The Lemming Rebellion
Chapter One
"Fucking adopted."
It is eight o'clock on a sweltering August evening. Two teenagers are struggling with an aftershock. One of them, the one with the long hair, is Squalo. The other one, the angry one, is named Xanxus. The latter is being shaken; the former is trying desperately to right the ship.
"They wait until fucking now to tell me."
Squalo can't think of a thing to say. Xanxus' anger radiates off his body like heat. Squalo wants to tell him to shut up and calm down, if only to lower the already horrible temperature just a bit.
"Did they think. I wasn't. Fucking ready? What the fuck?" He paces the street in tighter and tighter circles. "No, no, they were afraid. Of what I would think of them."
Who wouldn't be afraid of you? Thinks Squalo. A tiger hiding in a man—boy's—skin. A feral thing. Unclean. Unbelonging, but also uncaged—not safely locked up like the animals in the zoo. Dangerous. A threat.
Squalo realizes with a jolt that it is only a matter of time until creatures like them are put down. One way. Or another.
The threat continues to spew venom into the clean, air-freshener scented air of the kitchen.
"The cowards, living in their little clean house with nothing to hide…All their words. They stink of bullshit now. Those fucking pieces of worthless trash."
Xanxus smashes the bottle against the kitchen table, an exclamation point to end his sentence. It shatters loudly, shards like memories raining down to Squalo's worthless, faithless kitchen floor. Squalo winces slightly at the sound of lost control. He imagines the noise prowling like a tiger out his door, lithely striding down the silent asphalt roads. He sees it scratching at the closed blinds and green lawns and clean doors of suburbia. Coated in the sticky orange glow of the dying sun, the dust particles dancing like jellyfish in the air, Squalo feels like he's living on an alien planet. He picks unconsciously at the collar of his shirt, the walls of his parents' house closing in slowly.
Put down, one way or another. There can be only one winner. Squalo nudges a shard of glass with his toe. It looks forlornly up at him, lost and alone.
"Fourteen fucking years, they wait. And they tell me to calm down? What are they going to do, take away my things? Kick me out? I wish they'd hurry up and do it. Then I could leave—but what am I waiting for? I don't have to wait. They have no right to tell me what to do. They have no right."
Squalo can see murder in his eyes. Yes, he thinks. What are we waiting for?
He throws the punch like a lifeguard throwing a buoy at a drowning child. It lands squarely on the unprepared Xanxus' face and sends him flying out of the house. Squalo watches the neat edges of the door frame Xanxus' body. Portrait of the Exit of a Fed-Up Teenager. Or The Salvation of a Friend.
Squalo follows slowly, walking with the air of a saint. The fists he makes are holy with the air of martyrdom. He knows Xanxus can beat him in a fight, especially with this type of mood on him. But he's willing to take the bruises in exchange for giving a lesson, perhaps the only one he has ever really learned. Meanwhile, Xanxus is picking himself up in the street, one hand to his bleeding nose. The blood is violent red, made neon by the setting sun.
"What the fuck?"
Xanxus' eyes meet his, and it is the clashing of the thunderbolts of the pagan Gods before the lightning strikes the church tower.
"Fight me."
"Why?" He still doesn't get it.
"Fuck! You idiot! Does it fucking matter?" Squalo gestures wildly at the street, the air, the neat buildings and square lawns. "Who the fuck is going to care? Who's going to watch? If you want to fight, just do it!"
Just do it. If you want to fight—
Xanxus licks the blood on his chin, and it tastes like freedom. The flailing arms of his so-called parents die with the light. Neither boy notices when the sun slips beneath the waves of clouds, while the rumble of the thunder announces the last and greatest of the summer storms. The first drops are enough to wash away the thin fingers of Love and Submission. The punches land, and the black water beats down on the interlocked bodies of both boys, struggling together against a force bigger than themselves as the storm bears down hard. Squalo smiles as his teeth are bloodied, as the bruises plaster themselves to his skin. Just this once, he thinks. I'll only let him do this once. Next time, if he thinks it's going to be this easy—ha! I'll give him another idea—
A few minutes later, it is over.
The clouds move on. Xanxus is breathing hard, bent over Squalo's body, his best friend's blood coating his hands like a second skin. Xanxus uncurls himself. The night comes on and the stars peek out timidly from beneath the trailing clouds' veils. Is it over? They ask.
No, answers Xanxus. This is just the beginning.
From the ground, Squalo coughs hollowly.
"Get it now?"
Xanxus looks back, and there's the smile of a revolutionary on his face.
"Yeah."
Though most of the members are still missing, and despite the fact that it will be years until they call themselves that, this is the real start of the Lemming Rebellion.