The Pencil
It started with a pencil.
Specifically, Spotty accusing Plug of stealing his pencil during form.
Spotty, shorter than most of the group, loudmouthed and freckle-faced, was already halfway out of his chair when he jabbed a dramatic finger across the desk. "That's my pencil."
Plug—long and lean, all limbs and angles, with too-short trousers and buck teeth that didn't quite fit his face—didn't even blink. "It's mine. I brought it from home. It has a bite mark on it."
Spotty narrowed his eyes. "I also have a bite mark on mine."
"Then this could be yours," Plug admitted. "But it's also possibly mine."
"Possibly," Spotty echoed, like the word had insulted his entire bloodline.
They didn't speak for the rest of the day.
By lunch, everyone else was suffering.
"Toots, tell them to make up," Sidney said, through a mouthful of crisps.
"I'm not getting involved," Toots replied. "They're being idiots."
Danny glanced between the two. Spotty was hunched on one end of the bench, his freckled nose wrinkled in irritation, arms crossed, chewing his lunch angrily. Plug sat at the other, scarf perfectly adjusted, writing something in a tiny notebook like this wasn't even happening.
"They're not even arguing anymore," Danny muttered. "They're just... silently competing to be more offended."
By the end of the day, Plug returned the pencil without comment. Spotty nodded once.
Balance restored. No one spoke of it again.