[content warnings for bullying and suicide]
Background character description(s)
Isra: A black-skinned lizard with a tall, heavy frame, strong and muscular with a thick layer of fat. Tough and abrasive, she tends to just push through anything that gets in her way.
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Back in junior high, Isra didn't think much of pushing around the smaller, weaker kids. Everyone had to deal with shit. Isra was dealing with it. If they couldn't take it, they should just toughen up like she did, she thought.
There was one girl who was particularly small and weak, a little sheep named Tilly. She was an easy target for Isra's verbal abuse. Crybaby, wimp, loser. The tiny girl was easy to physically push around, and with her pink backpack and soft toys she seemed childish when other girls her age were all trying to act grown-up. Isra would see how Tilly cringed at the sight of her, and...this feels pretty awful to recall...it made Isra feel good.
Things changed abruptly the day she heard that Tilly tried to kill herself. She didn't come to school that day. Rumors rippled through the school, that she'd been sent to the hospital, that her injuries had been self-inflicted. For days, Isra felt sick with guilt, wondering if anyone would see Tilly alive again. She knew it had been at least partially her fault.
Not that that was enough to entirely change her ways. Sure, she was going to leave Tilly alone now. That seemed obvious, the natural thing to do now that it had come to light that she was suicidal. At least, she thought so. When Tilly came back to school, all the other kids went right back to pushing her around. She heard some of them mocking her for trying to kill herself. Isra couldn't just let this go on.
She brought it up to a teacher, and he explained to her like she was five fucking years old that Tilly has something called "clinical depression", and a bit of harmless teasing isn't going to have any impact. Isra politely inquired about how someone could have their head so far up their ass, and got detention for it.
The next day, Isra saw one of the bigger students making fun of Tilly again. Telling her that nobody wants her around, so it's no wonder she tried to kill herself; maybe she should try again and it'll stick this time, he said.
Isra stomped right up to him, and his brain only had time to register dim puzzlement as he turned to see her coming and received a crashing blow to the jaw. He fell flat on the floor, unconscious, and the hall fell silent. So that when Isra turned to Tilly, and Tilly slapped her square on the cheek, the loud smack could be heard crystal clear by every student watching. And Tilly spoke.
"D-d'you think, after all you've put me through, that you can just stroll up here and be a hero?" she cries out, nearly screaming. "D'you want me to give you a kiss on the cheek for being so good to poor, broken Tilly, is that it? No! Fuck you! I don't even care if you're ten seconds from crushing my skull by now, just...just go ahead and do it! Put me out of my misery!"
Tilly crumpled onto her knees and sobbed, looking for all the world like she was utterly convinced she really was on the executioner's block. Isra could only stand for a moment, stunned by what had just unfolded, until finally, she answered.
"I'm not gonna do that. You're right. I'm awful, and you should probably just slap me as many times as you feel like. Even if you hate me, I'm not gonna let anyone bully you anymore." She turned to address the crowd. "You hear that? If you make fun of Tilly, you may as well be walking up to me and insulting me to my face, and I know none of you are that stupid."
Tilly looked up from her crying, seeming all at once puzzled, amazed, disappointed, and hopeful at the fact that she was not already dead. The crowd began to mutter, and it was only now that a teacher burst onto the scene. In Isra's mind, the moment she walked onto the scene must've taken place at least an hour ago, but truthfully it couldn't have been more than a minute.
The teacher was a little unsure of what to make of the scene laid out before him, but needless to say, Isra got detention again.
But she kept her promise. Nobody would dare mess with Tilly, knowing that Isra would come after them. She stopped pushing kids around, and started protecting them, going after bullies more and more aggressively. Sure, black eyes and detention were commonplace for her, but what else was new? At least she was fighting for something now, rather than just blindly lashing out at the world like she used to. She saw the direction the world was oriented in, and started punching up.