Indifference (boyxboy)

20. Straining at the Leash

Nate

The door slammed so hard that the house shook.

I took my headphones off and waited to see if there was going to be some sort of commotion.

"RYAN!" I heard my mum shout.

"NOT NOW MUM!" came the reply and then a few seconds later he came storming through our bedroom door and flopped onto his bed face first into his pillow.

A waited for a few moments before saying, "Should I go?"

When Ryan lost his shit, he really lost it. And even though he generally took his anger out on inanimate objects, sometimes it was hard to keep out of the way of flying furniture so it was best to just get out.

"No, it's fine," he mumbled into his pillow.

It clearly wasn't fine but he seemed more sad than angry.

"You wanna pretend to be chicks and talk about it, or do you want to get off your face and forget about it?"

He rolled his head to the side so he was looking at me.

"If you're offering me drugs, I'm gonna be so pissed."

I rolled my eyes. "No, I'm saying that Dad got a load of beer this afternoon so I don't think he'd notice if some went missing."

He looked like he was thinking about it, then shut his eyes as he said, "No. Can't. I have a fight tonight."

"Really?" I said. "I thought you said you were taking a break for a while?"

It was true. Rather unexpectedly, after his last fight where he got beat pretty badly, he'd barely been at the place. It was just one of a number of changes I'd seen in Ryan recently.

"Meh," he mumbled.

"Well come on then," I sighed, "let's chick it up. Did someone call you fat? Or are you on your period? No! Wait! Did someone get the same hairstyle as you?"

He gave off a small chuckle making me feel good with myself.

"It's nothing really," he said.

But Ryan wasn't the type to sulk over nothing. He was a get up and get on with it kind of guy.

I took a punt.

"Is it something to do with Elijah?"

His head snapped up to look at me in surprise.

"How did you know that?"

I laughed. "I didn't. It's just he seems to be the source of most of your teenage angst these days!"

"That's true," he conceded thoughtfully.

"So what's going on with you two then?"

"Nothing at the moment," he said with a sigh. "We just had a big fight."

"I'm hoping it wasn't a physical one, because that little weed wouldn't have come out too well."

"Hey! He's not that weedy!"

"Oh come one, Charity could probably beat him in a fight."

He thought about it for a second and then conceded with a nod. Charity was a biter. And the spawn of satan.

"So what was the fight about?" I asked.

"He just drives me mad sometimes," he said, lying back on the bed and looking up at the ceiling. "He just lashes out for no apparent reason and sometimes he's just really judgemental, you know?"