Kyle knew what that felt like without being a hero. He didn’t fit in. Unlike Brittany, he didn’t want to fit in. The clique she so desperately clung to was all about popularity, appearance, affectation. As lonely as it was to be an outsider, Kyle knew he would feel so much more alone and empty trying to exist within that phony social structure. Brittany was finding that out firsthand, and yet she didn’t want any part of him reaching out to her. She treated him like he was the enemy, while it was her so-called friends turning on her.

He refocused on his drawing, his eye going to the girl Ultor was attempting to save. She was pretty, blond. If he were to color this, she would have eyes the blue of lakes on a cloudless summer day.

With a couple of deft strokes of the pencil he changed her expression from one of relief at being saved to something more like resentment. Leaving Ultor standing truly alone, a hero to an ideal.

The bell rang. Kyle stuffed his phone in the pouch of his hooded sweatshirt, closed his sketch pad, and gathered his things. Brittany fumbled with her phone, dropped it on the floor, spilled half the stuff out of her purse. Her cheeks flushed red as she scrambled to grab everything up and get out of the library. Kyle waited and held the door open for her like a gentleman. She didn’t thank him.

“What was it Christina tweeted about you again?” he asked as they started down the hall.

Brittany refused to look at him. “She was joking.”

“Yeah. Lesbian slut. That’s funny,” he said flatly.

“You don’t understand.”

“I understand with a friend like that you don’t need an enemy.”

She huffed a sigh and rolled her eyes. “Kyle, just butt out. You’re not helping.”

“I thought you didn’t need help,” Kyle said. “You don’t want my help because I’m a freak. I’m a loser because I don’t think it’s funny to bully people and call girls whores on Twitter. You’d rather have friends who treat you like shit. That’s fucked-up, Britt.”

She hugged her books and her purse tight to her chest, her shoulders hunched with tension as they negotiated the mob in the hall. “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

“Because I know you’re not like Christina. You’re so much better than her and the rest of them. You deserve better.”

She heaved a sigh as they turned with a flow of other students and started up the stairs like salmon bucking up a stream. She didn’t answer him. Kyle wasn’t sure if she didn’t believe she deserved better or if she didn’t believe she wasn’t like Christina Warner.

Christina was the bitch queen of the popular crowd. Girls wanted to be like her, wanted to be around her, wanted to be included in her inner circle of friends. She was the president of the sophomore class and belonged to all the right clubs. Teachers loved her. The people she liked saw her as successful and clever, always stylish. The people she didn’t like saw a different side of her.

“Have you heard from Gray?” he asked as they turned at the top of the stairs and started down the sophomore hall. Brittany stopped at her locker and focused on dialing her combination.

“No. Why would I hear from her? She hates me. That’s the last thing she said to me before she left. That she hated me and couldn’t wait to get out of here and never see anyone from here again.”

“Yeah, well, who could blame her?” Kyle said, leaning a shoulder against the next locker.

Christina Warner’s laugh drifted down the hall. Kyle could see them coming: Christina; her BFF, Jessie Cook; and her guard dog / boyfriend, Aaron Fogelman. Fogelman had a fat lip that gave Kyle a feeling of great satisfaction to see since he had made that happen.

Fogelman was over six feet tall and already beefy, like he was on steroids or had been held back five years or something. Despite the fact that he was a good enough student to attend PSI—or that his parents were rich enough to buy his way in—he struck Kyle as being as dumb as an ox. All the girls thought he was good-looking, but his eyes were a little too small and mean, and his mouth was always a little bit open. He was certainly stupid when it came to Christina. He followed her around like a big dog, willing to do whatever she told him. Kyle had given him the nickname the Henchman, though he didn’t call him that out loud. Calling people names was against his personal principles.

Brittany heard them coming too. She huffed another impatient sigh and gave Kyle a nasty look from the corner of her eye. “Would you just leave me alone?”

“You worried they’ll think you’re consorting with the enemy again?” he asked. “What’s Christina gonna put on Twitter this time? Last week you were a lesbian slut. Now you’ll just be a regular slut?”

She narrowed her eyes, trying her best to look mean. “There’s a reason people don’t like you, Kyle.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Because I tell the truth.”

“Hey, Brittany,” Aaron Fogelman said. “Is this runt bothering you?”

Kyle pushed away from the locker and stood with his feet shoulder-width apart, his books held low in front of him with both hands. He could be quick to drop them straight to the floor and move forward out of a fighting stance. Fogelman had taken the first swing of their last fight, but because Kyle tried always to be aware and ready, as Bruce Lee had taught, he had been able to move quickly, and Fogelman’s knuckles had only grazed his cheekbone.

“You’re calling me a runt, and I kicked your ass,” Kyle said. “What does that make you, Fogelman?”

“You didn’t kick my ass, Hatcher,” Fogelman said, irritated. “You must have a concussion.”

“From what?”

The truth was his body still hurt. Fogelman had fists the size of bricks, and he used them with what they called in the fight world “bad intentions.” He didn’t hit just to connect; he hit to hurt, to do damage. But Kyle would never show that Aaron Fogelman had hurt him. Fogelman might have been able to break him physically, but Kyle would always beat him when it came to gameness and psychological warfare.

Christina Warner held up her phone and took a picture of Kyle’s battered face. “This is what a loser looks like,” she said, tapping the keyboard. “Hashtag ‘Loser’ at XtinaW.”

She flipped her long white-blond hair back and gave Brittany a look, her perfect red lips turning down at the corners, her dark eyes filled with disapproval. “What are you doing with him, Brittany?”

“I’m not with him,” Brittany protested. “He won’t leave me alone.”

“You’re like a booger on a finger, Hatcher,” Fogelman said.

“I guess you’d know about that,” Kyle said.

Fogelman’s ears started turning red. It pissed him off no end that Kyle was more quick-witted than he was. He went for the cheap insult. “Why are you following a girl, anyway? Everyone knows you’re gay.”

Kyle narrowed his eyes, resisting the urge to punch Fogelman in the mouth, which was what he wanted to do. Not because he was a homophobe but because Fogelman was one, and thought that made him superior. Kyle thought of his hero, Georges St-Pierre, and what GSP said about dealing with bullies. Stand up straight; look your bully in the eye; do not retaliate with violence; be confident and tell the truth.

“Name-calling is the last resort of an ignorant mind,” he said.

Fogelman took a step in close, looming over Kyle, his expression dark. Kyle held his ground, never taking his eyes from the other boy’s. His heart started to beat a little harder. His ribs hurt as he tried to draw a deep breath, reminding him of the weight of this kid’s punches.

But instead of hitting him, Fogelman grabbed for his books, snatching hold of his sketch pad and quickly stepping back. A big grin spread across his stupid-looking face. Christina Warner laughed lightly, like she thought he was delightfully cute.

“What do you have in here, runt?” Fogelman asked.

Kyle stepped toward him and swiped at the sketch pad. Fogelman held it up out of his reach.