I only read over this a few times, but I wanted to get another chapter of this story posted - so if there are any mistakes, please tell me.
Thank you and have a nice day.
It was strange how easily he could dissolve into the environment, not minding the atmosphere, the precise schedule where each hour contained some preconceived event, some planned experience that would hopefully positively contribute to his future. It was strange that he gave up his freedom with no resistance or acknowledgment of the sacrifice. Years in the education system had molded his unconscious thoughts to accept the intruding hand that would restrain his freedoms for a generous portion of the day, where in any other situation alarm and his own human attachment to his natural rights would have caused him to question the authority of the school staff, as well as question the opinions they imposed on his malleable mind. But all of this instruction and discipline, this atmosphere, this environment - it was all natural and fitting.
It was strange how relaxing the school setting felt, though a majority of the students and staff had yet to arrive and the bell remained in its dead hibernation. An overcast sky had disheveled Vlad's hair with mischievous moisture lifting odd curls, increasing the volume with an undesirable frizz. This often happened as the boy usually walked to school. He left the influence of the weather once he entered the designated art building and soon found his designated table and his designated seat, pausing to glance at his designated teacher to acknowledge her existence. Lowering his head into his arms, crossed and forming a ready nest on the table, after slumping down into his seat, Vlad pondered again how strange it was that handing over his freewill was sometimes liberating, though it was actually sacrificing his freedom. It was a contradiction, but to have designated times, instructors, classrooms, and seats was comforting rather than constraining – it was relaxing. It, in some sense, removed part of the weight of responsibility imposed on him by his freedom. Only in the school setting would such a situation be acceptable, or compatible with his character.
Perhaps it wasn't so strange.
Red eyes shut, relaxing, indulging in a peculiar moment of comfort. They, however, were abruptly opened, dimly surprised by the teacher's sudden intrusion into his mood, where her entrance instantly destabilized his feelings, causing them to crumble into a ruin that slowly shaped itself into unease. Gradually the languid body stiffened, as rusted hinges tend to do in ruins, keeping Vlad in the same position on the table which gave the appearance of his having made a conscious decision to ignore the woman, though in all practical reality she possessed his full undivided attention.
It was obvious that the art teacher would have preferred to speak to a student who was sitting up properly and looking at her, rather than a student who could be either asleep and completely oblivious of her words, or even dead for all she knew. Vlad's face was still hidden from her. She wasn't aware that his eyes were open and staring into the darkness of his arm.
"I'd like to talk to you about your grade in my class."
There was no immediate response, but she had not expected one though she had chosen to pause. The pause seemed to make the topic more important.
"Right now you have a borderline C, but you're well on your way to reaching a D. Your participation grade is hurting you a little (more than a little). You tend to fall asleep or work on something that isn't related to what we're doing in class. But your biggest issue is that you don't fulfill the requirements I give for the assignments, and, also (before I forget), you have multiple missing assignments and unfinished work piling up. …I can give you an opportunity to raise your grade if you'd like." She paused again, her expression unconsciously becoming colder as Vlad's posture suggested his indifference, and - what offended her more - his apparent disregard for her authority and the effort she was making to help him. Nothing she was now saying was for her own benefit. If the student showed that he didn't care, she had little else to motivate her to help him. Annoyance slipped into her tone once her words became sharper. "I don't have to do any of this. I don't need to spoon-feed you like you're in middle school. You can either pay attention to your grade from now on or fail. I have no qualms about failing Seniors. If you need the credits for this class, you won't graduate. And that'll be the end of it. You'll have to take the class again during the summer, and you won't get to walk at graduation. And… you'll be the one who has to explain why you can't, to your parents."
The woman was startled when Vlad suddenly spoke, showing, for the first time, signs of life and alertness that meant he had indeed been listening to what she'd been saying. Her mood simmered, and the teacher listened quietly as the teen spoke with a short-lived rigidness in his tone and a hard seriousness that nearly convinced her that Vlad was angry.
"I don't need the credits. The only classes I need to be taking this year are Gov, Econ, and English, and I'm passing all of those classes- and also finishing off US History…that I need to…to finish." Vlad fell silent after the indirect confession. He hated dwelling on past failures, but this one still haunted him. He had failed his Junior history class and now sat in a classroom full of Juniors five times a week. The teacher seemed to have expected the failure. Either that or she had not noticed it.
"Alright. Then are you planning on passing my class?"
The teen took a moment to realize she meant the drawing class. He continued to speak from his arms, never sitting up or looking at the woman – the taste of his past failure keeping his face hidden, prompted to remain so by his shame. He never wanted to taste this sort of failure again. What would his uncle say?
"…Yeah." The reply was slightly muffled.
"Would you like to take advantage of the opportunity I'm giving you to improve your grade?"
"…Yeah."
"Then come over to my desk and I'll explain what you need to do." She was already moving away as she continued to speak. "And you can look at your grade to calculate what you'll need to get on future assignments to keep a C for your semester grade."
Vlad didn't respond though he rose and followed the petite instructor to her desk and stood to the side of it to watch her computer monitor – though his eyes trailed off to her computer's tower which was decorated with random handy crafts, beads, and taped up calligraphy that praised life and art. The teacher was separated from the classroom to an extent, sitting behind a desk that caused her line of vision to run tangent to the body of the class while a lengthy table fit along the end of her desk to form the longest side of an 'L,' resembling a low wall. An actual wall was on the opposite side of the desk, caging her in with the students. Handouts were often lined up on the table, accompanied by a box of colored pencils and markers, a large discolored can of pink and white erasers the teacher had individually snipped into halves, and a stack of cheap drawing paper. Currently, the table featured a mixture of these things. Back at the computer, the woman's mouse clicked while she and the boy remained silent. She typed in a username and a password to access her students' records.
Vlad decided to ask a question as she took her time finding his class. "Is it possible for me to get a B?"
The teacher hesitated, her bobbed hair cut bouncing slightly at the unexpected concern Vlad was showing, but then she continued, scrolling down a list of names and then scrolling back up when she realized Vlad's name was near the top. She clicked and his grades popped onto the screen, scarred with daunting blood-red wounds that indicated the missing assignments that were causing his grade to slowly wither as these points of weakness crippled it. "Maybe…" She finally answered him, running through the grades. "You can calculate it for yourself, but I give a final in this class to let kids pick up their grades if they want to. It's a multiple choice test and ranges from 40 to 60 questions. I haven't written it yet. It also has a drawing portion that usually counts for…oh, I'd say about twenty or so points. -That's sounds about right. In all, the final counts for 10% of your grade."
After hearing this and forming no solid disdain for the matter, Vlad nodded but he did this just before the woman turned away from the monitor to look at him, so she missed seeing the response. For a time she was quiet and simply stared up at the pale teen, noticing the improvements that had been made to his appearance. He looked healthier, maybe even happier – not as strained or withdrawn and angry – little scraps of emotional changes. Her years as a teacher had allowed her to develop a second sense that let her to pick up on such differences. His jacket was also new, along with his blue jeans - she glanced over them when she looked down to find a clamped stack of papers she had placed near her computer. A small hand freed the leaflets and spread them before Vlad as if offering him an array of dishes.
It was his unfinished art.
"You can choose three of these to complete and then you may also make up all of your missing assignments for partial credit. It'll include a few hours of work, but if you're serious about keeping or improving your grade, this is your chance."
The boy's eyes, brighter now with the purpose of reaching a goal that appealed to him, scanned the line of unfinished drawings as the teacher waited for a response. Offended by what his slowness did to her patience, the woman's lips flickered like an old film while the rest of her face remained as clear as it could be. Her mouth would be a calm line for one instant and then a frown for another, old negative emotions brooding - threatening to climb out of her and dominate with the aid of a stereotype her mind had already constructed to evaluate Vlad's behavior. "It that a yes or a no?" The neutral tone requested an answer.
Hearing her, Vlad gave a soft nod as he examined his art, piece by piece. "Yeah, I'm uh- I'm just figuring out which ones I want to do." He shifted his weight to one leg and then changed it to the other as his decision became pressured by the length of the woman's patience.
Once an answer had been given, neither surprised nor disappointed, a small hand, intricately detailed with age and different rings that made it difficult to know whether or not the woman had ever been married, returned to a black keyboard and proceeded to click a sequence of notes that failed to find a rhythm before a hand detached itself from the keys to reach for the mouse. The printer begrudgingly roused itself from its winter hibernation to perform a job that lacked any form of spontaneous creativity, taking someone else's work and simply spitting it back out again, regardless of its own opinion of it. When the printer had finished, spitting the paper out rather sharply, Vlad was holding two drawings. The teen was distracted from finding the third when the warm, freshly printed page was offered to him.
"Here are your missing assignments and the grades you currently have."
Not bothering to make a comment, a pale hand accepted the list of scores and red gashes of aching failure, and indiscriminately pulled one of his unfinished drawings into the group of papers that had collected in his arms. He returned to his designated seat and began to work in silence after retrieving a pencil from his backpack. Colored pencils came to join the basic tool, having been deemed well-suited for the task at hand. In the gap between this moment and the time the bell was called forth to awaken the school - officially ending the winter vacation - no other words were exchanged in the classroom.
Sound would continue to fill the room until the end of the school day after the morning bell finished yawning out its announcement that school would begin in five minutes - stretching its vocal chords with an extended and somewhat lethargic "Bee-ee-eep." First came the music that would play and repeat until the second bell, and then arrived the sounds of laughter, tromping feet of forming crowds, and bright stories of what adventures had taken place over the two weeks of freedom, when no schedule had organized their hours and no instructor had chosen what events would occur at what minute and what lifelong lesson would be garnered from the brief experience. It was time to be organized again.
*~*~::..+..::~*~*
Anderson was carried into the building with the throng, but broke away once he entered the drawing classroom, heading for Vlad's table as if it was his natural course. To others, it was a freak decision that was just as shocking as the first time it had been witnessed before the Winter break. There were whispers and rushed debates now, but deeper discussions would surface later once the room filled with the 'silence' that comes from 44 teenagers working like the 'diligent' and 'focused' students that they are, so that Anderson's behavior could be discussed with little risk of being overheard by the wrong people… or… the wrong person. Because, who in their right state of mind would purposely piss off Hell Dog Vlad? You'd have to be insane to talk about it right now. Fear of the delinquent inspired patience.
Vlad was interacting with Anderson as a handful of observant students watched in stunned awe, a little confused and a little thrilled by the excitement that was released as a taboo continued to be disregarded after it had been shattered and so obscenely desecrated.
They were actually…smiling, and not only smiling, but joking around and, good lord, laughing like they were old friends. Hell Dog's laugh was only supposed to be triggered by a bloodbath or a cry of agony. He wasn't supposed to be doing something so normal…it- it was just abnormal. It was weird. It was freakish, and that's why they stared. But eventually their stares were taken away by the teacher who stepped to the front of the classroom and asked for quiet.
Vlad was snickering at Anderson after the jock had reacted to being welcomed with a "Hey Fat Ass, took you damn long enough to get your ass over here." Anderson had grumbled incoherencies and then nudged Vlad with his elbow and jokingly threatened to sit on him with his apparently large derriere to see if he could break Vlad like the skinny, runty toothpick that he was.
"I dare you."
"Class! Quiet down! You need to get used to the schedule again. Your vacation is over and finals are coming up - it's an important time for all of you and you're going to be getting pretty busy soon, so you need to get back into the swing of things as soon as possible. You will be having a final for this class as well."
The predictable: "What?" "Really?" "Oh hell no! On what? We haven't learned anything in this class!" "Argh! I have like four other finals!" "This is total bull sh-" came with the announcement.
"Quiet!" The teacher reclaimed her authority and silenced the majority of unhappy students. Vlad had remained unchanged while Anderson had sighed with disappointment and fidgeted around in his seat as he frowned at the news.
"Darn. I was hoping this class wouldn't have a final. …Oh well…I hope it's easy and we review enough to get a good grade. I can't remember anything."
"Hm." Vlad tilted his head with an ambiguous shrug, not telling if he really had an opinion. He actually wanted the final, as did an equally mute sliver of the class.
The teacher had gone back to her desk to fetch a stack of papers she began tossing onto tables for groaning teenagers to sluggishly reach for or swipe at, having the same amount of affection for the study guide as they had for an obese, malaria-filled mosquito. "We will go over this in the coming weeks, but for now I want you to get an idea of what you should expect. If you've been paying attention in class and if you take notes when I go over the study guide in the coming weeks, then you should do just fine. Think of it as an easy A." The grumbling quieted as she handed out more papers, nearing Vlad and Anderson's table. "There will also be a drawing portion-"
"What?" A single outraged exclamation spoke for those who cursed in silence.
"The drawing portion won't be difficult. It'll be relatively simple and on a small piece of paper. …Gosh you guys are sassy today! You just had two weeks of school off! Be grateful!" She slipped two study guides onto Vlad's table after pausing to give Anderson a questioning look. The woman retreated to the front of the classroom and told her students to put the study guides in their binders and to keep them safe. She wouldn't have extras for anyone if they lost the copy they had just been given. The school didn't have enough paper and ink to be able to afford to print out another forty plus copies for each class she had. Undoubtedly though, many of the study guides would be lost. It was just in the nature of the negligent teenager to lose things, regardless of whether or not they cared for the specific thing.
Vlad was stuffing his study guide into his binder, having glanced over it. Anderson was still skimming the list of topics while half listening to the new project the teacher was explaining. He took out his binder and slipped the paper into an inner pocket, and discovered - upon giving more attention to the teacher - that the new project was a drawing of a hand incorporated into scenery or an object. It would be a detailed pencil sketch that should take up two class periods. Anderson failed to show enthusiasm. Vlad was, once again, neutral. They remained quiet until they had fetched their art supplies and begun to brainstorm on a scratch piece of paper.
The jock was hard at work, hunched over his paper, frowning as his imagination creaked and strained with the exertion he was making. Vlad's eyes gravitated to the walls and then to the ceiling, pondering as they passed random details. Then the red irises swept over the hunched blonde beside him and found the teen's drawing paper. "You can draw a flying ladybug with your hands as its wings."
"No…no way. That's hard, and there only needs to be one hand." Anderson stopped working to grumble away some of his frustration while Vlad's attention had returned to the apparently fascinating ceiling. "I don't want to draw a ladybug. I'm sick of ladybugs…"
Vlad cut him off with a forced sigh. "Draw the damn ladybug, Anderson. You can only draw lady bugs, anyway."
"No. And no way if you ask that way." Anderson snapped back, nettled by the tone even though he knew it was fake.
"Aw. Did I hurt poor Andy-Alex's sensitive feelings?" The sarcasm made Anderson wince, but he was more affected by the use of the mortifying nickname his half loving, half sadistic and twisted sister had given him. The years of abuse his name had sustained caused the corners of his mouth to droop.
He growled through his frown. "Don't use that name."
"Aw…Andy-Awex is sooo angwy wit' me."
"And stop talking like I'm 2 years old."
"Oh? You aren't?" Vlad couldn't postpone his laugh so he gave up on the taunting to chuckle off the influx of high spirits.
Anderson suddenly scowled, and, without warning, a tan hand reached out and quickly scrawled a fat ball with wings and spots on Vlad's paper. Vlad watched as the shape formed, raising his brow at the boldness of the hand. Once the vandalism was complete, the smug teen grinned at the pale face that continued to show an expression of pretend shock.
"There! There's your ladybug. Are you happy now?"
Vlad stared for a moment. Then his arm shot straight into the air with an unnerving air of urgency, startling Anderson who gawked at the hand and the false expression that remained on Vlad's face.
"What-? What are you doing?"
Vlad kept his eyes round as he observed Anderson's nervous agitation. "I'm telling on you Anderson. I'm going to say 'Hey teach, this Fat Ass is bullying me. Look at what he did to my paper. He's such a delinquent.' I mean, look at what you did to my paper."
"I'm not a delinquent." Anderson insisted with a mildly humored, crooked line shaping his lips.
Black hair shook with the pale face, still maintaining the joke. "Such a delinquent. Such a bad, bad student. You ruined my artwork. I worked so hard on it too."
"What? You hadn't even started it yet!"
"You killed my creativity. I can't bring myself to start now that you hurt my feelings with all your bullying – because you are just so mean to poor little old me. Now I have to tell on you so I can get on with my life."
In total bewilderment, the tan teenager shook his head and held out his hands to catch some measure of logic that might fall into them. "What are you even-?" He began, but Anderson suddenly sucked in his words, alarmed by the presence of the teacher who had been drawn to the table by the universal beacon for assistance - Vlad's raised and urgent hand. Green stared at Vlad and then the teacher, the jock's large body shrinking as his nervousness returned and continued to increase.
Vlad's face had become a neutral mask again as he looked up at the questioning teacher. "Can I work on my other stuff so I can finish them off for the first part of the class, and then work on my hand project for the second part of the class? I don't have any ideas for the hand project yet, but I know what I want to do for the others."
The teacher pursed her lips, considering the proposal. "I'd prefer it if you'd worked on your hand drawing for right now so you can finish it on time with the rest of the class."
"I'll finish it on time." Vlad assured her.
Her lips pursed again, examining his face. The woman gave in with a shrug and told the teen to do whatever he felt would work best for him, but she would take off points if the current project was turned in late. She glanced down at Vlad's paper and paused, tilting her head to look at the doodle.
"But you've already started-" She stiffened, frowning menacingly at the doodle while Vlad and Anderson watched, confusion descending as they instinctively made sure their faces were relatively blank to preserve the right to claim that they were innocent of whatever crime had been detected. Irritation was evident on the aged face as the woman's mouth twisted into a snarl, but she maintained a calm tone, despite her aggressive expression. She straightened her thin shoulders and a long nail briskly tapped on the paper. "I won't stand to have inappropriate things drawn on my paper in my classroom. Do you understand that?" Her gaze was piercing.
Vlad's spine had become stiff with surprise when the question was thrown at him, quiet as the voice was. "What?" Red flicked to the page, completely lost. Er… What's wrong with it? His eyes twitched when he looked up and the voice shot back at him.
"You know what it is. Don't try this game with me. I know what it looks like."
Both Anderson and Vlad were drowning at this point, with no clear idea of what was going on. Vlad rumpled his brow and stared at the paper. Slowly he turned it around.
Mute hilarity filled his face, his grin stretching, gaping, as he held in his howl of laughter. The boy turned to Anderson, biting his lips to hold in the laugh as the blonde's confusion was worsened by Vlad's sudden change. "Your stupid ladybug… looks like a *#$ … "
Snickers slipped out while horror consumed Anderson, and the teens' confusion shifted to the teacher instead.
The brunt force of the confusion seemed to collide with her face as it suddenly scrunched into itself and drawn back by heavy lips. "You mean to tell me, that Alex drew this?"
Both looked at her, one a little paler than usual, one close to exploding - bottling up an evil cackle as trembling shoulders struggled to hold back the humor his body wished to express.
Vlad nodded, and then gulped in a breath to calm himself. "He drew on my paper without permission," he gasped out. "Such a delinquent- pff!" The teen crumpled into himself and hit his head on the table, fingers gripping and digging into the wood, as if he was in physical agony. More snorts and snickers forced their way out – leaving Vlad fully incapacitated, and Anderson was left with the job of clearing up the situation. He explained what had happened, giving the truth and exhibiting the shame he clearly felt now that his lack of drawing skills had actually created something so obscene.
The teacher, equally embarrassed, apologized profusely. Meanwhile, Vlad has begun to complete his unfinished projects, snickering to himself from time to time as he sought his elusive composure. It took the teacher another minute to depart, after apologizing again to Anderson and giving him all the encouragement and comfort she could provide, but afterwards the teens were left to their own devices – which led to much teasing before the topic could be changed...
…A formidable amount of teasing had to be endured by Anderson, for a span of ten painful minutes. Then the blonde spoke.
"Have you figured out where you're going to be staying now?" Anderson squinted down at the fist he was sketching, destined to become part of a mountain range. Vlad's wrist froze before continuing to shade with a purple pencil he often exchanged for a dark blue, tilting his head and adjusting himself so that he seemed wholly engrossed in what he was doing in order to excuse his long delay.
He took a breath and let it out quickly. "Same place." The pencil rushed back and forth over the paper, the friction building upon the settled color - instead of wearing it away as friction naturally should. "I uh- I'm still going to be staying where I am right now. The place I was looking into… The woman who was gonna rent it to me changed her mind when she found out how old I was."
Anderson was a little surprised and asked why she had decided to do that and whether Vlad had done something to dissuade her from letting him stay wherever he had wanted to stay.
Vlad shrugged his shoulders restlessly and fidgeted, bringing his eyes closer to the paper. "Cuz um- Because I'm not a legal adult- She would have been responsible for me if anything happened… And it wouldn't be good for her… I mean, if I ended up being some drug dealer or something like that. It just wasn't in her best interests." Vlad continued to color while the jock seated beside him took a break from his own drawing to look at the pale teen. Quietly, he resumed his hand drawing.
"Where…" Anderson hesitated, and then shoved the feeling aside when he found that it was ridiculous. "Where are you going to stay now? I mean…" He trailed off, unsure of how to continue.
Vlad didn't need anything more to help him understand what Anderson was getting at. "Same place, Anderson. I'm not going anywhere, and he- and that's okay for now." He snapped his mouth close as a 'yup' meant to reassure himself, threatened to jump out on its own.
"You said you were staying with someone, right?"
"Er-yeah-um…" Sighing again after this unique answer, Vlad took a moment to reflect on the developing bond that connected him to the blonde, evaluating the strength, the durability, the value… Anderson was a good friend…a selfless friend, who was interested in his wellbeing…
The teen straightened a bit and then leaned over his paper. "Well, there aren't that many people I could be staying with…" Anderson didn't get the hint, though he glanced at Vlad and eventually stopped working altogether. Vlad followed the example to make himself more comfortable, spinning his pencil leisurely in his hand as his eyes remained on the table. "Jake's letting me stay with him. He offered before, but I didn't want to bother him or anything…" A hand shaded in a patch on the paper to make it darker. Then Vlad leaned back, sighed at the ceiling, relaxed his diaphragm, and looked at the bronze frame and the lenses that were directed towards him. "I like Jake. He's a good guy…really, he actually is. He just doesn't look like it. But, I mean, if you look at me, I don't look like a good guy- But Jake's letting me crash on his couch. All my extra stuff is fillin' up his –er, one of his closets. He's actually got a pretty decent place, and all. And the rats are happy to see me."
The purple pencil twirled and they were quiet. Anderson had two fists on the table, which he gazed at as he digested the information and considered Vlad's judgment. Who was he to butt in? To burst into the situation and force his own opinions on Vlad? With thoughts fading, the jock returned to his drawing while Vlad sat idly in his chair, watching an empty space of air dully.
"So Jake is the one with the rats? I can't remember if you ever mentioned it before."
Vlad filled his vision with the boy who spoke. "The rats? Them, I've mentioned them tons. But yeah, Jake- I never told you whose they were. I think I tried to avoid it- Well, since the Chief doesn't have the best opinion of him. That car theft thing was a nasty, messy business. It left a bad taste in the cops' mouths, having the wrong guy, being used- I guess. I dunno, it- it was pretty weird and crazy. It really sucked for Jake. I felt really bad when it happened. It was a bad time for him…his mom had divorced his dad like a year before it happened…less, maybe. It was a bad time."
"…I'm sorry." The gloom that had covered Vlad while he was speaking prompted Anderson to offer up some form of comfort, however weak or confused. The more they talked, he noticed, the darker the conversation was becoming.
"It's alright. Jake got over it. It was for the best- his mom wasn't the greatest kind of woman… But it hurt his dad more, and I like his dad, he's a really cool guy… But that's what led to…everything that the Chief dislikes about Jake. He has anger issues, I know that." Vlad nodded to himself. "But, that whole…mess of shit made it all worse for him. But he's a good guy, Anderson, and he's a good and close friend of mine. If…well, I've never really seen it this way, but the friendship itself is close enough that…if I had ever had a brother, I would have that kind of friendship with him, like the one I have with Jake. But I don't see him as a brother…" He shook his head and frowned at Anderson who looked up when the red eyes were on him. "Am I just being- am I just confusing you? Or-"
"No, no-" Anderson shook his head sharply and returned to his drawing. "-no, I get it. It get it, totally. I just don't know him well. I don't really dislike him or anything- I just don't know him."
Pencils sounded on paper as they worked.
"And your sister is safe with him."
The mention of Seras triggering an inherent alarm, Anderson forgot about his drawing, becoming more engrossed in the conversation as the topic became increasingly more important to him.
Vlad didn't let the jock speak, wanting to get the explanation down before he lost the chance, or the drive to complete it. "Jake had some issues when he was younger- you know, mid-teens (if that's what it's called, whatever) and he…um he had some issues respecting girls. He had been around some pretty…er, well I won't say." His posture shifted as the discomfort flushed through him and dissipated gradually while he continued. "But I let his dad know about it at some point – an accident, I won't deliberately do anything like that otherwise – and, well…his dad, I think…manually corrected Jake."
The wording implied something disturbing to both of the boys. Vlad sensed that Anderson had assumed the worse and now earnestly wished to explain the assumed evil away, so his pace quickened with the raised pitch of his voice, both of which eased after a few things had been said.
"Joel- er, is Jake's dad, and he has a strict kind of moral code with…with all things female, basically." The pale teen leaned back in his chair and stretched a bit to collect his thoughts and loosen some of his tension. "If a woman, or a girl, has a weapon, like a gun, and is gonna shoot you in like the head, or whatever…he says that you - as the man - can't do anything. You can't touch her. You can't do shit to her, you know what I mean? If she wants to shoot you, you can't hurt her- You can sure as hell run, but you can't lay a hand on her. If a woman is about to get shot - then, you – because you're a man - have to get between her and the bullet and save her. It's the man's duty, in his mind, because men were built stronger for the purpose of protecting females… I dunno how he sees it… But I've kinda looked at it as part of evolution, in order to understand what he means. The females reproduce- er…they make the babies and all that stuff." Vlad coughed and ruffled his hair, and then spread his arms to stretch his muscles again. "And guys protect them so that the human race doesn't die out… But Joel really sees it more as in…the stronger male protects the weaker female and it is a crime against his honor to lay a hand on a woman."
Vlad was quiet as his explanation took root and became stronger, with further mental adjustment on Anderson's side. The delinquent was picking through his own colored pencils, along with Anderson's, to add to his drawing. Vlad began to speak when Anderson seemed to have had enough time to accept what had been said so far.
"But I think it really comes from the size in their family. They're all big…huge guys. …Jake is the little giant." Anderson couldn't help but blink in surprise and stare. "Joel is basically seven feet tall…he's got some problems with his legs, just a little, now- I think, because of it. But, if he were to so much as nudge someone small, let's say a woman who's maybe 120 pounds… She'd go straight into the floor or a wall, without him even meaning to do it – though that has never, never happened, to my knowledge – just because of his size and weight. And if Jake were to, in some instance, slightly push a girl, maybe to get her away from him or whatever, doesn't matter, the likelihood is that she'd get hurt somehow. Though, that has never happened. But that's probably the reason why Joel has his…code of male conduct thing, and he really pounded it into Jake's head for his own sake, probably… but not really literally, Anderson, cuz Joel is a really nice guy and he loves Jake. Jake's his only son, his only kid, so…"
Vlad released the compressed air that had been putting pressure on his chest, and let his pencil fall on the dented and stained wood of the table as he realized how the conversation was taxing his body, how he felt more than a little fatigued at this point. He rolled a shoulder and cracked his neck, taking deeper breaths and closing his eyes for a time. "But yeah, so Jake got over his disrespecting girls problem – and whatever he says now is mostly a joke. I mean, you could have some girl with a freaken sign taped to her forehead saying "Disrespect me! I'm a total-" er…whatever, you know? Walking down a street even butt naked, and he'd still respect her, he wouldn't say anything and wouldn't give her any sort of bad attention even if she wanted it…alright?" Vlad hunted for Anderson's response in the tan features, but the jock remained deep in thought, so the red gaze returned to the table when it found it had nothing to interpret. The pale hands had lost the motivation to draw, and were hidden in the boy's lap.
"So you see…" Vlad began again after what appeared to be a few minutes had passed. "Female Anderson is safe with Jake…though, the safest person in the world for her to ever be with is his dad. He'd just lay down his life for her without even knowing her name… So…I was just saying this Anderson, in case you were a little…nervous or anything about Jake and your sister, since…you didn't really know that he has an odd sense of humor sometimes…which might be on the border of being- which might seem rude – mostly when he thinks he might not like someone- But he doesn't really mean anything bad by it."
Anderson responded quietly while concentrating on copying down the creases in his left hand. "Alright… Yeah, I get it."
It took a while, but eventually Vlad returned his attention to his art. A few more minutes went by before he gave the blonde a cautious glance. "Are you gonna tell your mom where I'm staying? …I'm not really saying you can or can't- you can do whatever. I just don't know what she'll think of it. …She doesn't really like Jake."
"If she asks me about it, I'll explain that you're staying with a friend who's gonna look after you. If she asks if I know who it is, I'll tell her -but I'll let her know that Jake is a good friend…and he has nice pets that like you and want you to stay there."
The joke made them both smile faintly and by the time the bell rang for the next class, their spirits had risen significantly, as well as their perception of one another.