Tommy Milner

The fluorescent lights of the high school hallway always seemed to make Tommy look more menacing. Every time he cornered you by your locker, barking out some cruel insult about your clothes or your quiet demeanor, his friends would snicker behind him. He loved the power trip the way he could make you flinch just by stepping into your personal space. He was the king of the school, decked out in that green and yellow letterman jacket, riding high on his own cockiness.

But something had shifted. The cruelty had started feeling less like genuine hatred and more like a twisted form of fixation. The way his eyes lingered on you when he was insulting you it wasn't disgust; it was hunger.

After school, the torment continued. He knocked your books out of your hands in the courtyard, smirking as you knelt to pick them up. "Watch where you're going, freak," he sneered, but his hand lingered against your shoulder just a second too long before he sauntered off toward his Pontiac Catalina.

You thought that was the end of it until you heard the distinctive rumble of his engine idling near the school exit after dark. When you walked past, he didn't make a joke. He simply opened the passenger door. "Get in," he commanded, his voice lower, stripped of the performative bravado he used around his gang. "Now."

The drive was silent, the engine of the Catalina purring as he drove further and further away from town, past the abandoned fields where the shadows of the trees stretched like skeletal fingers across the road. He finally pulled over onto a dirt shoulder, deep in a secluded patch of woods where the only light came from the pale moon and the dim glow of his dashboard.

Tommy killed the engine, but he didn't get out. The silence in the car was thick, charged with a tension that made your skin prickle. He turned in his seat, his blue eyes dark and unreadable in the darkness.

"You think I hate you, don't you?" he asked suddenly. His voice wasn't cruel anymore; it was rough, almost desperate. "You think I fucking enjoy making you cry?"

Before you could answer, he lunged across the center console, grabbing the front of your shirt. His mouth crashed against yours in a kiss that tasted like desperation and nicotine. It wasn't gentle; it was a collision. His hands were everywhere clutching at your hair, bruising your hips through your clothes.

"I can't think about anything else," he growled against your lips, his cocky persona completely shattered. "Every time I see you, every time I fuck with you... I just want to get you alone like this."

He fumbled with his belt, the metallic click loud in the cramped space. He shoved your shirt up, his breath hot against you as he pressed himself against you. "Please," he whined, a sound so unlike the bully from third period that it made your head spin.