People Can Still Change Too - A Bildunsroman

Shaarav Bhatia Author

People Can Still Change Too

It was a Thursday in the middle of summer. In the middle of Perth lies Watterson High, the bullying capitalist of Western Australia, and that is no joke. It’s either you’re the one getting constantly bullied or you are a follower of the leader of this group, Nathan Coran. He is notoriously known across all grades for bullying people and also for his hordes of people following him. Teachers and even the principal himself came out and tried stopping him, but it failed. They even brought the police over to give them a speech about racism and bullying, but they just punched her in the face. Besides shooting Nathan, the police couldn’t do anything. As long as Nathan was in Watterson High, the school would be overrun by bullying.

It was lunch break in school and Nathan took this opportunity to practice his bullying skills. He wore silver circular earrings, shirts with pure white skulls on them and Michal Jordan shoes. He usually wore black shorts, even during PE. He had black hair and blue eyes.

As soon as Nathan got up from the metal eating bench everyone that was his ‘friend’ got up immediately and bowed to him. Nathan instilled this habit into his friends by forcing them and giving them a consequence. The consequence was being bullied everyday and being excluded by this horrid group.

Everyone that walked around with him did so much for Nathan, while he did close to nothing for them. He appreciated the sense of royalty.

Everyone in the eating area didn’t dare to set an eye on Nathan. He walked through and saw one person not bowing down to him. So Nathan did the logical thing. He took the boy by his collar, smashed him into the wall, punched him in the nose so hard blood started coming and then pinned him to the ground. Nathan then dusted his hands and left the boy there groaning. Nathan’s actions seemed to make everyone scared. He exited the eating area and into the hallway, which led to a basketball arena. Just as he was getting there, he ran into the principal, Mr. Corswan. Mr Corswan looked at Nathan and Nathan looked at him.

“What are you looking at?!” he sneered.

The principal responded with, “That’s no way to talk to your principal! Go to detention right now!”

Nathan muttered something under his breath. He angrily stomped to detention. Detention took up 2 hours, and you would do harder tests than normal. After detention, Nathan headed back for class, where he sat down and started to annoy the teacher, Ms. Com. He started off by throwing a pencil at her. Ms. Com spun around to see everyone sitting in their seats and looking bored.

She turned back to the whiteboard and started writing. “So Alex Jocon was famous for his political skills and…”

Nathan then had the cheeky idea to throw a small and grey yet sturdy rock he found under his desk at Ms. Com. He was aiming his throw to make sure he didn’t miss. As soon as he threw the rock, his hand extended forward like a catapult shooting a giant metal ball. The rock flew forward and snatched everyone’s attention. It hit Ms. Com right in the spine.

She wailed in pain and fell to the ground, which caught a couple of gasps of shock from students in the classroom. Just before anything else could possibly go wrong, the end-of-school bell started to blare at everyone. Nathan jumped out of his seat and sprinted to the classroom door.

“Stop!!” shouted the teacher from across the room with all her remaining strength. Nathan just ignored her and ran for the exit to the classroom. The door swung open as Nathan pulled with ferocity. He ran out of the door and sprinted to exit the school. He basically kicked the door open with his feet because he was so impatient and wanted to leave this dump, or at least that is what he thought.

As soon as he was free, he was encountered with a problem. The gates to leave were closed. For Nathan, this could be easily worked around by just climbing it. So that’s what he did.

It was about a 20 minute walk from school to Nathan’s house, but 10 minutes if he ran. Nathan ran as fast as he could back home so he could turn on his laptop and start to play Fortnite.

When he arrived home, his mother was standing there, unimpressed and with a frown on her face. “I have had enough.” she said sternly.

“What do you mean?” asked Nathan.

“The school has had enough with your rough, violent and disruptive behaviour. You can’t keep on going around hurting people with every turn you take.” she replied.

“They deserved it,” he said as he shrugged.

“I am going to send you to a place where you will learn your lesson and not bully anyone again.” she said harshly.

“You can’t make me!”

“Either that or no games for the next 2 YEARS and replaced with harsh studies.”

“WHAT!?!” exclaimed Nathan.

“That’s what I thought.” replied her mother. “Now get in the car.”

Natahn’s mom’s car was a yellow Toyota Corolla. There were stains on the car from when Nathan threw a bucket of light green paint on it. There was a dent on the front of the car and only one headlight worked, so Nathan’s mom never went anywhere if it was dark. Inside the car was even more horrific.

The floor was littered with test results, school homework and chocolate wrappers. The seats smelled like dead flies and one of the windows was partially cracked from the time Nathan threw a sharp rock at it. In the front, the seats were a bit peeled and the steering wheel had blue stains on it.

Nathan’s mum tried starting the car, but it refused. She tried again but it still didn’t turn on. Nathan tried to use this opportunity to get out of the car. He slowly opened the car door without a sound and slipped out. He opened the front door which was conveniently unlocked. He opened the door stealthily and just as he thought he was home free, literally, he was met face to face with his mother.

“Wait what?” stuttered Nathan looking at the car, then at his mom. “How!?”

“You better get in the car before I take your PC COMPLETELY.” she responded sternly.

Nathan slowly slumped to the car, anger burning in his veins. He practically fell into the car and waited for the car to finally start. He looked outside, seeing the other kids, a bit younger than Nathan, playing. He wanted to just get out and take out all of his anger on them, but he knew that was the wrong decision to make. Just then the car finally turned on.

It was a 2 hour drive to the centre which was in the middle of a remote place. It was one of the only buildings in the area, but despite that it was huge. It was a white building with ‘Mental Centre’ written at the top of it.

“You’re taking me to an asylum?!” shouted Nathan as he sprang out, his seatbelts restricting him from jumping out of his seat. His mother laughed.

“No, no.” Nathan sighed in relief. “I’m taking you somewhere worse.”

Nathan immediately started stressing. “For how long?”

“You’ll see.” she replied very calmly and positively. Nathan guessed she had high hopes for this place to change him for the better.

Nathan’s mom parked the car far away from the centre on purpose, which made Nathan groan. His mom ignored it.

It took them around 5 minutes to get to the centre because Nathan’s mom parked the car on a hill. When they arrived at the centre, the sliding doors slid open gracefully. Inside, the ceiling was high and the colour combination for the interior was yellow and white.

There were awards almost everywhere that shone brightly. A chandelier hung from the ceiling. There was a reception desk straight in front of them. Behind that desk was a man in his mid 20’s. He wore a red uniform with a name tag that read, ‘Hello! My name is George. Nice to meet you!’ George had freckles on his face and had blond hair. His eyes were an emerald green.

Nathan’s mom walked up to George and they talked for a bit. Nathan went up to his mum and asked, “What are you talking about?”

His mom ignored him while George briefly looked at Nathan and then nodded to Nathan’s mom.

“Hello young man! My name is George and I am going to be your guardian for the next 2 week. Now, if you follow me, I will lead you to a place specifically designed for you.” he said in a very kind and enthusiastic voice.

“Mom, are you serious?” Nathan asked.

“What did I say about you losing your PC?” she replied.

“How does he know what I like if he has only taken one glance at me?”

“You’ll see.”

Nathan followed George, doubtful yet excited and curious. They were led down a long corridor that stretched far down. There were lots of paintings that looked very simple yet colourful on the corridor walls.

After what seemed like an eternity, they finally reached the room. George opened the door and inside was not as impressive as Nathan had imagined.

He imagined a giant 80 inch TV on the wall, lots of bean bags, an ultimate gaming setup and so much more. But what was in there was a pure white queen-sized single bed, a manikin that was weirdly staring at him, a bookshelf full of what looked like study books and some ceiling lights.

Even though the room had lots of space in it, Nathan was massively disappointed.

“No! I am not staying here!” shouted Nathan as he turned back the way they came from and sprinted through the corridor. He whizzed past all of the paintings that looked like blobs of colour. Once he reached the end of the corridor, he turned to exit the building where once again, his mom was waiting for him.

“Oh come on!” exclaimed Nathan.

“I guess I’ll have to take your PC no matter what.” said his mother in a threatening way.

“Fine! I’ll go back.” replied Nathan grumpily.

Nathan angrily slumped back down the corridor and to the room. He slowly made his way up to the room. Once he reached there, George was waiting very patiently. Nathan angrily slumped his way in the room.

Then George slowly and silently closed the door and locked it. It was only then Nathan realised that he was locked in. There were glass panes on one side of the room, from which you could see the car park.

There were some bushes in the car park and lots of bark on the floor. There weren’t many cars there, maybe 3 or 4.Other than using the study books (which Nathan was never going to use) Nathan didn’t have a whole lot of things to do.

He could sleep, or state at the lights, or look out into the car park, but that was pretty much it. He decided he would stare out into the empty car park because that was probably the most ‘fun’ option.

Occasionally, a car would park there and the person driving would get out. After 20 or 30 minutes, someone would get back in their car and then leave.

But, this is where Nathan’s life changed. The sun was setting and the number of cars that came to the centre slowly decreased, which meant it was pretty rare to see a car. But just then a bunch of kids that were in year 12 were all surrounding a younger kid who looked like Nathan.

He had black hair and the same blue eyes. The older kids were snickering and pointing and laughing at the younger child. They were getting ready to beat the child up.

But then, Nathan had a flashback. Back when he was in the 7th grade and started to go to Watterson High, he got picked on all the time. Nathan remembered how he was bullied and how he was beaten up back then.

This made Nathan feel awful for how he treated the younger kids because now he actually remembered how he felt when he was bullied and now he knows how others feel too.

After that day, Nathan never bullied someone ever again and abandoned every single one of his ‘friends’. He only said nice things and stood up against all the other bullies.

Categories: : Creative Stories, Fiction, Stories For Children