Hi, everybody, and welcome to yet another sequel to "Smells like Teen Spirit."The only major difference in this one is that instead of just telling it from one point of view, I'm switching off between three. Hopefully it won't get too confusing. Enjoy!

Long Road to Ruin

I'm just a kid, and life is a nightmare…

-Simple Plan

Chapter 1: Ace of Spades

(Celegorm)

"I'm ho-ome!"

It took me a second to figure out who was yelling. Then I remembered: Oh, yeah. Maglor. My loudmouthed, too-cool-for-school older brother who'd run off to Alqualonde the previous fall and who none of us had ever really expected to see again. What was he doing home, anyway? He hadn't been scheduled to return until the end of the summer.

Just because I was curious, I got out of my very comfortable seat in the living room and went to go greet (well, greet and insult) my brother.

Maedhros and Maglor were standing in the entrance hall with their bags (why they couldn't carry the bags up to their rooms like normal people, I didn't know). Maedhros was leaning against the wall messing with his fingernails; Maglor was kneeling on the ground with his back toward me, digging through a bag.

"You know," I said, "maybe you should have checked to see if you'd forgotten anything before you left Alqualonde. That would have made a lot more sense."

Maglor stood up and raised an eyebrow at me. "And since when do I do anything sensible?"

"Wow," I said, going somewhat off-topic. "You look different."

He did, too. Before he'd left for Alqualonde, Maglor looked like your typical gangly, awkward punk—too skinny, too pale, messy hair, bad posture, the whole shebang. Not too impressive. Now, however, he'd gained some weight, gotten taller, and, for some reason, had streaks of bright gold in his hair. He actually looked kinda good.

Maglor snorted. "Yeah, that's cuz I dyed my hair and got my ear pierced. Nothing gets past you, eagle eyes."

Well, at least that hadn't changed. You could take away the awkwardness and you could take away the lack of self-confidence, but the attitude would always be there.

"Who's got their ear pierced?" demanded Mom, hurrying into the entrance hall. When she saw Maglor, she gasped, burst into tears, and threw her arms around him.

"Maglor, Maglor, I thought I might never see ye again!" she sobbed.

"Yeah, Mom, missed you too," said Maglor, patting her on the back and looking a mixture of freaked out and amused. "So…how's stuff at home been?"

"Not the same without ye," said Mom. "Sure and we just can't function when yer not around, me boy."

"That's what I said," said Maedhros. "And that's how I convinced him to come home early."

"Oh, so that's what happened," I said. "I'd been wondering about that. Now, getting back to Mom's original question, apparently Maglor got his ear pierced. I haven't seen it yet, though."

"I'll show you, as soon as Mom lets go of me," said Maglor, looking at Mom pointedly. She quickly released him and folded her arms.

"Well, let's see it, then," she said.

"All righty." Maglor pushed back his hair to reveal a gold ring in his left ear. Mom gasped again.

"Did you do that yourself?" I asked.

"Nope, my buddy Dirgon did when we were up north. He's a genius. I think you should consider adopting him once Dad disowns me, Mom."

"Oh, come on, Dad's not gonna disown you, Maglor," said Maedhros.

"Bro, it's an inevitability. Either I drive him completely insane, or he disowns me. Those are the only choices."

"Is there a reason that everyone's yelling when I'm trying to read?" demanded my younger brother Caranthir, stomping into the room. Caranthir's a total nerd—always reading, never doing anything fun. He's not too pleasant to have around.

"Oh, yeah, sure, why don't you read all the time," said Maglor sarcastically. "It's not like it's summer or anything. Sheesh, dude! Get a freaking life!"

"Well, well, look who's home," said Caranthir. "What happened to your hair?"

"My hair is freaking awesome. Why don't you shut up?"

"Boys, stop fighting," ordered Mom. "I'm not having me family fighting like cats and dogs on the first day we're all reunited. Where's yer father, anyway?"

"I'm right here," said Dad tiredly, joining us in the entrance hall. "What on earth is going on?"

I saw Maglor stiffen a little at Dad's arrival. Dad and Maglor didn't have a very good relationship, seeing as Dad thought that Maglor was a dangerous troublemaker and Maglor thought Dad was an old-fashioned idiot.

"What's going on, Dad, is that I'm home," Maglor said slowly. "And now I suppose you're going to roll your eyes and say that I don't have enough follow-through to finish anything and I'll never make anything of myself, even though I left Alqualonde early because Maedhros told me the family was falling apart without me and I missed you guys."

Dad looked at Maglor and shook his head. "Where on earth do you get these ideas, boy?"

And then he went up to Maglor and hugged him.

This, of course, was somewhat of a shock, since Dad usually didn't hug people, and especially not Maglor. Even Mom was surprised.

"Um…okay," said Maglor when Dad was done hugging him. "Yeah. Missed you too, Dad."

"I hope you learned a lot," said Dad, going back to his usual stern self.

"Well, I learned how to cure a hangover and how to stay up for forty-eight hours without getting tired," said Maglor. "Does that count?"

Caranthir cracked a smile at that, but quickly hid it before anyone other than me noticed.

"How to cure a hangover?" said Mom. "Maglor, sure and ye weren't drinking, were ye?"

"No, of course he wasn't, Mom," said Maedhros sarcastically. "Because of course it's possible to get a hangover without drinking."

"Hey, I was going to say that," said Maglor. "You know, I invented being sarcastic."

"Right, of course you did," I said. "Even though you're fifteen and sarcasm has been around since before Dad's day."

"Go to hell."

"Whoa, whoa," said Dad. "You've just gotten home, so I'm going to be more lenient with you, but I'm not having that kind of language around here. There are people a lot younger than you in this house."

Maglor muttered something very rude-sounding under his breath.

"None of that, either," ordered Mom. "Well, shall we have some lunch, then? You boys must be starving."

"Mom, I'm always starving," said Maedhros. "Can't speak for this guy, though."

"Maedhros, just because I'm skinny doesn't mean I don't eat," said Maglor. "Lunch sounds good, Mom."

"Excellent," said Mom. "You boys go put your bags away and sit down. I'll get everything ready."

"So, tell me, ratface," Maglor said to me as he picked up his bags and we headed upstairs. "How've you been without me to make fun of? I imagine it's been difficult."

I rolled my eyes. "Don't flatter yourself. You're not the only weirdo around here, ya know."

"But I'm definitely the weirdest person you know. You can't even deny that."

"Maybe that's why your girlfriend broke up with you."

"Okay, you know what?" snapped Maglor.

"Guys, come on, shut up," said Maedhros. "Mom's right, we shouldn't be fighting until we've been home for at least an hour."

"Whatever. I'm just tired and hungry," sighed Maglor. "I hope Mom makes potato soup for lunch. I haven't had decent potato soup in ages."

"I hope she makes steak," said Maedhros dreamily.

"Dude, first of all, steak is gross, and second of all, who eats steak for lunch? No one. It's way more of a supper thing."

This would be a good time to explain what is possibly the weirdest thing about my dear brother Maglor: He's a vegetarian. Doesn't eat meat or birds of any kind, and hasn't since he was nine. His reasoning for this is that he doesn't like meat, and why would he want to kill some dumb animal that never did anything to him? I've tried to tell him that that isn't the point, that you're supposed to have fun hunting, but it doesn't work. I seriously do not understand that guy.

"Steak is awesome," I said. "You're just delusional."

"SUCYAI," said Maglor coolly.

"Why do you always talk in acronyms? You know perfectly well that the rest of us can't understand you."

"Exactly," Maglor said, giving me his evilest grin. "And what I said was, 'Shut Up Celegorm, You're An Idiot."

"Right on," said Maedhros, high-fiving him.

I rolled my eyes. "Way to gang up on me. Losers."

"I challenge your definition of 'loser'," snarled Maglor.

"I challenge your challenge," replied Maedhros.

"Shut up. I invented challenging things."

"Right. Of course you did. Just like I invented dirt."

"You did invent dirty jokes," I said. "Or at least it seems like you did."

"Speaking of dirty jokes, here's a joke," said Maedhros. "There's two loaves of bread in an oven. One says, 'Boy, it's hot in here.' The other says, 'Holy shit, a talking loaf of bread!'"

Maglor, mature adult that he was, doubled over with laughter. I raised an eyebrow at Maedhros. "That wasn't dirty. And it wasn't even that funny."

"Then why is Maglor laughing?" asked Maedhros.

"Maglor thinks everything is funny. He laughed when he caused that fire that burned down half the forge, remember?"

"The irony of it was beautiful. I couldn't help it," said Maglor, stopping mid-laugh. "But Dad still made me continue my apprenticeship. I figured I'd have to burn down the freakin' house to get out of it."

"And all it really took was for you to run away from home and study music with some weird Alqualonde guy for a year," said Maedhros. "Life is strange."

"As are you guys," I said. "I'm outta here."