the surface and a choked sound came out of his mouth.
"Grit your teeth."
He said it so calmly that it almost didn't register as a threat, but the way he pulled his right fist back made the meaning very clear to everyone watching.
Mura's whole body changed in an instant. The smug look that was on his face since the moment Shu walked into class was completely gone and what replaced it was something so pathetic that it almost made the anger feel pointless.
"P-please, I'm sorry, I'm sorry okay?! I won't do it again, I swear, please don't hit me, please-"
He was crying... full on tears running down his face while his voice cracked on every other word, and his hands had stopped trying to pull Shu's grip off and were just shaking in front of him with his palms open.
'They all react the same... this types of people never learn unless you make them.'
Even though his nose was filled with blood, he picked up a strange smell. He glanced down saw a dark stain spreading down the front of Mura's pants.
'He pissed himself? How pathetic.'
A few people in the room noticed it too. Someone let out a small noise that sounded like a gasp and laugh mixed together.
Mura's face went from red to white as he realized what happened, and for a second Shu almost felt bad for him because that was the kind of thing that follows you forever and no amount of being the school bully would ever erase the fact that thirty people just watched you wet yourself while crying.
'I should really stop. He's done, this isn't even satisfying anymore, it's just sad. But I still want to hit him, I can feel it in my knuckles, and the fact that I want to hit someone who's already this broken is exactly why I hate myself when I get like this.'
His fist was still raised and his arm was shaking, not from hesitation but from how hard he was holding the punch back while every part of him was screaming to just let it go.
A hand landed on his shoulder from behind.
"Shu." Daichi called out.
Shu turned to look at him.
"Don't do it, man, it's not worth it."