Awkward blue

~Kael~

My grandfather owns a private tech company. Every once in a while, he calls me and my male cousins into his study at his grand mansion in Daven-Heath and starts telling us what to do.

By 25, we must be married. We must study the right things. We must become “real men.”

Back then I used to roll my eyes during his sermons. He’d line us up in groups of five, oldest to youngest in the Lance lineage. I’d hide behind my older brother’s tall frame, sneaking in coughs and side comments, while my cousins tried not to laugh.

The pressure then wasn’t on me, it was on the older cousins. They had to breed him an heir. Carry his legacy. Bla bla bla. He was “dying” (mind you, this man had been dying since I was born), and every sentence leaned in that direction.

“I need to see my grandchildren,” he’d rasp.

And then, one week after my 16th birthday, he demanded I move into his cold-as-guck mansion. My mum protested. My dad… well, he’d lost his voice years ago, metaphorically. These days he just mutters “hmmh… uh…” before disappearing into his car collection.

“Now that you’ve turned sixteen, it’s time to enter the Lance mentorship program,” Grandad said. “I’m enrolling you into one of the best high schools in the country, one with this family’s legacy. Iversen Ivy Preparatory. Your great-great-grandfather attended, as did your brothers and several cousins. It should be your honor to join that line as you prepare for college.”

And just like that, my life flipped. I traded my old banged-up truck for a sports car, late nights at the diner for endless study sessions, my sports jerseys for slick uniforms, my girlfriend for arranged dates, and my best friend for a pack of Ivy goons. Over a thousand miles from my old life, I had no choice but to adapt.

Grandad controlled everything: diet, clothes, schedule. Even out of uniform, it felt like I was still wearing one. White and green themed cardigans, striped necklines, sweaters, even joggers stamped with the Iversen badge.

What I hated most? Hanging around arrogant d*cks like one legacy kid who thought flipping up his collar was high fashion and talked about girls like they were stock options. As part of the “Legacies,” I had to help him run the Molasses group, which thrived on nepotism and hazing. I stayed out of the hazing, but I never snitched. Until one day I snapped and whooped his and his friend’s asses. That earned me my first suspension.

Grandad brushed it off as a rite of passage.

“The McCains have to learn things have changed. This is a new generation of alphas. We, the Lances, are on top of the pyramid. Don’t worry, son. I’ll put in a good word.”

I was back in school the next day.

When that didn’t work, I “accidentally” hooked up with another guy’s girlfriend at a party. What started as me offering her a shoulder to cry on, “he’s such a jerk", ended with a messy make-out session.

“Wait, what are you doing?”

“Oh my gosh, I’m sorry…”

“You—”

He caught me in the bathroom the next day. Second suspension.

Grandad smiled.

Wtf.

I was never leaving this mansion.

Good problems? I guess.

The final straw: he invited one of his friend’s daughters to dinner so we could “connect.”

“You need to catch ’em while they’re still young,” he said.

So I vandalized the principal’s office. In my defense, I was high as fuck.

Grandad sighed, setting down his porcelain teacup.

“You’re seventeen now. I can’t take it easy on you anymore. You want to own Lance Techs, you have to earn it.”

It was aggravating, this boot camp nobody asked for but everyone was trapped in. The constant insecurity, never knowing if you were “enough,” watching cousins turn on each other for scraps of his approval. My brother’s empty stare, void of free will. Another cousin’s breakdown. An older one’s exile.

I swore I wouldn’t play this game. And this was my chance.

“That’s the thing,” I told him. “I don’t want to own Lance Techs.”

He didn’t move.

“I don’t want any of this.”

His glare could eat you alive. His mouth shook.

“Your mother raised you in a fantasy. The kind that will leave you cold in the trenches. The Lance name is not one to be taken lightly. In this family, you pay your dues.”

“To what end? One cousin nearly offed himself. Another’s marrying someone he doesn’t even know. And Michael—”

He shot up. “Shut up! You shut up about that vagabond! You want to end up like him? You’re not fit for Iversen—never were. You’ve just earned your way into a nightmare. By the time I’m done, you’ll regret what you left behind.”

And that’s how I ended up here.

At a remote boarding school in a backward town called Maynard. Hand-washing laundry on a stone sink under a merciless sun.

“Bro, I don’t even know why you’re doing your own laundry,” said Bernard, my new friend at Maynard High. “Lexie said she’d do it for free.”

“But I’d have to date her.” I turned away.

“And? I’d give both kidneys to date Lexie a.k.a. Aquamarine. Heck, any of the Blue Girls. Well… except Siobhan,” he said.

I thought about Siobhan: frizzy ginger curls, honey-colored eyes. Pretty, actually.

Bernard laughed. “Wait. You think Siobhan is pretty?”

Shit. Said that out loud.

“That Siobhan,” he pointed, as she jogged down the path dividing the junior and senior dorms. Bright hair, green uniform, brown knee-high socks. Always the last boarder up from sports grounds.

The sky rumbled, darkening.

“Oh shit. They’re here.”

Bernard and I locked eyes, then bolted for the dorms. No wonder Siobhan was running.

“Hurry!” Shadreck our dorm monitor shouted, dragging us inside. Shadows crept past the sophomore classrooms. Footsteps scattered across the yard like polka dots on an ugly summer dress.

We froze, hearts pounding. One sound, and we’d be gone forever.

That was the school my grandfather sent me to.

A school I might not survive.

“They’re near.”