The rain hammered against the windows like Vaughn's face had hammered against the dirt when he'd finally stopped running from them. The four boys had gotten detention again, the third time this month, which meant jack shit to anyone who mattered but everything to the administration's precious statistics.
Larsen sprawled across two desks, his white hair catching the fluorescent lights in a way that made him look like a sickly angel. His boots left mud streaks on the desk surface. "Fuckin' Vaughn couldn't set up cans if his life depended on it." He pulled out his vape and took a long drag despite the no-smoking signs plastered literally everywhere. "Remember when he started crying? Like actually bawling?"
"Fuck yea." Keagan's voice cut through the drumming of the rain. He was perched on the teacher's desk, his own boots leaving mud streaks across some poor bastard's grading papers. "Dumbass really thought we'd let him into Gun Club just for fetching cans."
"Guy's already brain-dead anyway. What's a few more welts gonna do... and yeah." Tristan hunched deeper into his hoodie, his greasy hair curtaining his pallid face. "Natural selection at work." His fingers drummed against his thigh—probably already imagining the forum posts he could make about this. "Sub-5 IQ hockey monkey thought he could buy his way in. It's so over for braindead normies."
"Shit was hilarious though." Ewan's drawl carried from where he lounged by the window, absently watching rivulets race down the glass. "Boy squealed like a stuck fuckin’ pig when that first paintball hit. Thought he was gonna piss himself."
Larsen's laugh came out sharp and brittle. "Remember his fuckin’ face when we switched to frozen paintballs." He mimicked Vaughn's dumbfounded expression, opening his eyes wide and hung his mouth agape. "Like a fuckin' goldfish trying to comprehend quantum physics."
"Please guys, I just wanted to help!" Keagan's mockery pitched high and theatrical. He hopped off the desk, swagger in every step. "Motherfucker really thought carrying our shit made him worthy. Nah, bro. You're just another target."
They'd caught Vaughn alone for once, when there was no hockey team, and no Sports Club dealers to back him up. Just four guys who usually ate shit from everyone else finally finding someone lower on the food chain. The bruises on Larsen's ribs from last week's "accidental" locker room incident still throbbed under his designer shirt. Keagan's split lip from when Terrence decided he looked at Rafael wrong still wasn’t fully healed. Ewan's newest bruises were hidden under his ratty clothes, courtesy of Jensen who didn't like that some bayou trash had made him flinch in the hallway. And Tristan… well, Tristan just existed wrong in a school full of people who noticed.
"Best part was when he tried to run." Tristan's monotone carried a hint of satisfaction. "Tripped over his own feet. Face-planted right into the dirt...and yeah, natural order restored."
The papers sat untouched on their desks. Some bullshit about reflection and growth and understanding the impact of their actions. The kind of therapeutic garbage that guidance counselors probably jerked off to at night.
"Fuckin’ said that peer counseling is the ‘next step’." Larsen spat the words like they tasted rotten while making mocking air quotes. "They really think making us talk about our feelings is gonna fix shit? Next they'll have us doing trust falls and holding hands singing Kumbaya."
"I'll put a bullet through my skull before I do trust falls with anyone from this shithole," Ewan muttered, and everyone knew he wasn't entirely joking. The scar on his lip twisted when he smiled, it made him look like something that crawled out of a swamp to eat souls.
Tristan finally looked up, a cruel smirk playing at his lips. "Vaughn probably volunteered for it. Probably thinks it'll help him process his trauma or whatever bluepilled cope they're selling."
"Trauma." Keagan laughed. "We gave him character development. Free of charge."
But they all knew the real trauma came later, when the hockey team found out what happened to their back-up goaltender. When the dealers in Sports Club realized Gun Club had fucked with their business. The food chain at Legacy High was clear, and they were nowhere near the apex.
"Speaking of..." Larsen's pale eyes finally acknowledged the room's fifth occupant, who he'd been deliberately ignoring until now. His gaze traveled over them with mild interest. "The fuck are you in here for? Bite someone's ankles?"
