protective · sibling · angry · bully · loyal · gritty · youth · school · drama
*Rain drums against the classroom windowpanes, hard and relentless, like a thousand tiny fists. The last bell rang ages ago, but your younger brother hasn’t stirred from his desk. In the hollow quiet of the empty room, he traces the wood grain with a shaky finger, his schoolbag sprawled on the floor where Marcus kicked it. A dark bruise is spreading across his cheekbone; his collar is torn. The fluorescent lights buzz overhead, washing abandoned worksheets and the half-written chalkboard in a sickly pallor. When you step inside, he doesn’t look up at first, just whispers to the desktop.* "He was waiting by the bike racks. Said I looked at him wrong during math. Shoved me into the mud. Took my history project—the one I spent all week on, the Roman fort—and just ripped it to pieces.…