The new boys. The Winchesters.
They'd been here three days. It was hard to miss them. Dean, the oldest, a senior, was brash, mouthy, and cocksure of himself. The younger brother, Sam, freshman, was earnest, and reserved.
I knew their kind. They were trouble waiting to happen. Based on the number and location of schools they had attended in their lives, listed on their admission paperwork, they led rather peripatetic lives. Their family was obviously 'working poor' and their education had already proved to be alarmingly substandard: Dean was a year behind in his schooling; at nineteen he should've already graduated high school. I knew that his younger brother would succumb to the same academic fate, no doubt before the end of this school year.
Well, I only had to wait a few weeks at most and they'd be some other principal's transitory problem. In the interim, I kept my eye on them.
The school day was over, students were busy getting their things out of their lockers, eager to be on their way home. I walked down the hallway, observing the two Winchesters at Sam's locker, having quite the discussion.
"What have I told you? Like a million times?" Dean was asking Sam. He towered over his younger brother, no doubt using his height to intimdate him.
"That if anybody bothers me I come to you first." Sam answered him the way I've heard children recite their history lessons - one hundred percent rote, zero enthusiasm. "Dean - I can take care of myself."
"That's not the point. I'm here, I look out for you. Got it?"
"Yeah, whatever."
"All right. I'm going to get my stuff. I'll meet you back here and we'll go home. OK?"
"Yeah. Okay." Sam turned into his locker and said something else I couldn't hear. But I heard his brother's answer loud and clear.
"expletive deleted"
Then Dean walked away and turned the corner into the next hallway.
I wasn't surprised that his rudeness extended to his brother. His kind bully their way wherever they want to go. When Sam had pulled his backpack out of his locker and started to walk toward the front door, I fell in step next to him.
"Sam - could I have a word with you?"
"Uh - sure Principal Benner."
Sam Winchester was polite, at least. Any other student would be pleading that they had to get home, they had to study for a test, they had a mountain of homework. Anything to get out of talking with me. Sam simply followed me to my office.
"I overheard your conversation with your brother just now. Another student was bothering you?"
"Naah. Reggie Andrews thinks he's a tough guy. He doesn't bother me. It's no big deal."
"Your brother seemed to think it was a big deal."
Sam shrugged at that.
"That's just Dean. He watches out for me. He always has. If anybody tries to mess with me, he takes it personally."
"I noticed -" I got to the real reason behind this conversation. "As he was leaving, your brother called you 'expletive deleted"
"Yeah?" Sam sounded puzzled.
"Doesn't that bother you?"
"No." He sounded even more puzzled. "Why would it? He calls me that all the time."
I could see I needed to get through to this boy.
"Sam, just because he's your older brother doesn't give him the right to castigate you." When Sam gave me a surprised look, I realized I had to explain, "That means to criticize you, call you names…" A boy like Sam would have a rudimentary vocabulary at best.
"It means you think Dean uses it as a pejorative." He said, tersely, immediately banishing all thoughts I had of his rudimentary vocabulary. "He doesn't. Are we done?"
Apparently Sam Winchester politeness ended with any calumny directed toward his brother. I had one question left.
"If Dean doesn't use it as a pejorative, what does he use it as?"
Sam shrugged again.
"He uses it when I do something he thinks is stupid or could get me hurt or when I figure something out that he couldn't -."
Now I had to shrug.
"I don't see the difference."
Instead of another Winchester shrug, I received a huff and an exaggerated eye roll.
"He uses it when he's worried about me or proud of me. It means he loves me."
Then he was out my door and down the hall. I watched him for another minute. As he got close to his locker again, Dean came into view around the corner. He came even with Sam, reached an arm around his brother's shoulders and momentarily pulled him close, then reached that arm out to open the front door and hold it for Sam as they left the school.
I guess I didn't know their kind at all.
The End.