By Thursday, Amy had memorised the school's danger zones.
The lockers near Science—too crowded.
The benches by the gym—too loud.
The stairs in English—full of whispers that slipped under your skin.
So she avoided them.
She took longer routes. Slower routes. Routes that made her late sometimes—but quieter. Safer.
Or safer enough.
Chloe noticed something different.
"You're walking like you're avoiding landmines," she said one morning.
Amy shrugged. "It works, I'm able to get through life at school without feeling judged and overwhelmed." ."
Jamie scowled. "It shouldn't have to."
The third period was PE.
Which meant changing rooms and what also meant nowhere to disappear.
Amy sat on the bench, pulling on her trainers as slowly as she could manage. Around her, girls laughed, compared phone screens, talked about things that felt impossibly far away from her now things that felt too far for Amy to think of.
Near the sinks, two girls whispered. Quiet enough for no one to hear but also loud enough for Amy to get what they were trying to say.
"Is that her?"
"Yeah. The writer one."
"She's so quiet now."
"Guess she couldn't handle it."
Amy tied her laces tighter.
Too tight.
Her fingers throbbed.
Good.
Pain was easier than shame or that is what she thought.
After PE, she felt hollowed out. Hair plastered to her forehead. Muscles aching. Confidence worn thin, like it had been rubbed away.
She walked toward her next class with Chloe and Jamie, keeping her eyes on the floor.
Then—
"Oi, Shakespeare."
The voice cut clean through her and she knew straight away who it was but didn't know either to turn.
Kelsey.
Amy's stomach dropped.
"Got any tragic poems about embarrassing yourself yet?" Kelsey added, smirking.
A few laughs followed. Sharp but also quick.
Amy stopped walking.
Chloe went rigid beside her.
Jamie turned.
Slowly.
Dangerously calm.
"What did you say?" he asked with a calm look on his face, but the look said i mean business..
Kelsey raised her eyebrows. "Relax. It's a joke."
"No," Jamie said evenly. "It's bullying."
The corridor still.
Phones lifted. Someone whispered, Oh my God.
Amy's heart slammed against her ribs.
"Jamie, don't—" she murmured.
He didn't look back.
"You've been spreading stuff about her for days," he continued. "Laughing at her. Messaging her. Making it impossible for her to exist without you watching."
Kelsey crossed her arms. "She can block me."
"She shouldn't have to," Jamie snapped.
A teacher appeared at the far end of the corridor.
Amy prayed Jamie would stop.
He didn't.
"You're insecure," he said, voice steady, "so you pick on someone who actually tries. That's not funny. It's pathetic."
Kelsey's face flushed crimson. Not from just the embarrassment but also from the anger that Jamie used to be the person who she treated like a puppy dog and the boy who will do anything she asked for just from a click of her finger, but now he turned from that to the person that realised he had a voice and the person that seemed like he would change just from the sight of a new person.
"At least I'm not hiding behind a notebook," she shot back.
Jamie stepped closer.
"And at least she has something to say," he replied. "What do you have? Other people's rumours? Or are you the type of girl that just feels powerful when you have people around you because Clara and Mackenzie would be better people if you weren't around them."
Silence.
Not awkward silence.
Real silence.
Even the teacher slowed.
Kelsey opened her mouth.
Closed it.
Then scoffed. "Whatever."
She walked away.
The teacher hurried over. "What's going on here?"
"Nothing," Jamie said. "It's sorted."
The teacher studied them, then nodded. "Get to class."
They walked on.
Amy's hands were shaking now.
"So," Jamie said lightly, as if his heart wasn't pounding too. "Guess I'm officially banned from diplomacy."
Chloe laughed. "That was incredible."
Amy stopped walking.
They turned to her.
"Jamie," she said quietly.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you."
He shifted awkwardly. "Someone had to."
"I was terrified," she admitted. "But you made me feel... worth defending."
That made him smile.
Not his joking one.
A real one.
That afternoon, Amy found a note in her locker.
No folds. No cruelty.
Just plain paper.
You didn't deserve that.
Some of us think you're brave.
No name.
She stared at it for a long time.
Then she slipped it carefully into her notebook.
At home, Mrs Carter listened as Jamie retold the story, growing more dramatic by the sentence.
"And then," he concluded, "I basically destroyed her with logic."
Mrs Carter raised an eyebrow. "Did you now?"
Amy laughed.
A real laugh.
The kind that surprised her.
It felt like light breaking through clouds—thin, fragile, but unmistakably there.