"Troubled students."
The flicker burst into a full-fledged fire. It was heating me up. I knew who they meant--kids like me, who had violent tendencies, who had no futures, who were going nowhere in life. Prison or six feet under. Those kids.
"That's who you think joins crews?" I asked. "Those kind of kids."
"Well, yeah." The principal gave me a blank look. He had no idea how wrong that statement was.
"I see."
The firefly returned. She flew in, bringing the darkness with her. I felt it rising, coating my insides, blanketing me. It molded with the fire. I closed my eyes a moment, letting her take over. Once she had, I couldn't be touched. They couldn't hurt me anymore.
I stood and began to leave.
"Bren."
I didn't know which one spoke. I didn't care.
I reached for the door handle, and I left.
I didn't turn back.
The bell must've rung. A line of students started to leave their classrooms.
"Bren?"
I walked right past Taz, then Tabatha and the others as they left their room. Students slowed, casting me looks of confusion, of irritation, of concern.
I ignored every single one.
I went to my locker. I got my bag and keys, and I left. I was in the parking lot when Cross shouted my name, hurrying behind me.
I didn't want to see him. He'd try to shake her hold on me. She protected me. He just wanted me to be open to more pain. I couldn't.
I held up a hand. "Don't, Cross. Not this time."
He caught up to me. "What happened?"
I kept walking. I had ten feet to go. Only ten. It seemed the length of a football field.
"Bren! Hey!"
That was Jordan. I had no doubt Zellman was with him. My crew had come for me, but I couldn't this time. They couldn't protect me from this like the darkness did. The darkness, that firefly, had another name, one I'd put out of my mind.
Things were better. Channing was acting like a real brother. He loved me.
My crew was with me. I was with Cross.
I should've been happy. I shouldn't have any need for her, but her hold was so strong. Her hooks were in, and they weren't letting go, not until it was safe again to come out. I opened the door of my Jeep and got inside.
"Bren, stop!"
Cross blocked me from shutting the door.
Jordan and Zellman stood behind him. But I only shoved him back and shut the door. I put my keys into the ignition. I turned. The engine came on, and I put it in reverse.
The passenger door opened.
"Get out!" I yelled.
Cross climbed in, shutting the door and glaring. "Not a fucking chance."
"Leave, Cross!" She cracked. She let emotion ring out in my voice. "You heard our teacher. You can be someone. You can do things. Why are you here?" I shook my head. "You shouldn't be. You shouldn't be anywhere near me."
"Stop it." His jaw clenched.
"Get out."
"No."
"Cross!"
"No."
He put his seatbelt on, and the doors in the back opened. Both Jordan and Zellman got inside.
Jordan leaned back. "Just drive, Bren. We're with you whether you want us or not."
I laughed hollowly, but I couldn't make them leave.
I really had no option. I was easing back when someone rapped on my side window.
I braked. It was Alex. I lowered the window.
"What do you want?" I asked.
"What happened in there?"
"Walk, Ryerson." A low warning came from Cross. He wasn't messing around.
I began putting the window back up, but Alex clamped a hand over it. I would've cut his fingers if I kept going. That was tempting, but Channing had said later for Alex.
I stopped my window. "Leave me alone."
"What happened in there?" He wasn't moving.
"It's none of your business--" Jordan began.
"I heard it had to do with the crews, not just yours. I want to know what it was about." He scrubbed a hand over his face, briskly. He sounded frustrated. "Bren, you need to tell me. If it's all crews, you have a duty."
I felt her rallying in me. She didn't want me to feel or think or care. She wanted me to be numb to the world.
But Alex was staring me in the face, and I was surrounded by my crew. Her hold was slipping. Feeling the darkness draw back down, I could almost see the firefly moving away.
"They want to fix us," I said quietly.
A vein stuck out from the side of Alex's neck. "Fix who? How?"
"Us. The troubled kids, the ones who are going to prison or underground. They want us to be better."
"Say what?"
Cross cursed under his breath.
"What the fuck?" Jordan roared. "That's what they said?"
"They want us to be mentored by convicts." And the real kicker... "My dad is one of the ones in the program."
"They want you to be in the program?" Cross asked.
"They wanted me to ask Channing to get all the crews involved."
"You serious? We're all troubled kids?" Alex barked.
That was the implication, yes. I let him figure it out.
He cursed, and I swore I saw an actual red glint in his eyes before he stepped away from my Jeep.
"Where are you going?" Cross called.
Jordan and Zellman had stood up in the back of my Jeep. They were quiet, watching whatever was going to unfold, but not Cross. He hopped out of my vehicle and darted in front of Alex, forcing him to stop.
"Think, Alex. Think first."
Alex tried to go around him.
Cross moved too, still blocking him.
"Fucking hell, Cross. Get back. I mean it."
That was enough for the rest of us. I slammed the Jeep into park and yanked the keys out. Jordan and Zellman scrambled out, coming up behind Alex. I was there a second later.
Cross put a hand up, holding us off.
"They're wrong, Alex," he coaxed. "We all know they're wrong. We're not worthless. We're not the bullies. All those words are attached to the word troubled. We get that. They don't. We're not wrong."
"They need to learn." Alex growled in his throat, starting around Cross again.
This time, I hurried forward to stand side by side with Cross, adding to his wall.
"Really, Bren?"
I nodded. "Listen to him. He's smarter than all of us."
Cross glanced at me as he continued. "Alex, they're the uneducated ones. They're adults who don't see grey. They only see black and white. You go in there and do what you're going to do, you're confirming their assumptions. They'll put us all in the wrong category. We're not wrong. We're not worthless."
"You're not!" Alex shot back, that vein sticking out again. "They love you. Everyone loves you. You're lethal as hell, but you get away with it because you're smart, and you look like a pretty boy. You don't get stereotyped like the rest of us."
"You think that matters to me?"
Now Cross was pissed. His eyes narrowed.
A shiver wound down my spine.
"You're talking to me like I'm not in the trenches with you," Cross said softly. He looked to Jordan, Zellman, and me. "Like I don't bleed when my crew bleeds."
"You know what I mean," Alex huffed.
Cross got in his face, forcing him to step back toward Jordan and Zellman.
"No, I don't," he said with a scary quiet that promised he was about to strike. "Why don't you spell it out for me? I want to make sure you didn't just insult me to my face."
Alex swallowed, taking note of his surroundings. We'd attracted a crowd as soon as I left, and now it seemed to have doubled. A new wave of awareness rippled through them. It wasn't a student-teacher fight like before. Word would spread that the Wolves were pushing around the Ryerson crew's leader.
"You know what I meant." Alex looked at the ground.
Cross didn't let up. "Then don't fuck up the rest of our crews," he
hissed. "You want to watch something burn, you wait until we can't get in trouble for it. Going in there, starting whatever shit you want to start--that's going to have effects for all of us. Not just you. They're going to blame Bren for whatever you do."
"So what do you want me to do?" Alex didn't have it in him to stand down. But he was keeping it together. He was a bull being told not to leave the pen while the door was wide open. He was stomping on the ground, wanting to charge.
But he was listening.
"Wait."
One word. That's all Cross said.
"They insulted all of us," he added after a moment. "They'll be educated on their mistake. But wait until we figure it out."
"Wait for what?"
"For me!" Cross snapped. "You wait until I tell you the plan."
Alex nearly snarled, but he clamped his mouth shut and swung away from us. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he walked off.
It took a second of silence, but Cross glanced around. Everyone was staring at him.
"What?" he snarled. "What are you looking at?"
I'd always seen this side of Cross, but everyone else was seeing it now.
I looked to Jordan, and he lifted his head, pride raising his chin.
He said, "We're staring at our leader."
Around a bonfire pit behind Manny's that night, we filled Channing in on everything. When I told him we needed to talk, he'd said the crowd would be less bloodthirsty in Fallen Crest than at his own bar.
"He called you troubled?" Channing asked, his nostrils flaring.
Cross, Jordan, and Zellman sat with me, and three of Channing's own crew had come: Chad, Moose, and Congo.
I nodded. The words weren't coming. I didn't feel like speaking.
"They want all crews to do this program?"
I stopped interacting. It burned a hole each time I had to remember.
Cross sat on top of a picnic table beside me. "All crews. That's what she said."
Channing frowned, not saying anything for a moment. He shared looks with the rest of his crew before he nodded. "Okay. Thank you."
"Wait." Jordan pushed up from the wall he'd been leaning against. "That's it? Just thank you?"
Channing lifted his hands. "What do you expect? We're not in high school anymore."
"But..." Jordan looked at Channing's crew. "You guys are, like, the godfathers of crews. You're the longest-running crew there is." He turned to my brother. "You created the system. You have to help us."
"Look." Channing stepped toward him. "It's an after-school program. There's not much we can do except maybe help you start a petition so they don't only target crew kids. Other than that, I'll be honest. I'm not sure it's a bad idea. You guys would be talking to convicts. I think every teenager should go through that. The more information you get, the better."
"Even Dad?"
I couldn't believe I'd said that word, but as all eyes looked my way, I couldn't shrink now. I'd spoken. I had to own my words, though my hand trembled.
I tucked it under my leg.
"What'd you say?" Channing asked.
"You heard me. You want me to see Dad? Hear his words of wisdom?"
Channing's eyes narrowed. "I recall asking you to go with me to visit him not too long ago, so yeah. Go and hear what he has to say."
He started to turn away, his shoulders rigid and tight.
He was such a hypocrite. He hated him more than I did.
"Should we talk about that night? That's what he's going to say to me. He's going to talk about his regrets."
Channing's back got even tighter. His shoulders seemed to stretch out, widening his shirt.
I waited. I wanted him to say something. I wanted to hear him acknowledge that night.
I laughed. "Don't you want to hear a play-by-play of that night? I can tell you. I don't need to go see Dad to remember." Slowly I stood, though I kept my head down. I felt like I was talking to a sleeping cobra. I was wooing him, trying to engage him. It didn't matter that the cobra was my brother.
No one talked about the night our dad was arrested. No one. I never had, and I knew Channing hadn't. I didn't even know if Channing knew what had happened. This was the first time I'd brought it up. And I was using it to needle him. I wanted to get at him. I wanted him to feel some of the pain I would have to suffer if we didn't fight the mentoring program.
He looked back toward me as I stood waiting.
"Bren."
He wanted me to let him off the hook. I wasn't going to do that. I wanted that cobra to wake up. I didn't care if I would get bitten. I might have welcomed it.
"Were you told what happened that night? Are you able to imagine it?"
"Don't." He drew in oxygen, then letting it out just as quickly.
So he did know. Maybe?
I began remembering myself, speaking the memories out loud. "She died. She was gone, and you were gone too. It was me and him in the house."
Way too many fucking years, just him and me. Him. Me. His alcoholism.
"It was quiet when she was sick. Did you know that? It was eerily quiet. Then she died, and there was no sound. Not a peep. You were gone. He was gone. She was gone. It was just me, until..." I hated this. I hated peeling back the layers, the memories, the numbness. It was all being stripped away. "Then he started coming back. So did the booze. The partying."
Channing's jaw clenched.
He knew what that was like. It was why he'd left in the first place.
"His friends started coming around too."
I would be in bed. I'd be trying to sleep.
I could hear their drunken laughter. They'd hoot. They'd holler. Their dirty jokes had them slapping hands. They sickened me. They sickened me now.
"That became the norm, Channing. Every night he brought friends home. He didn't care who they were, just as long as the house wasn't empty. He didn't want to feel her like I did."
Like I still did.
"Stop, Bren," Channing rasped, but wouldn't look at me.
He couldn't. He would see what had happened to me.
"At first he stayed up while they were there. He was responsible, making sure no one found out about me. That didn't last."
He started falling asleep.
That night his latest group of "friends" had woken me up with their noise. But they always stayed downstairs, so I didn't think too much of it. I'd just needed to go to the bathroom.
"I didn't have toilet paper," I said aloud.
If I had...
"I was going to use the bathroom in the hallway."
Stupid toilet paper.
"Bren." Channing's eyes had shut tight. He didn't want to hear this, but it was coming. It was time. Finally.
"Maybe I should've grabbed a robe. I don't know. Maybe if I'd stayed in my room..." If I'd had toilet paper. If I hadn't needed to use the bathroom outside of my room.
I felt her coming now. She wanted to protect me. She wanted to envelop me so I didn't feel what I was about to say, but I pushed her off. I wanted to go numb, but I couldn't. It wasn't right, not this time. Not yet.
My throat was scraped raw. "The cops made note of what I was wearing that night," I told him. "A sleeping tank top and boy shorts."
Like it was my fault.
Like it mattered what I had been wearing.
I still felt their silent accusations. It had been in their eyes, the way they looked at me, as I sat there covered in blood.
I had to get to the bad parts. I couldn't hold her off anymore. Inch by inch, I let her in, and I became so numb I couldn't feel my lips.
"I was in the hallway, on my way back. The cops told me later that when I flushed the toilet, that's how he knew someone was up there. He heard me."
I had reached for my bedroom's door handle. Three feet and I would've had the door locked. I would've been inside. I would've been safe.
"He came out of nowhere."
I never saw him. I felt him.
There was a shadow on the stairs, and t
hen his hand was on my mouth. He dragged me back into their room.
God. I clamped my eyes shut. What if it'd happened in their room? What then? What would've been the ending?
"Bren?" Someone had called my name.
He'd paused, just inside their bedroom, and he must have changed his mind.
"He was going to rape me in Mom and Dad's room. Then he heard Dad, and he took me into my room instead."
He'd shut the door and whispered in my ear, "You fucking tell him you're fine and you're going to bed, or I will kill you. You got that, cunt?"
"He shook me as he threatened me."
Our dad had said that's how he knew I was lying. I never told him I was fine. It was a lie.
I didn't lie.
"I said what he told me to. I recited it word for word."
But I'd known what was by my bed, what I could grab.
"He said he was going to kill me." Even now, anger swelled inside me. I felt it pushing at the numbness.
"He waited until Dad bought my lie and we heard him leave."
I'd heard one agonizing footstep on the floor after another until they faded. I'd felt my humanity going with him.
"He threw me on the bed. He started ripping my clothes off. He was in a hurry. He fumbled for his condom--so thoughtful of him, right?"
I'd known where my knife was.
He'd gotten distracted for a second, and I reached for it, under the mattress.
"I stabbed him. I thrust that knife in as far as I could, as hard as I could--just like he wanted to rip inside me."
He'd knocked my hand away, but I fought him. I rolled too, punching his dick as hard as I could. As he doubled over to the floor, I was on him.
"I grabbed my knife and pulled it out."
I'd raised it above my head, straddling that asshole.
"Then Dad took it from me."
It had been time for his crime.
"I wanted to do it."
He'd taken the knife from me, and with a gentle hand, he'd ushered me to the side. He'd told me to leave.
"He tried to get me to leave. But I knew what he was going to do." I could feel tears in my eyes. I hated them. They were weakness. "He cut his throat, and I watched from the door."
He'd killed him so I wouldn't.
I waited a beat, then asked Channing, "Still think I'd benefit from hearing how I should be in prison and not him?"
My father went to prison for a crime I should've committed.
The silence was thick.
Weak. Vulnerable. Exposed. I was all three of those, and I hated it.
I reached for my knife, and as soon as I felt it, everything off balance centered again.
"Were you going to kill him?" Channing asked.
I'd expected the question from Cross, so I looked over. He already knew.