On the Shoulders of Mice
Four brothers frequented the hallways of Pembroke High. Two hated each other with a passion that the teachers there in all 25 of their years as educators had never seen. The other pair was a younger and an elder. The younger was a shy-eyed boy of 16-years and a vanishing waistline, and his elder, a boy of 20, had eyes the color of foxfire and a body like a spring sprig of grass soon to blow away. They loved each other with the fury of lions. It made up for the fact that they were the Savannah grass, withering each day. Their hunger screamed into the silence of those lonely high school hallways, felt by the fibers of the building, but never voiced as teens in their wasteland went on with the banal drama to the march of daily class bells.
"I'd stab you if it weren't for Mom," said Carson, in the middle of lunch hall, startling the lunch lady.
"I'd throttle you for saying that but then Dad might cry for you..." Braxton hissed. Two jocks they were, and a funny pair they made, thinking themselves giants. They walked on the small ones and what they did not know was that the earth hangs upon nothing, that the giants stand on the shoulders of mice.
Sam Winchester, with his shy eyes and shaggy hair, slipped into the lunch hall as the two brothers who hated each fought. Their friends snapped to attention. There were only small pleasures in this trash school that were merely a bus stop of a jilted education they neither appreciated nor wanted.
One small pleasure, dripping with the blood of guilt, was to torment Sam Winchester's every moment in this school. Sam who seemed to give a damn about their book report and Sam who spoke to no one.
They were arched, both Carson and Braxton silently signaling ceasefire as they cooked up what sort of fresh hell they would serve to Sam today. Sam was especially fun to torment because unlike the other nerds in this school he seemed cold-blooded. They could stab him, flick rubber bands at him, and generally make a mess of him and never break his concentration. The most he ever did was wave them off, with a strange noncommittal wave that channeled the Queen of England in his strange towering way.
Carson, Braxton, and miserable company were to be displeased today. Their wretched fun was ruined by The Other One as they called the wild-eyed brother. He slipped in, hair on end, smiling.
"Sammy!" His teeth were fireworks as they spread in their smile. He was too thin and skeletal, the teeth were saber-like in their smile. The girls swooned to see this scarecrow with the doe green eyes and the boys inwardly groaned because this cat was much too old to be in their school and yet the teachers let him each his lunch here if only because he was sitting with Sam and Sam was his famous little brother. Sam was only known socially in relation to the beautiful green-eyed man that came to eat a meager lunch with him each day.
"Hey, Dee." Sam smiled and closed his book. Dean sat down chuckling and smiled at Sam. They said nothing just studied each other for a long moment as they were wont to do.
"They are disgusting..."Braxton hissed.
The others were not convinced. On that day, the whole highschool was to learn a lesson too soon forgotten in brotherly love. It would all be Carson and Braxton's fault, for they, the elephants, must trample twice shy of mice and walk on those they thought beneath them. Sam and Dean, while being mice, under the feet of all those towering Football Stars and Prom Queens, moved the earth from the undertow. All things stood on their shoulders. They were perfectly content there at the center of the universe alone with one another.
"Do you think they do each other?" Carson groaned as Dean put a hand on top of Sam's arm. Sam smiled at him, a smile that was sad and shy. No one answered. The jocks were unaware that they were hanging on their every word. They thought they were acting in spite, but in truth, they had a morbid curiosity in the vermin they so despised. How tragic it must be to live in their world, schooled at the feet of Cinderella in the ways of outcasts, and yet, their world with all its ashes seemed warmed by the fire of the shining teen idol's afterglow.
"So, no lunch today, huh?" Dean frowned. Sam shrugged. Dean nodded.
"Didn't think so..." Dean grew wistful.
I'm sorry, man. The money just wouldn't stretch anymore. I was gonna get us fruit cups but the machine didn't take dimes..."Sam's lips twisted to the side. The jocks were hanging on to every word in hopes to find some weakness in them to destroy. The rest of the immediately present school, who could finally hear with the silence of the obnoxious jocks, pricked their ears in horror. The Broom Sticks as some called them were starving for real. The running jokes about how skinny they were suddenly held a whole new context.
"Ah, don't worry about it, man. It's my fault. Dad trusted me with the money and I guess I spent too much on our last grocery run..."Dean shrugged.
Sam smiled.
"Nah, I eat too much. I mean, you've gotta eat too."
"Sammy, you know I always let you eat first! How am I supposed to pick up chicks if I don't keep gorgeously slim?!" Dean winked. Sam drew back a soft snicker.
Dean nodded then.
"Well, actually, today is our lucky day. Because I...managed to score this..."Dean reached into his coat and produced a tiny package of Goldfish crackers.
"Dude!" Sam's eyes visibly brightened.
Dean drew his eyebrows up and down.
"It gets better...Are you ready to party like it's 1999?" Dean grinned.
"Get it, cause next year the world is supposed to crash?" Dean smirked. Sam was making a face that said he was clearly not amused. Dean rolled his eyes.
"Dude, you're a buzzkill. Don't get overly hyped." He set a Surge cola on the table.
"Where did you get that?!" Sam's eyes went wide.
"Your brother is the king of dumpster diving. You're welcome. You get the first sip and I get the first cracker. Deal?" Dean smiled.
"Sounds good to me...but wait...I also have squirreled away something to make these crackers extra good..." Sam rubbed his hands together. He reached in his book bag and pulled out packages of Chinese sweet and sour sauce.
"Because who could eat Goldfish without sweet and sour, right?!" Dean giggled nervously, hiding the fact that their situation was that severe.
"Bon appetite!" Sam smiled through gritted teeth. Dean toasted the Surge can with a cracker and they set about their meager feast, with Dean frantically counting out so that Sam got more crackers.
"Nah, nuh-uh. Make sure we get an even half. It's been two days since it was your turn to eat," Sam almost spilled his share of the soda.
"I have to maintain my figure..."Dean quipped as he crushed one of his crackers in half.
"I'm not playing around, Dean. Equal crackers. Don't make me cram mine in your face tonight when you're asleep." Sam raised his eyebrows.
Dean looked up making a puzzled face.
"I'm serious, man. If you don't start eating a little bit I'm gonna have to try the sugar water IV thing again. You blacked out for a good six hours last time..." Sam frowned.
"You make me sound like a crash dieting teenage girl," Dean frowned.
"Only when you act like a crash dieting teenage girl. Now eat your damn crackers!" Sam flicked one at him.
"Alright! Sheesh, force-feeding me Goldfish is a little bit awkward in front of all the geeks, don't you think? I usually don't allow that until the second date, and you know I get stage fright..."Dean shrugged, indicating the portions of crackers with his hands to determine if his maths pleased Sam.
The two ate in silence then. The jocks had turned the color of baking flour and dared not look at each other. For two brothers had hated each other enough to fight wtih their food and threaten each the other with death save only for their parents. Yet, not more than three yards away, two brothers loved each other so much so that they split a tiny carton of Goldfish and a can of soda rather than starve to death alone.
"If Dad doesn't come back soon, you and me are gonna die..."Dean said softly, eyes crossing.
"Yeah, I've been running the numbers too..." Sam frowned.
"It's just, we can't stay in the hotel, I can't find anymore work around here, we're fresh out of money...We can't leave the um...the effects... and we have our little playmates down the road to worry about so we can't exactly bail town on foot to find more work," Dean sighed, a heavy sigh.
"Yeah, and we can only go so long with dumpsters before the lovely grannies of the neighborhood figure out what we're up to and start locking them..."Sam frowned.
"God...Wouldn't it be something if...if you know one of these days grannies left their dumpsters unlocked? I mean, there are more people like us...more vermin..." Dean frowned.
Sam sighed.
"Yeah, even the dogs lick the crumbs that fall under the table. What the dogs don't get, the mice pick up after them...Guys like us are more like mice than dogs..." Sam sniffed a soft laugh.
"Dude, I am not wearing little red suspender shorts like Mickey. I draw the line at that," Dean stood up.
"Can I borrow you early?" Dean looked up.
"Yeah, we just had PE left anyway..."Sam shrugged and got up, lugging his bookbag that now seemed so much more the shell of massive turtles than a bag for a student to carry.
The two brothers passed like spirits from among the tables where ghost-faced nearby kids had felt the shadow of death for the first time in their unbothered lives. They would forget what they heard before the end of the day, so callous was youth, so cold the halls of highschool dining.