Chapter 1
Bad day at school. We took a math test and I failed. I really wish that I were better at math. I also failed my science test. Really, who in the real world needs to know how photosynthesis works?
I sure don't.
Right as the bell rings, I hop up out of my seat and get out of that math room as fast as I possibly can. I go to my locker after stopping to say bye to my friend, Caitlyn, and shove all my binders in there and grab my backpack.
I stand up and put on my winter coat, then sling my backpack over my right shoulder. I leave the school and head down the snowy path to my house.
Thank Buddha tomorrow is Friday. I so need a nice weekend off.
When I get home, I see Shane sitting at our table eating toast. He looks up at me and then looks down at his plate, which is covered in breadcrumbs.
No hello?
"Uhh… Hey," I say awkwardly.
Shane looks up at me, and without one word, puts his plane in the sink and leaves the house.
Right when he closes the door, Jason comes down the stairs.
"Have you noticed that Shane has been acting really strange these past few weeks?" I ask my eldest brother, letting my backpack slide down my arm and hit the floor with a thud.
Jason grabs a cup from the cupboard and fills it up with some orange juice. "Yeah," he says, drawing his attention away from the juice and on me. "It's the weirdest thing. He used to be so hyper and fun… now he's so quiet and phlegmatic."
"What's wrong with him?" I ask, worriedly.
Shane suddenly turned like this. One day he was jumping on the trampoline, and the next he was in his room, blaring disgusting emo music.
"Maybe it's a phase," Jason says. "Hey, why don't you stalk his Facebook or ask his friends? Can you find out some way? This is so strange."
"I'll be the best stalker I can be," I say with a hint of amusement in my voice.
Jason lets out a huff of laugher and goes back up to his room.
Hmm… Let's brainstorm a list of ideas why Shane would be acting like this.
He's PMSing
He killed someone
He's pregnant
Uhh…
He's PMSing.
Satisfied with my diagnosis, I head upstairs and so my homework.
Ha!
Homework… that's a good one.
X X XI go downstairs and see my mom in the living room doing yoga along with one of those silly yoga videos. "Hey, Mom."
She jumps in surprise and turns around. "What do you want?" she asks, going back into her meditative position. "I'm yoga-ing."
"Have you noticed your son's behavior lately?" I ask.
"Oh you mean Jason always coming downstairs with a smirk on his face… Yeah, honey, please don't do that," she says and goes into another position.
"No, not Jason. Shane."
Mom goes into a position that looks very uncomfortable. "Uh… you mean how he's been so quiet?"
"Yeah."
"It's a phase, sweetie."
"But it's really strange… And we haven't seen Mitchie in a while either."
"Maybe they broke up. Maybe that's why," Mom says, going back into the meditative position.
"I don't think they broke up," I say. "I would know if they broke up. He still texts her every day."
"Well," Mom says in between her deep-breathing exercises, "if you're so worried, just ask him. Good lord. Now leave me alone; I can not do this with all of your bad energy."
I roll my eyes and head upstairs. I knock on Shane's door.
He cracks open his door and sticks his head out. "What do you want?"
"Uh… can I talk to you?" I ask, hesitating slightly, hearing the loud emo music in the background.
"Why?" he asks very rude like.
"Since when do we ask 'why' when we want to talk to each other?" I ask, appalled that he would be so rude to me. "You're my brother, that's why."
Shane looks at me and shuts the door in my face.
I bang on the door. "Shane! Open the door!"
He responds by turning up the volume on his music.
I sigh and stand there for a second, wondering what to do.
I kick his door really hard and then realize that his bathroom's lock is broken, so I go through that door and go into his room.
"What the hell?" he yells.
I look around his room and see him in the corner of his room, sitting on his bed, facing the wall.
"Shane?" I ask, nearing the bed.
"Go away!" he calls.
I ignore him. "What are you doing?"
He shakes his head and stays turned away from me.
"Shane, what are you doing?" I ask a little louder.
Shane holds up his middle finger to me. But then I see something on his arm. So I grab his arm and turn it around. It was blood.
"Ow!" Shane cries when I touch his cuts. He turns to me, his eyes red like he'd been crying. "I said to go away! Get the fuck away from me! I don't want to talk to you right now!"
I back up, startled. "Shane… what the…?"
He stands up and pushes me out of his room, barricading his broken door with his body.
I try to get back in, but he's stronger than me, so I give up.
I look at my hands and there is blood smeared on them.
That's fucking nasty.
I wash my hands off in my sink and then go into Jason's room. Unlike Shane, his door is unlocked and I go in there. He looks up at me and greets me with a warm smile. "Hey."
Only I frown, and so does he.
"What?" he asks.
"Shane's like really depressed," I say.
"I know you're worried about him not talking to you, but he's not-"
I cut him off. "He cut himself."
Jason freezes and pauses before saying, "Really?"
I nod. "I got blood on my hand to prove it."
My brother stands up. "He's in his room?" I nod, so he leaves his room and goes to Shane's door, knocking gently on it. "Shane? Can I come in?"
"Fuck off, Jason!" Shane yells over the music.
Jason frowns. "Shane, don't you dare swear at me!"
"I can say whatever the fuck I want! I'm sixteen!"
"Yes, well I'm eighteen, which means I'm an adult. So open this door."
"You're not Dad!" he calls.
Jason and I flinch.
"Well," Jason continues, "you're not a five year old, so open the door before I break it down."
We get no reply.
"Get me the saw," Jason says.
"We have a saw?" I ask.
He kicks me lightly
I get it. "Yeah… that one. I'll go get it."
"Good," Jason says loudly. "Now I can break Shane's door and he won't ever get a new one."
"Oh, so you mean he'll have no door for forever?" I ask loudly.
"Yeah. That's exactly what I mean."
"SHUT UP!" Shane practically screams. "There is no goddamn saw!"
Ooh, he's angry and smart.
Jason starts kicking the door. "Shane Adam Gray, you open this door right now!"
"Or what?" Shane asks.
"Or I'll beat your ass!" Jason yells.
I gasp. Jason swearing? How absurd!
Jason shoots me a glance.
I point to the bathroom door and Jason opens it with as much force as he had in him. Only too bad for Jason because Shane wasn't even blocking the door, so the door broke the little thing that makes a farting noise when you hit it, and the doorknob makes a hole in the bathroom wall.
Wow.
Jason ignores the hole he put in the wall and goes into Shane's room.
I watch this all from the safety of the bathroom.
Jason grabs the knife Shane had in his hand and throws it across the room. Shane then starts screaming, crying, and punching Jason at the same time, but since Jason is so much stronger than he is, nothing really bad happens to Jason.
Shane gives up when Jason doesn't get hurt at all.
Maybe all of those years of hockey were useful after all.
Should I have played hockey? Maybe then I wouldn't have the upper-arm strength of a kitten.
Jason starts yelling at Shane and Shane yells right back. I have no idea what they're talking about but I hear Shane scream.
"Get the fuck away from me! Why don't you just fuck off and die! Why don't you have to be such an asshole?! Huh? Fuck you! You stupid fucking bastard, do you want to know what it feels like? Huh? Well get ready to die, you fucker! Fuck you!" Shane yells and attempts to hit Jason.
Oh good lord. This is very 'G' rated, eh?
Jason looks over at me, a pissed off expression on his face when Shane just repeatedly hits him on the arm, still swearing at him.
Jason sighs and turns back to him and screams as loud as he can, "SHUT THE FUCK UP, SHANE!"
Shane flinches. I flinch.
The room gets silent except for the music in the background.
Jason gives Shane one of his famous stare-downs. "Shane, I hope you do realize that I can break every bone in your body. Don't you even dare fuck with me!"
Shane suddenly switches from angry teenager to scared puppy.
Jason's serious. He's done it before, and he can sure as hell do it again. He even got kicked out of hockey for being too violent. But then he changed into a harmless flower, so it's all good.
"Now if you would calmly tell me why you decided to go all emo on our asses, that would be much appreciated," Jason says, calmly.
Shane then bursts out in tears.
Well then.
X X X
An hour later and we haven't accomplished much. Shane really hasn't said anything. He just kinda… softly cried every time Jason asked him something.
"Why did you cut yourself?"
Sob… sniff…
"Why do you never talk anymore?"
Sniff… wipe away tears…
"Do we need to go to therapy?"
Shakes head… sniffs some more…
Jason eventually gave up when he realized that Shane wasn't going to talk to either of us, and because it was late, we decided to sleep on it.
When I wake the next morning, I knock on Shane's door.
To my surprise, he opens it, but he looks really upset.
"Hi, Shane, are you coming to school today?" I ask. "Cause I need a ride. It's cold."
Shane shakes his head, "I'm gonna skip today," and walks out of his room and downstairs. He then walks out the front door.
I sigh. I hate walking to school in the snow.
Jason already left for work, and there's no point in asking Mom to take me.
As if she'd take me anywhere.
It seems like all she's done since Dad died was do yoga. Like she almost doesn't even care about us anymore.
I get ready for school and then head out the front door.
It's cold. Like freakishly cold.
I readjust my scarf and walk. It's snowing right now, and the tip of my nose is starting to get really, really cold. I bet I look like Rudolf right now.
I trudge through the snow – damn snow plow thing hasn't come yet – and as I walk, a car splashes really cold water on me. I gasp and flick off the car.
It turned out to be my worst enemy, Tess Tyler, and she pulled up next to me and stuck her tongue out at me. I throw some snow at her, but she had already rolled up her window and drove off. It's not fair that she can drive and I can't.
I head on again and when I catch fair sight of my school, I look at my watch. Shit, I'm going to be so late. Ms. Tranny is going to have my head!
I pick up my pace, but then get so winded that I slow down.
I go through the back entrance of the school, but when I pass the dumpsters, I hear something or someone crying.
I stop dead in my tracks and look around.
Where did that come from?
When the crying doesn't stop, I begin getting worried.
Was it a baby? As in a real baby?
I look around and try my best to hear where it was coming from. I wind up right next to the dumpster.
This is when I flip a shit.
I flip the cover off of the dumpster and the crying is less muffled. I climb up on a box and look inside the giant trash collector.
Much to my horror, when I look inside, there's a newborn baby in there.
My heart beats faster and I look around.
No one's around.
I quickly grab the baby. She's so cold. I take off my jacket and wrap it around the baby girl, trying to get her warm.
I frantically look around. "Help! Help!" I call out.