ZEV
"You'll be better off dead!"
Those were the last words that my mother had told me before kicking me to the curb.She didn’t cry. She didn’t hesitate. She just slammed the front door so hard the glass rattled in the frame, leaving me on the pavement with nothing but a duffel bag full of mismatched socks and a bruised jaw.
Turns out, I wasn’t better off dead. I was just better off a delinquent.
Now, I sat on the freezing stone steps of St. Mary Academy. A gloriously overpriced boarding school designed specifically for rich parents who wanted to pay someone else to deal with their mistakes. The uniform tie felt like a noose around my neck. I adjusted the collar, glaring down at my bruised knuckles.
I was supposed to be reforming. I was supposed to be fixing my “behavioral issues.”
Instead, I took a long drag from a smuggled cigarette, watching three other guys walk up the pathway toward the headmaster’s office. They looked just as wrecked, angry, and out of place as I did.
I was supposed to be reforming. While also fixing my “behavioral issues.”
Looking around at the other three guys, they seemed like quite the bunch. The one with blonde hair kept leaning into the one with red-dyed hair, who just kept glancing at his phone, completely annoyed.
I tossed my cigarette to the ground, crushed it under a stomp, and fell into step behind them. We all seemed to be heading to the exact same therapy office.
When I told my gang buddies back home that I was being sent to an all-boys academy, they filled the halls with laughter. They clapped me on the back, telling me how gay I’d become if I didn’t have any women around to play with.
I didn’t really care about girls much anyway. Back then, I used to just flirt with the cheerleaders until they invited me over to their houses. We did fuck a bit, sure, but it never became an actual relationship. I never let it.
I watched as the three boys stop infront of the door. I came to an halt a few steps behind so I don't clash into them. The one with blonde haiir turns the handle and they step inside I follow and closed the door behind me.
"Good Afternoon everyone, Please go find a seat" an old voice annouced to us. I looked around the room and my eyes land on the perfect seat near a window where I could ignore the whole session. I took the seat hands in my lap as I stare at the glass.
The old voice started to clear as if they were having a cold then footsteps started walking across the room. I finally break eye contact with a very uninteresting leaf to have a look at this so-called therapist.
I wasn't all that surprise our therapist looked like a man in his late fifties his hair was as white as snow and his eyes were pink as if he smoked something before coming for the session. To be honest, my gang buddies had also let me in on something else. Apparently, to them, therapists were no good. If you broke the word down, it sounded exactly like ‘The Rapist.’ And who would want to get their mind raped by a guy who looked like an old white hare?
The old guy took a piece of white chalk, walked over to the chalkboard, and wrote in big, sweeping letters:
BEHAVIOR REHABILITATION
I reread the words twice just to confirm that this was actually reality. Sitting in this classroom, with these other three boys, and this old, used-up therapist.
“Now that you all have arrived, we should all share names,” Mr. Harris said, turning around from the board. “My name is Mr. Harris, and I will be your therapist. It is my job to make sure your behavior is changed throughout our sessions.”
Mr. Harris’s pink eyes scanned the class, clearly waiting for someone to willingly open up about themselves.
When no one answered, the silence in the room grew heavy. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed. Finally, losing his patience, he extended a pointed finger toward one of the boys sitting in the corner.
The boy felt all the eyes shift to him and seemingly enjoyed the suspense. His blue locks fell over a pair of tinted glasses. Maybe it was some sort of aesthetic he was going for, because I could easily tell the glasses were fake.
He finally stood up, looking at everyone with a smirk.
“My name is Leonard, but I choose to go by Leaf.”
His voice was charming and rather amused. He sat back down in his seat, but not before pointing directly at the blonde boy with a smirk, clearly challenging him to introduce himself next.
The blonde boy blinked, caught off guard for a split second before his face morphed into a massive, cocky grin. He leaned back so far his chair balanced on two legs.
“The name’s Khristopher but I go by Kip,” he said, while looking up at the ceiling lazily before saying. “And honestly, Mr. Harris, unless you’ve got snacks in those desk drawers, my behavior is staying exactly the way it is.”
Mr. Harris’s jaw tightened, his pink eyes narrowing as he made a sharp note on his clipboard. He looked ready to blow, but before he could speak, Kip casually kicked the foot of the guy next to him. The one with the red-dyed hair who hadn’t looked up from his screen once.
Your turn, redhead,” Kip grinned.
The red-haired guy slowly lowered his phone. The glare he directed at Kip could have melted engine blocks. He slid his phone into his blazer pocket, his posture stiff and defensive.
“Dax,” he muttered, his voice flat and dangerous. “And I don’t need to be here.”
“We all need to be here, Mr. —” Mr. Harris started, checking his sheet. “Mr. Dax. And finally, the young man by the window?”
All eyes in the room snapped to me.
I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I wasn’t shy, nor was I the antisocial type, but sitting in a room full of other possible gang members was kind of nerve-racking. I fought the urge to swallow hard, regained my confidence, and looked everyone dead in the eye.
“My name is Zev,” I said, without breaking eye contact.
I wasn’t about to become someone’s prey by acting or looking weak. Mr. Harris clearly felt the iciness in my gaze because he quickly shifted his eyes downward and tried to change the subject, jumping into what we would be learning throughout the session.
My eyes drifted back to the window glass. I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of this classroom.
I never got the chance to zone out.
A loud, violent crash shattered the silence of the room as Dax suddenly lunged across the desk, his hands wrapping around Kip’s throat.
