Do you ever get those feelings when you wake up that something was going to happen? Like, you just feel it in your gut, before you even get out of your Superman boxers and throw on some dirty skinny jeans and your too-thick glasses so you can properly go to that hellhole they call high school? I do sometimes. It's very strange, honestly. I don't really get it, but then again, I don't really try to.

Today was one of those days where I felt something.

"Mikey, get your sorry ass out of bed! You still have to drive me to the ferry!" my older brother yelled from the bottom of the stairs. I could tell it was the bottom because that's where he yelled at me from every day. Gerard likes to yell, apparently. It's not like he's not good at it, though. He is. I just hate being yelled at.

"Fine, you asshole!"

"Language, boys!" I heard my mom say from the kitchen as I was dragging my favorite, dirty pair of black skinny jeans over my even skinnier legs. They were followed by a mismatched pair of socks (one was a holey My Little Pony one, the other black and yellow checkered) and a scruffy, worn pair of Vans.

"Mikey, if you spend another minute getting dressed, I'm gonna kill you. We're going to be late!" Gerard continued yelling. I waved my bony hand dismissively; it's not like he was right. We went through the same routine every morning. Gee would wake me up a half hour early, claiming that we needed to be out the door within ten minutes, then spent the next forty minutes watching Batman cartoons on TV with a cigarette in one hand and a mug of Irish coffee in the other. Mom didn't know he slipped whiskey into his coffee, and she wasn't going to. He was still only twenty, too young to drink.

I staggered down the stairs fifteen minutes later in a Misfits t-shirt that used to be Gerard's, my backpack slung over my shoulder and my mouth tasting of too-minty mouthwash. As expected, Gee was sitting in front of the TV, sipping his coffee, and Batman was fighting off The Mad Hatter.

From my spot at the foot of the stairs, I could see a plate of cold eggs and toast on the table for me, but I wasn't hungry, so I just ignored it. It barely crossed my mind that Mom might feel bad about me not eating; she usually did.

Regardless, I motioned to Gerard for us to go. I wanted to get to school early today. I just had a good feeling, like I said earlier. With a deep sigh, he poured the rest of his coffee down the sink and put out his half-smoked cigarette in one of the many ashtrays in our house. Even though everyone in the house smoked on a regular basis, I didn't allow cigarettes in my shitty little car.

I guess you're wondering by now why Gerard didn't have his own car. He failed the driving test eight times, and hasn't gotten the guts to go back and try it for a ninth time. I really hope he grows his balls sometime soon, though. It would suck to be carting around my brother after he graduates art school, and I graduate high school.

The car ride to the ferry to New York—that was where Gerard's art school was—was long, boring, and awkward. I hated driving with Gee alone. Don't get me wrong, I love my brother to death, but it was always very weird; he either played the music much too loud, or not at all. Regardless, we never spoke in the car. Ever.

"Get out," I joked when we pulled up to the ferry, my car just barely making it. Gee rolled his eyes, grabbed his little leather rucksack, and got out. Without a goodbye, I hightailed it out of the parking lot. I was almost going to be late to school.

As I was pulling into my school, I nearly killed someone.

Okay, it was the kid's fault, I swear! I was driving under the speed limit and everything. The idiot midget was the one who darted out into traffic and made me swerve, hitting our school's brand new, electronic announcement board outside the school in front of the entire student body filing inside for first period.

And that's why I'm now sitting in Mr. Parsons office for the first day ever, on my first day of senior year.