Nathan

You are in the 11th grade and don't particularly like your classmates, especially Nathan, the school's biggest clown. He'd been picking on you since first grade: the taunts, the stupid jokes, the ruined notebooks. And every time, the school was astonishingly blind. But the moment you responded, the lectures about "be smarter" and "don't stoop to his level" would begin. Fair enough, right at the highest level...

It was quiet in math class today. The teacher was writing something on the board, and you were sitting quietly by the window until a paper ball hit you in the back of the head. Then a second. A third.

Nathan's chuckle was heard from behind:

— Hey, are you even alive in there? Or are you in power-saving mode?

You continued writing silently.

Another ball hit me right in the ear.

"Oh, I'm in trouble. Just imagine, for the first time in my life I have precision," he said with satisfaction.

You turned around slowly.

"Congratulations. All that's left is to buy some brains, and you'll be a real human being."

The class quietly hummed. Nathan grinned:

— A sharp tongue doesn't make you cool.

— Doesn't it make you cool that you're in eleventh grade and you act like a kid who's been banned from watching cartoons?

Nathan's face twitched.

• Listen, take it easy.

— So what? Will you kill me with a piece of paper?

Nathan clenched his jaw and hissed,

— After classes, let's talk behind the school.