Casey remains standing outside Bianca's office, slouched against the wall, staring at his sneakers.
He couldn't hear what was being said inside the office as much as he attempted to eavesdrop, but was certain Wesley and Grant were spinning some unlikely story about him being the one at fault.
What seemed like ages but had only been fifteen minutes, Casey startles from his thoughts when he hears the door to the office open.
"And make sure I never have to speak to you boys about this again," Bianca calls out.
Casey relaxes his shoulders upon hearing Bianca's more relaxed tone, having never really experienced his brother's girlfriend angry; the prospect of it made him feel a little nervous.
Wesley and Grant both glare at Casey as they pass by upon exiting the office.
"Good going, retarded loser; you got us a lunchtime detention all because you lashed out at Aiden for telling the truth about your pathetic freak of a brother and we got caught being accessories to the fight," Wesley whispers; repeating the phrase Bianca had used to describe them.
Casey rolls his eyes and scoffs.
"Yeah, it was our turn to use the basketball courts to practice shots," Grant retorts.
"Suck to be you: you need the practice," Casey smarts.
"Because of you now, we're stuck having to sit in the library and organise the books like some pansy geek like your brother," Grant states.
Casey scowls.
"Stop calling him that!" he snaps.
Bianca opens the door and clears her throat.
"I thought I told you boys to go straight back to class with no stalling," Bianca implies with a firm tone.
Wesley and Grant turn away and make their way down the hall as Casey glares at them angrily.
"At least we still have about fifteen minutes left of PE. Maybe it will be good now that stupid Braxton and his geek-a-zoid brother won't be in the class," Wesley whispers to his friend with a snicker.
"Come back into my office now, Casey," Bianca instructs and waits for Casey to enter before following and closing her door behind her.
"Sit down. I hope you have calmed down from your outburst from before."
Casey sits down and looks down at his hands.
"What have you got to say about fighting in class?" Bianca asks.
"What does it matter? You listened to Wesley and Grant's story first and probably believed their lies," Casey grumbles.
Bianca sighs, "I am trying to give you a chance to explain, Casey."
Casey remains quiet, only frustrating Bianca more.
"Casey, I expect an answer. Whatever possessed you to punch Aiden Connors several times and break his nose?" Bianca demands, raising her voice again.
"He's a jerk and he deserved it," Casey answers in a grumble.
"That is not an acceptable reason," Bianca scolds.
"Fine, he was hassling Kyle and I got angry, and he kept encouraging me to fight, so I let him have it," Casey grumbles.
Bianca shakes her head.
"Please elaborate on what you mean by Aiden hassling Kyle," Bianca urges, feeling concerned for Kyle.
"He was calling him names and tripped him," Casey mumbles.
Bianca huffs.
"Name calling is no excuse for physical violence. Who started this fight?" Bianca demands.
Casey remains staring at his hands.
"Aiden punched out at me," Casey mumbles.
"Who started the fight, Casey," Bianca repeats with more authority in her voice.
Casey shifts in his seat.
"He and his stupid friends wouldn't shut up about Kyle and I was angry. I only shoved him then he punched me, so I had to fight back," Casey quietly admits, purposely leaving out how he threatened to punch Aiden in the first place.
"No, you did not, Casey. Although I do not condone Mr. Connors' actions, antagonising him into fighting is just as unacceptable!" Bianca reprimands.
"I am really surprised and disappointed in you Casey. I would never have imagined that you would display such violent behaviour when I've known you to be such an exuberant boy, especially since a strong business-man like Brax, a kind, smart boy like Kyle and a gentleman like Heath, have never shown this kind of behaviour," Bianca scolds.
Casey shifts uncomfortably in his seat, not knowing what exuberant actually meant and thinking how she could ever say Heath was a gentleman.
He rubs his hands in his lap nervously.
"I didn't have a choice, he was being a jerk to Kyle," Casey mutters.
"Don't you give me that; you could have notified the teacher or even come to my office and notified me, not attack Mr. Connors and break his nose!" Bianca yells.
"On the grounds of your actions in class today, Casey, I have no other choice but to suspend you."
Casey glances up at Bianca, shocked by her decision.
"Fighting under no circumstances is tolerated and if I have to warn you about this kind of behaviour again Casey Braxton, I will expel you; is that clear?" Bianca yells.
Casey remains quiet, reeling from shock.
"I said: is that clear, Mr. Braxton?" Bianca repeats, raising her voice further.
"Yes Miss. Scott," Casey whispers.
Bianca goes to reach for her phone when Casey sees her from the top of his gaze.
"Miss. Scott, you're not really going to call home, are you?" Casey whispers, beginning to feel a little scared at the trouble he was now in.
"Yes, Casey I am. Your behaviour has warranted a suspension and that means a guardian must be notified," Bianca replies sternly and starts to dial Brax's number.
"Please Miss. Scott, don't tell Brax,'' Casey pleads.
"No Casey, your behaviour was unacceptable, and Brax needs to be informed."
"I'll take lunch detention for a week...a month. Just don't tell Brax; please Bianca," Casey begs.
Bianca scowls at Casey.
"The answer is no. Your punishment is non- negotiable. I am calling Brax now and that is final and need I remind you: it is always Miss. Scott to you when we are at school. Now please go and wait outside my office whilst I make the call," Bianca says, remaining stern and dismissing the teen.
Casey sighs heavily but gets up from his seat and makes his way out of the office; glancing back briefly to see Bianca dialing Brax's number, and he swallows a lump in his throat and closes the door behind him.
Casey tries desperately to listen in through the door again but can only work out muffled sounds of Bianca explaining what happened.
After about ten minutes Bianca reopens the door.
"Turns out neither of your brothers can come and pick you up. Brax is busy with a business meeting and cannot leave due to being short staffed and Heath must have been with a client or in a class because I had no answer so you will remain with me in my office until the end of the day," Bianca informs and indicates for Casey to re-enter her office.
Casey makes his way in but then stops.
"Wait: you contacted Heath as well?"
"Yes, Brax suggested I do that when he couldn't pick you up, but as I said I couldn't get a hold of him."
Casey thinks; if Heath came to pick him up, he probably would have humiliated him the entire way out of school; dragged him out by his underwear in a wedgie.
"You can do your schoolwork while you wait," Bianca instructs.
"My bag is still in the gym change room," Casey whispers.
"Very well, I will send someone to get it."
Bianca then sends a call through to her administration assistant who quickly sends Sasha in who was acting as the student messenger for the day.
Sasha spots Casey and gives a bashful smile.
"Hi Casey, what are you doing here?"
"Hi; it's complicated," Casey grumbles.
"Sasha, you are not here to talk to students in my office. I need you to run down to Mr. Gardiner's class and ask him to bring Casey's bag here," Bianca requests.
Sasha farewells Casey and goes down to Mr. Gardiner's class.
It was nearing the end of third period, which was Casey's gym class anyway and Mr. Gardiner is getting the class to do cool down exercises when Sasha fronts up.
As soon as his class is finished, Mr. Gardiner finds Casey's bag and takes it to Bianca's office.
"Here you go young man. I hope Miss. Scott has given you a good reprimand for fighting in my class and rest assured Mr. Braxton, that despite being one of my better physically performing students, if you ever fight in my class again I will ban you from participating in any competitions for the rest of the year," Mr. Gardiner warns.
Casey blinks: that would mean no basketball trials, or soccer championships.
"If it happens again Mr. Gardiner, Casey will be expelled," Bianca informs and Casey hangs his head; feeling both Bianca and Mr. Gardiners eyes bore in on him.
"Do you have something to say to Mr. Gardiner, Casey?" Bianca asks sternly.
Casey flicks his gaze up to his stern gym teacher.
"I'm sorry for fighting in your class and thank you for bringing my bag," Casey says, barely audible, before staring back at the floor under Bianca's desk.
"I hope for your sake you really are sorry young man; violence is not an acceptable way to solve anything," Mr. Gardiner states sternly.
Mr. Gardiner farewells Bianca and leaves and Bianca turns back to Casey.
"Get your work out and get started. I'm sure you have a lot to catch up on."
Casey gets his Geography book out first and gets started on his homework from the first period.
A short time later, Bianca receives a call saying Aiden's parents have arrived for their son.
Bianca tells Casey to remain in the office while she pops out. She asks her admin assistant to keep an eye on Casey in her absence.
Bianca returns about twenty-five minutes later, having explained to Aiden's disgruntled parents about the fight and Aiden's equal suspension to Casey's, before letting them go and take their son to the hospital.
The remaining twenty minutes of fourth period there is nothing but silence in Bianca's office as Casey quietly scribbles out what work he could when his mind wasn't wandering, and Bianca keeps busy typing up the letter for Casey to take home for Brax to sign.
The bell for lunch rings as Bianca prints out the letter and folds it into an enclosed envelope.
"Put this in your bag and make sure you give it to Brax because I need a signature from him upon your return," Bianca instructs.
Casey stares at the envelope.
"Can't you just suspend me without a note?" Casey asks, knowing having a letter sent home only made the situation more troublesome.
"I already told you; your punishment is not something to be bargained. You are to give this note to Brax and don't think I won't check in with him that he received it, and I expect you to be better behaved upon your return," Bianca says firmly.
Casey takes the envelope in his clammy hand and shoves it into his bag, fighting the urge to cry, knowing how real the trouble he was in.
He wishes there is some way to get out of all this, but knowing Bianca already called Brax, there was no chance.
"Place your work away and get out your lunch," Bianca instructs and briefly pops out of the office to her staff room nearby to grab her salad for her lunch.
Bianca sits back down with her salad and sees Casey open his lunchbox with what looked like a container of grapes, a mandarin, a small packet of potato chips, and a snap bag containing two sandwiches.
As Bianca begins eating her salad, she continues to glance over at Casey who instead of eating his food is rolling his grapes around in the container while staring at them.
"Is something the matter Casey; why aren't you eating?" Bianca asks; curious that the usually ravenous, food-loving teen was not scoffing his lunch.
"I'm not that hungry," Casey mumbles out a lie, not taking his eyes from the grapes rolling around in case the loss of concentration made him start crying the more he panics about the suspension and being the first ever Braxton to be suspended.
"I find that a little hard to believe," Bianca comments.
"Well, you wouldn't be that hungry if you knew it was going to be your last moments and Brax was going to kill you," Casey mumbles.
Bianca sighs at Casey's dramatics of feeling sorry for himself.
"I must say Casey that it's your own fault that Brax is going to be angry with you and he has every right to be, just as I am given your behaviour, but Brax is a lovely man and to say he will kill you is over dramatic. So, I suggest you accept the consequences and eat your lunch before the time is up and it's back to book work," Bianca states in a stern tone.
Casey blinks away the wetness forming in his eyes and stops playing with his lunch and slowly begins to eat it.
Bianca eventually holds out her bin for Casey's rubbish.
Casey packs away his lunchbox and moments later the bell rings for the end of lunch.
"What would have been your fifth period lesson?" Bianca asks.
"Science," Casey mumbles.
"Well, get out your science book and summarise some notes on the topics you are learning at the moment," Bianca instructs.
Casey quietly makes some notes from his Science textbook on Astronomy, which was a lead up to a major project which was meant to be handed out soon.
Finally, the end of the day bell rings, and normally Casey would be the first out of the building, but today he is in no rush to get home.
Bianca notices Casey stalling and urges him to hurry up, before following him out of her office and out of the building where she notices Kyle, Ryder, Liam, and Romeo waiting at the front for news on their friend.
Bianca guides Casey towards his friends and greets the four boys, before turning her attention further on Kyle.
"How are you, Kyle? I heard you went to the nurse and Casey mentioned about some boys making comments at you," Bianca asks.
Kyle nods, "I'm fine, Miss. Scott," Kyle replies.
Ryder, Liam, and Romeo were busy chattering at Casey who seemed completely disinterested in cheering up.
"Whatever happened to your lip?" Bianca asks.
"It was an accident," Kyle replies.
"Well, as long as you are okay. I will see all you boys later, and Casey, I hope you use your suspension time wisely to think about your behaviour."
"Yes Miss Scott," Casey mumbles quietly.
"Are you okay, Case; what happened?" Kyle asks as Bianca leaves.
Casey shakes his head.
"What did she mean by suspension?" Ryder asks.
"I thought you were just stuck in her office all day," Liam adds.
"I'm in real deep trouble. I got suspended for two days and I have a note to take home," Casey says.
"Oh shit; all because you fought that psychopath Aiden?" Romeo asks in surprise.
Casey nods.
"This is why I didn't want you getting involved," Kyle states, feeling guilty that he was the reason behind Casey being in trouble.
"I didn't have a choice, they made me so mad, and they shouldn't have been treating you like that," Casey mumbles.
The boys are interrupted by Liam's Dad giving a shout from his van.
"I guess I better go. It sucks about your suspension Casey," Liam says.
Romeo was next to leave, followed by Ryder.
"I guess we better get home too," Kyle says.
"I don't want to. I'm in real big trouble this time Ky and I'm scared," Casey confesses and rests his head on Kyle's shoulder.
"I'm sure you're just overthinking this Casey," Kyle reassures.
"No, I'm not Ky! Brax is going to be so mad. No-one has ever gotten suspended in our family before," Casey says.
"I'm sure if I explain what happened and that you were just defending me, Brax will understand and go easy on you," Kyle comforts as the two continue to walk.
Casey shakes his head.
"I doubt it. You know how Brax gets when he's really angry; he doesn't care about reason and doesn't listen," Casey whines.
Kyle sighs and slings an arm around Casey's shoulder.
"He's not going to be home until six thirty tonight, remember? Maybe he'll be cooled off by then," Kyle suggests.
"I still don't want to go home," Casey says sadly.
"I understand that, but avoiding the situation is only going to make it worse."
"How can it be any worse? I mean he's going to eventually come home and maybe the longer I avoid him the more chance of life I'll have," Casey moans dramatically and Kyle sighs.
"Casey, Brax really does care, and he'll get over it," Kyle comforts.
"Maybe so, but it's probably not just the suspension I'm worried he'll be mad at me for. I lost my temper when Bianca was yelling at me and I kind of swore…" Casey explains and is cut off as Kyle pulls away.
"You swore at Miss. Scott; why'd you do that? She's nice Casey," Kyle accuses in shock.
"It just came out; I couldn't help it and it wasn't at her. It was mainly towards Wesley and Grant who were egging me on," Casey defends then hangs his shoulders.
"Please don't you get mad at me too. I need all the support I can get," Casey pleads.
"I'm not mad at you and I am here for you, considering you got in serious trouble because of me. I'm just surprised. Though I'm sorry I won't be able to help you if Brax gets mad about the swearing; you know he hates that more than I do, and to do it at school with a teacher and even worse it being Miss. Scott," Kyle says.
Casey shuffles his feet.
"I know that!" Casey snaps, frustrated.
"Sorry, Case. I didn't mean to sound like I was telling you off," Kyle says quietly.
Casey sighs heavily.
"Can we just walk really slow and maybe go the long way home?" Casey suggests.
Kyle remains silent and wraps his arm around Casey's shoulder again.
They eventually turn the corner into Saxon Avenue and Casey's stomach flips, and he slows down.
"Hey: remember Brax isn't home for another hour and a half. Maybe you can have something to eat and stay in our room to get on his good side," Kyle suggests.
"Maybe I can just eat and pretend to go to sleep then I wouldn't have to deal with him until the morning," Casey groans.
Kyle rolls his eyes.
"Don't prolong it, Casey," Kyle supports, while Casey whines in response.
They reach outside their house and Casey suddenly halts and his eyes widen as he sets sight on Brax's Ute in the driveway.
"What is he doing home? I thought he wasn't meant to be home until six-thirty?" Casey says in panic.
"I'm not sure," Kyle answers.
Casey backs away.
"I can't go in there, Ky. I'm going to have to say goodbye to my freedom, probably for the rest of my life," Casey moans and rests his head on Kyle's shoulder again.
"Don't exaggerate, Case" Kyle comforts.
"I'm not. It's been so nice knowing you; you've been a great big brother, but I have to face it: if I go in there, I'm dead!"
"You can't avoid going home forever."
"I can try; can't I?" Casey bargains.
Kyle rolls his eyes.
"What if he kicks me out of the family?" Casey suddenly has a thought and panics.
Kyle stops and stands in front of Casey.
"What? Don't say a thing like that Casey; Brax wouldn't disown you," Kyle lightly scolds, shocked by Casey's statement.
Casey stares down at the ground, fixated on the patterns the gravel made and his cheeks turn red.
"How do you know? You've never been suspended; no-one has," Casey replies, reinforcing the idea he was the only 'bad' Braxton with being suspended.
Casey lets out a sniff as tears begin to well in his eyes at the thought of his pending doom and he takes another glance at Brax's Ute.
"Come on; it'll be okay," Kyle says and gives Casey's hand a squeeze and gently encourages Casey to continue towards their front door.
"You'll stick by me and help explain what happened?" Casey asks with a hint of nervousness in his voice as he wipes his eyes with his free hand.
"I promise," Kyle assures and opens the front door with Casey by his side.