Home. The sound of the television playing in the living room, and my mom starting up dinner with the clang and patter of pots and silverware. Damn, I was glad to be home, and away from the fucking insanity that called itself 'school.'

I immediately ran upstairs to my bedroom, after shouting a greeting to my parents. I kicked off my shoes, chucked my backpack on my bed, and sat down at my work desk. Yes, it's a work desk; it's where I do all my work. Homework's still work! And I tinker with stuff on it occasionally, too...either way, work desk, end of discussion. I stretched out in the chair, yawning and putting a hand on my forehead. Oh yeah, I probably shoulda grabbed something to work on.

After getting my homework, I decided I'd take the next hour to finish it, so I could spend the rest of my night doing whatever. I mean, there was plenty to do! I could pick apart one of the things dad brought home for me in the shed, or maybe work on my bike, or...

"Kevin, you have company!"

...or, talk with Nazz, I guess. That'd work too.

I sighed, pushing myself up from the chair and groggily walking towards the door. Yes, I do genuinely get myself psyched up for homework. It's mental exercise, arithmetic acrobatics, theoretical gymnastics! I mean, yeah, I'd always be looking forward to doing stuff in my free time, but I knew for a fact I had to work for what I wanted to be in the future. Might as well enjoy it. Think my dad pushed that attitude on me, kinda glad about it.

As I descended the stairs, I heard a voice. Not Nazz's, not my mom's. Alright, so some chick was here for me...wait, huh?

"...for allowing me to come over even though you didn't know about it." Marie?

I heard my mom's voice respond, "Oh, it's no trouble, dear! It's always nice to meet Kevin's friends, even if he forgets to tell us about his plans..." She rolled her eyes with a sarcastic smile.

I cut in, "What plans?"

"The essays, silly! Remember? We were gonna work on them tonight! Wow, is he normally this forgetful?" Marie exclaimed animatedly.

I blushed, even if she was making all of this up. My mom chuckled, "Not often, no, I'm actually surprised he didn't tell us though. Kevin, do try and keep us informed on when you plan to have company over. I'm the one cooking dinner, after-all," she had a hand on her hip, and a feigned frown on her lips. I put a hand behind my head embarrassedly.

"Sorry mom. ...I guess we should go to work on it then. Come on, my room's up here." Marie smiled innocently and walked up to me, following my footsteps.

My mom called out again, "Oh, and please leave the door open, honey!"

...I groaned. Marie laughed, and replied to her in my stead, "Don't worry, my boyfriend knows I'm over here. I'll leave it open a crack though," her smile was infectious, sweet, and totally not her. But all I cared about was the fact that, you know...she had a boyfriend? Like, was it Eddward? Legit?

She followed me upstairs, my mom shrugging the whole thing off and returning to dinner. I sighed inwardly, not looking forward to having to learn anything from Marie, but what was I gonna do? Tell her to leave? Hell no, Eddward would have my ass! She could probably beat me up, too! No, better to just play it cool and deal with it. I'm quite happy in my non-bruised state, thank you very much.

Upon entering my room, Marie decided to hop onto my bed, bouncing on it as to test its springiness. I didn't even want her in my room, let alone on my bed! I sighed, flicking on the light and closing the door almost all the way, because I knew my mom would have a fit if she heard any foul language. And I didn't much trust Marie to keep her mouth shut.

"Nice bed you got here, Red," I kept myself from growling at the pet name Eddward had originally given me, "so you excited for today's activities?"

I rolled my eyes and pulled my cap down, covering my eyes. "Yeah...really excited," I said with the least amount of enthusiasm I could muster. The response was a very unladylike chuckle.

"Aw, come on, we're gonna have fun! Just you see," her eyes flicked to the doorway. I figured she'd seen my mom peering in, though by the time I looked, she was gone. I sighed.

"Let's just get this over with."

I finally noticed the tattered grey bag she was wearing over her shoulder. She swung it off, unzipping it and letting the contents slide over my bed. Fortunately, it was just papers. Unfortunately, they looked like papers that had been in the trash. I cringed my nose, giving her a weird look.

"What? Oh, these," she let her fingers glide over the papers, looking for some specific one on the crumpled mass of lined white clutter, "yeah, Eddward doesn't like to save the stuff he writes, so I kinda maybe have to dumpster dive for em."

At that, I went bug-eyed. Those were his papers? He just threw them away? He should have a whole damn portfolio of them, they're brilliant, if a little dark, how could he...and she had to get them out of the trash?

A thought occurred to me: my bed was covered with papers that came out of the trash. Eww.

Another chuckle, "Don't worry, it's his bedroom's trash, very clean. He just crumples them out of pure spite. You know him, all hate, every day, blah-de-blah-blah."

I was surprised she could be so casual about him. I was almost afraid to reply, thinking that the wolf could be hiding anywhere, listening in. That maybe she planned to draw something out of me to tell him. I guess she caught the worried look in my eyes, because her smile fell.

"Hey," she pushed herself up from the bed, walking up to me and reaching a hand for my shoulder. I flinched away, backing up a step, and she rolled her eyes, sighing, "look, kid, I don't bite. Seriously, not my thing. But no, really, we gotta get to work on this. I need your help, got it? I just...just sit down at your dumb desk already and listen, okay? I gotta find that paper. What was it again, 'Without Pain?' Yeah, that one...now where is it..." She wandered back to my bed, sifting through the litter for a specific paper I remembered quite clearly. I had no idea why, but I decided not to question it.

"...Whatever," and so I walked, begrudgingly, to my desk, taking a seat and swinging around to watch Marie look through everything. My arms rested on the back of the chair as I tried to figure out what tonight was supposed to accomplish. Not 30 seconds later, I heard her excitedly announce her discovery by way of a maniacal cackle. She's so strange.

"Found it! Now, let's get to work on this baby," I found the crinkled paper placed in front of me, and stared at it. Yeah, that was the paper, still had my signature and everything. I sighed. She didn't say anything for...what, another half a minute? Then I heard her growl.

"Alright, what's your deal? Don't you see anything wrong with this?" Her face voiced her disbelief.

"No, it's, like...fucking perfect, alright?"

She looked shocked, "Perfect? HA! If Eddward showed this to the teacher, he'd end up locked in a damn institution for the next 6 months. No, it's a complete fuck-up of emotions but that's sooo fucking expected of him. He always does this!" Angrily, she grabbed the paper from the desk, scrunching it in her hand as she lifted it, and cleared her throat, "Ahem., 'Throughout our lives, everything we do or don't do is influenced by pain, or a lack there-of.' Alright, nerd, what's wrong with this? The essay was supposed to be about feelings, like, EMOTIONAL feelings, and he's totally taking it out of context! And this stuff is like, shrink stuff, not class stuff! Seriously! Come on, say something, nerd-boy!"

I furrowed my brows, looking up at the paper, back down at my desk. She was right; I didn't even think about the teacher reading it before she said something.

I guess I took too long to think, cuz she started up again, "Eddward's dense. I love the boy, but he just. Doesn't. Get it. This is fine for friend stuff, but totally not okay for in-class. I basically have been his damage control for like, years now, and it sucks. Wanna see what happens when he doesn't get his stupid paper fixed?"

She turned and walked back over to the messy pile of papers, grabbing some specific one from the madness, and stalked back over to me. She shoved it down in front of me.

I read the title.

Respect

...huh? Wait...did she mean this is what he turned in? I read on, "People around us can be respectable, but they have to do something to earn it." The flow of the entire essay was off. It felt forced. "When you do something mean to someone, they will often lose their respect for you." No shit. Where'd the brilliance go? This was elementary crap!

"It's shit, right?"

I turned to Marie, "Yeah, the fuck?"

She smirked, and it actually seemed somewhat genuine, "He just does that cuz he doesn't know how to shut himself off. I kinda have to help him, or he goes on a tangent. He hates rereading his own work, it's half of why he tosses everything in the trash. Other half is because he hates being acknowledged in general, but that's just some weird thing of him. Either way, I've had to be his eyes and brain for years now. And," she held her head, "and I'm so fucking sick of it." She looked at me, desperation in her eyes, "That's kinda why I'm making you help him now. I...I just can't deal with his shit anymore. Sorry."

I was kind-of baffled, "What do you mean? The guy's fucking scary, and he hates my guts! How can I even start to help him? Seriously though, I don't get it."

Her eyes softened, "By fixing his paper. Just this one for now. I'll do his other one, this is just a...a test, alright? I just...I can't anymore, Red, I just can't," if she were a weaker person, I'd swear she was holding back tears at that point, but she continued, "Just think of something, anything, and write it next to every sentence. Tell his fucked-up sense of life to fuck off, tell him he's an idiot, hold a candle to his foolish lack of self-worth and just..."

You know, I'd never seen anyone get like this before. I'd seen Nazz pretty upset when she failed that Biology exam, and Sarah always cried when she got caught doing something wrong. But this? Marie wasn't even crying and I already felt like I was the shittiest person in the room for not helping her out.

Ugh. Fucking guilt-trips, man.

"Alright, just...give me the paper."

We locked eyes for a moment, and her trembling hand dealt me the paper. Trembling? Whatever, I had to write something.

That first line...that first, fucking depressing line.

I mean...sure, pain's pretty powerful. But it's not that bad. I'm afraid of a lot of things, but not every one of those things is because of pain. Some are just common sense, others are just stupid, like not wanting to sleep without a nightlight. I bet superheroes can sleep without a light at night. Heroes don't give a shit, they have someone to save, nothing else matters. They don't care if they die, as long as the person they're fighting for is alright.

...I couldn't get past that thought. Maybe I should write that? I took up a pen, Marie waiting on baited breath, and started to write.

"Heroes don't pay attention to pain."

Yeah. That was a good start. I looked to Marie, whose eyes were still on the paper. I caught the smile flicker on her lips. She looked at me, and nodded. I breathed out in relief.

Alright...so maybe this wouldn't be as hard as I thought.