Anathema pt 1

Scott turned off the engine of his car. He sat still, listening to the noise around him, for an innumerable amount of time. He could hear the voices of everyone he hated, and everyone he could tolerate, around him. It was his birthday. It was his day.
         "WOO! BIG EIGHTEEN!"
         Joshua Chaplin, a football player, had jumped on the hood of his car. Scott jumped out, slamming his door.
         "What the hell are you doing? You're gonna put dents in my hood!" Scott screamed at him. Joshua jumped down, still smiling.
         "Your car's a piece of crap anyway.! You're eighteen! This opens up a whole world of possibility for you. Do you understand that?" Joshua grabbed his shoulders, shaking him. Scott laughed, pushing Joshua's hands away from him.
         "I understand perfectly."
         "H-h-happy b-birthday," said a voice from behind Scott. He turned around. Daniel Moreno was standing behind him, holding out a card. "It's just a l-little p-p-present," he said. Scott took the card from his hands and opened it. A twenty dollar bill lay inside.
         "This is great Daniel, thanks." His voce was softer as he placed the twenty dollar bill into his pocket. Daniel smiled, pushing up his glasses and smoothing down his boisterous black hair. 
         No one else wished Scott happy birthday as they made their way through the halls. Few people ever spoke to Scott, really. Scott liked it that way. He had always thought that Joshua was burdened by his popularity. He was always forced to be personable. But Scott, Scott was untouchable. He was almost the god of St. Augustine Catholic.
         Laurie Arismendez was waiting by her locker, leaning against it with her eyes closed and her hands tucked into her front pockets. Her brown hair lay in untamed waves to her shoulders. She opened her heavy-lidded eyes when they got close to her, smiling only slightly. Laurie Arismendez's beauty was of a dangerous nature. She was a siren.
         "So how's the birthday boy doing?" She asked playfully.
         "Not too bad," Scott replied. He stepped in closer toward her. Laurie smiled again, kicking Scott's ankle with the bottom of her tattered shoe.
         "I'm sure St. Augustine isn't the place you wanna be on your eighteenth birthday, now is it?" She asked. She leaned forward, kissing Scott lightly on the cheek.
         "Of course not," Scott said. Laurie nodded. With a last glance at him, Laurie turned and walked away. Scott shook his head, smiling at something that no one else could see. He turned to Daniel who was still watching Laurie walk down the hall.
         Joshua closed his locker to reveal his ex-girlfriend's face staring directly at him. His stomach jumped just a little. Amy was smiling.
         "What do you want Amy?" He couldn't stop the bitterness that garnered in his throat. He shifted his eyes to Scott and Daniel, who both made their best efforts to turn the other way and look occupied.
         "Can't I just come and talk to you?" She asked.
         "Oh, you want to talk to me? Are you sure you don't want to talk to Scott?"
         "Not that again, Josh."          
         "Don't call me Josh. My friends call me Josh." 
         Amy frowned, her lips pursing in the way they always did when there was something she couldn't figure out. It drove Joshua crazy. Whether it was in a good or bad way, he never was able to figure out.
         "What do you want me to call you then?" She asked.
         "Don't call me, ok? Can you handle that?"
         "I hate not being able to talk to you. This isn't how I wanted things to work out."
         "Well I know that," Joshua said. He glanced over at Scott, who was still keeping himself occupied with the contents of his locker. Daniel was watching them keenly.
         Amy threw up her hands. She was always one for dramatics.
         "Fine. Fine!" She turned away from him and stormed down the hallway. Her perfectly manicure hands were resting on her hips in frustration. Joshua ran his fist into his locker, feeling the pain shoot up into his arm. Scott wrapped his arm around Joshua's neck. It was an I-know-how-you-feel-and-I'm-sorry-bro. Joshua forced out a smile.  He wanted more. He wanted his best friend to apologize for being so appealing to the only girl Joshua had ever loved. And as much as he cared about Scott, he wanted to punch him in the face for it. But he wouldn't get that, because as much as Scott knew he was the reason that Amy and Joshua had broken up he would never admit to it.
         "Any more waiting and I'm gonna loose all my motivation, lets get to class," Scott said.
         "I never thought I'd ever hear Scott Marsters tell us to get to class," Joshua said.
         "Yeah well, it's the last day of school. I want to be done with it."
         "You know we still have another year to g-g-g-go right?" Daniel said. Scott shook his head.
         "Now you see Daniel, that's the part we don't talk about the day before summer."

An exodus of oxygen

         Scott watched the smoke gather on the windows inside his car. It drifted it from his lips and crawled up the windows trying to escape. He took the cigarette between his fingers, staring at it. He watched the wisps of smoke curl up and into the air.
         "Eighteen," he said softly. He turned to Laurie, with her knees up to her chest and a menthol cigarette resting at home between her lips. Her eyes were closed. "I guess that means it really is the end," he said.
         "The end of what?" Laurie asked without opening her eyes.
         "Everything. Of life. Its finally time for me to really start doing something if I ever want to make it out of war path, not end up like my father." Scott flicked the cigarette angrily and watched its ashes fall into the cup holder.
         "Or your mother," she added thoughtfully. Her unconcerned way of speaking didn't offend him, if anything, it was what had first endeared him to her. Laurie made no apologies. Scott put out his cigarette. 
         "Everyone tells me I'm going to," he said.
         "Going to what?" Laurie twisted a piece of her deep brown hair around her finger and twirling her cigarette in her free hand.
         "End up just like him. I can't escape him. I can't get away."
         Laurie made a face like she was going to say something. A knock on Scott's window stopped her. She quickly put out her cigarette and leaned back in the chair casually, almost comically. Scott rolled down the window, half expecting the police, half expecting God himself.
         A perfectly tanned face with a head full of dirty blonde hair stuck itself into Scott's car, smiling snidely. It was Ryan Davila; the Hades to Scott's Zeus.
         Ryan was fun and handsome and charismatic. He and Scott hated each other with the purest hatred that had ever been felt because they knew they were the same. Ryan Davila was everything Scott wasn't, but he was everything Scott was, too.
         "You know smoking's a nasty habit. You really should try to kick that," Ryan said. He had rested his arms inside of Scott's door, and Scott pushed them back.
         "You really should try to stay the hell away from my car," Scott replied.
         "So uh, Marsters, I never figured you to have a thing for the slut. I mean, you could probably have any girl at St. Augustine and you go for the school slut. Interesting, very interesting." Ryan smiled at Laurie. Scott tilted his head forward to block Ryan's vision.
         "What do you want, Davila?" he said.
         "Nothing, Nothing. I don't want anything. I just thought I'd warn you."  Ryan shrugged.
         "Warn me about what?"
         "It's over Marsters."
         "What are you talking about?"
         "This little game, it's over. For good." Ryan tilted his head, curling his lips into a sly smile. That was the same smile that drove St. Augustine girls wild.
         "You and me Marsters, we've spent the last three years battling each other, playing these little games. But we're not going to do it anymore. It's done with. Next year we aren't going to play anymore."
         "You're a fucking maniac," Scott said.
"Just so you know." Ryan said, still smiling. He stepped back from the car and turned to walk away. Scott watched him walk, and pushed his fist into the dashboard of his car. Laurie laughed. Scott looked at her, tilting his head.
         "Something funny?" he asked.
         "It's not over Scott," she said. "It'll never be over. You're like arch nemeses. It won't be over until one of you dies."
         Scott looked back at the windshield, tracing the crack that ran from the hood to the top of the car. She was right, although embellished, and he knew it. 
         Scott Marsters and Ryan Davila had never fought. They'd never even touched each other. But they both knew that it was inevitable. Once day they would have to finally prove who reigned supreme, once and for all. 

Enlarging your world

Daniel turned the key slowly. As he pushed open the door he could see his mother from the front door. She wasn't asleep, as he suspected. But she wasn't awake either. Her eyes were closing and opening quickly, and her head rested on the back of the couch.
Daniel walked directly past her. Scott and Joshua were behind him, and both tried to follow his heels quickly. Just as Daniel took his first step onto the staircase she called out.
"Daniel, where are you going?" Her words were slurred almost beyond comprehension, but Daniel understood every word.
"We're g-going upstairs, m-m-mom."
She stood up and stumbled over to the three of them. Her beady eyes glared from Scott to Joshua and finally rested on Daniel.
"Nothing of mine better be stolen," she said. She played with the gaudy costume jewelry around her wrinkled throat.
"All that's yours in this house is the al-alcohol and the s-s-s-sleeping pills," Daniel muttered. His mother grabbed the sides of his face. The smell of old vodka assaulted his senses as her face got very close to his.
"I put up with you," she said. The tips of her acrylic nails pressed into the sides of Daniel's cheeks. He squinted in pain.
"I kn-know mom."
She let go of his face and pushed him back. The red marks from her nails remained on his pale skin. As she walked away Scott tried to meet Daniel's eyes but he had already turned and walked up the stairs.
As soon as they got into his room Daniel closed the door and walked back out. Scott and Joshua took their seats and were looking up at him expectedly when he returned with the small brown box.
"What's that?"  Scott asked. Daniel smiled widely and opened the box. He delicately pulled the gun from the box and showed it to them. Scott jumped up.
"Where did you get that?" he asked.
"It's my m-m-mom's."
Scott took the gun from Daniel, cradling it in his arms. Both awe and corruption were written across his face as he traced each line and curve on it with his fingers.
"Is it loaded?"
"It wasn't when I checked this morning."
Scott laughed and tucked the gun into the front of his jeans.
"This is great," he told Daniel. Daniel smiled nearly ear to ear, unable to conceal his pride. Scott fell back onto the chair, placing his hands behind his head and closing his eyes.

The Cancer Station

         It was already getting dark by the time they all climbed into Scott's car. None of them had a place to go or a thing to do. They just got in and hoped the wind would carry them. Somehow, they ended up at the cancer station.
         The cancer station was an old privately owned convenience store. It sat on the corner of Arbordale's busiest street, and behind it was a casing of dense trees, where high school kids went to smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol. The station smelled like cigarette smoke and spray paint, from the various "taggers" who liked to spend their free time marking their territory in bright colors.
Scott got out of the car, Joshua following after him. Daniel sat inside for a moment, watching them from through the window. He could see Ryan Davila inside the store. He thought about the gun that was tucked into Scott's jeans, and his stomach sank.
         He didn't know if Scott had seen Ryan or not, but he didn't say anything to him when he got out of the car. When Scott said to him, "I need some cigarettes", he let him walk into the store unwarned.
         Joshua and Daniel waited out by the car. Ryan emerged from the store only a minute after Scott had gone in. He and his two friends were laughing heartily, expectedly at Scott's expense. As they made their way towards the back of the cancer station, Scott came out. His face had hardened and he followed after the departing Ryan determinedly.
         Daniel and Joshua did not ask any questions. They simply followed him. Scott followed Ryan all the way to the circle of trees at the back of the station. Ryan hadn't noticed that he was being trailed. As soon as they were completely cloaked in darkness and foliage, Scott shouted after them.
         "Davila!"
         Ryan rounded on his heels to face Scott. He didn't look surprised. He looked amused more than anything.
         "Marsters, come back for more? Why would you want to embarrass yourself like that?"
         Scott said nothing. He advanced on Ryan silently, his face incomprehensible. Joshua and Daniel followed at his heels, just as Ryan's friends stood behind him faithfully. They knew their parts as minor characters, but they were prepared to stand there until the end if they had to. Scott finally stopped when he was just inches away from Ryan. Ryan laughed in his face.
         Scott's hand moved to his beltline. As he brought the gun up to point directly at Ryan's face, Ryan's expression dropped. He looked surprised for a fleeting moment, then any fear he might have had was quickly masked by a sneer.
         "Trying to be a big boy now, are we Marsters?"
         Ryan couldn't deny the fact that if he had been anyone else, the sight of Scott Marsters at that moment would have terrified him. His eyes looked empty, reflecting the light from the moon onto Ryan's own face. It was like his soul had sunk so low inside him that it couldn't be reached anymore. His hand grasped the gun firmly. He wasn't shaking or moving at all. He didn't even seem to be breathing.
         "You talk big game Davila," Scott growled.
         Their hatred for each other radiated off of them. They could feel it pulsing inside them. It gave them power.
         "Put the gun down. I know you're not going to do anything with it."
         Scott cocked the gun. The click bounced off the trees and rang through their heads. No one moved. Daniel felt his own hands shaking as though he was the one who was holding the gun. Ryan lifted his hand up to the barrel of the gun, pushing it away from his face to Scott's side.
         "Come on Marsters," he said disapprovingly. Scott glared at him as Ryan backed away. When he was far enough to feel safe, he turned and left. Scott lifted the gun again, pointing it at Ryan's departing figure. He tilted it up just a bit and blew air through his lips, making a sound like a gunshot.
         Daniel stepped up to his side nervously. He grabbed Scott's wrist, pulling it down.
         "I'm gonna kill him," Scott said.
         "Come on Scott, let's g-get going," Daniel told him. He was looking at the gathering of trees that Ryan and his friends had escaped behind. His voice was unnaturally calm. Scott turned to him and smiled.
         "You like Laurie, right?" Scott said. Daniel raised his eyebrows.
         "What are you talking about?"
         "You like Laurie, I know you do."
         "Scott, look, Laurie's yours. Everyone knows it." Daniel still sounded confused, but there was no mistaking the defeated look that had invaded his face. Scott wrapped his palms around Daniel's face, his hand still clutching the gun.
         "Laurie doesn't belong to me, or anyone. Okay?"
         Daniel looked at him doubtfully. "Okay," he said. Daniel knew that he couldn't get Laurie Arismendez if he tried. She was too beautiful and too in love with Scott. But that was it; his permission to try. Scott's hands dropped from his face.
         "Okay, lets go," he said.

Brotherhood

Scott's house was silent as usual. He turned off his car and stared at the dark porch. Sitting on the splintered porch steps was his older brother Greg. It was as though someone had carved him out of the same wood as the steps.
         As Scott leaned forward he felt the handle of the gun pressed into his stomach. Without even thinking about it, he pulled it from his beltline and placed it in the glove compartment.
         It was darker than death around Scott's house. It got dark too early in Arbordale. It was as though God got tired of seeing the city after just a few hours and simply wanted to hide it under night.
         "I'm gonna need the car tonight," Greg declared as Scott walked past him on the steps. He didn't look at him, only took another drink of beer.
         "Fuck you," Scott replied as he pulled open the screen door. It was broken and swung off its hinges. As it slammed shut the noise echoed through the empty house.
         It was a shack composed of two rooms, a bathroom, and a walk- in- closet. The carpet had molded years before so it had been pulled up and was the floor had been lined with newspaper to keep the splinters out of their shoes.
         Scott opened the refrigerator. Beer, old milk, and a half-eaten slice of pizza. He slammed it shut. There was never any food.
         "Greg I'm out of bills so do you think," a female voice rang out from the second room. A small blonde woman emerged, pulling a shirt over her head. She stopped when she saw Scott.
         "Oh, you must be Scott," she said smiling. Scott nodded and turned away. He didn't know or care who she was. "Today's your eighteenth birthday, isn't it?" She smiled, leaning over the counter with her shirt still not completely over her chest.
         Scott nodded shortly, hardly looking at her.
         "So you as good as your big brother in bed?" She giggled, and Scott was reminded of every girl that ever hit on him at St. Augustine. He shook his head and walked past her.
         The walk-in closet was Scott's room. It didn't have a bed because he slept on the couch. All it had was a dresser, a small lamp, and a crumbled paper with a list of girls' names pinned to the wall. Joshua had made the list.
         Scott opened the drawer and pulled out a brown sweater. It was small. It was a girl's sweater. It smelled like menthol cigarettes and incense. Scott knew immediately. It was Laurie's. Something inside his stomach churned. He laughed in spite of himself and set the sweater on top of his dresser.
         He continued to search through his drawer. A small cigar box. He opened it. A few ounces of marijuana and a few papers. Scott closed the box and put it in his pocket. He would go to Daniel's house and get food.
         The girl wasn't in the front room anymore. Scott saw a stack of papers on the counter and he grabbed them. Bills and junk mail. It was all they ever got. Well, that, and,
         "Greg," Scott said. He opened the white letter, postmarked from the state penitentiary. Cradled inside the white paper was a check for two hundred dollars.
         "You have the keys?" Greg asked as he walked into the room. Scott didn't answer him, but stuck out the envelope for him to see. Greg took a look inside it, and disgust covered his face. "We don't need his dirty money," he muttered, throwing the envelope into the trash.
         "We need any money we can get," Scott replied, staring at the lid of the trash can.
         "Not from him, you get me?" Greg's voice was harsh, final. He left the room to take his place back on the front steps. Once the door had slammed shut behind him, Scott opened the trash and pulled out the envelope. He held the check in his hand, his mind picturing the two hundred dollars inside of it.
         Scott sighed heavily, tearing the check in half and throwing it back into the trash can.
         Greg was back in his place, carved where God had put him.
         "You have the keys?" he asked again.
         "Yeah, and I'm using them." Scott walked past Greg in the direction of the car, fisting his hands in his pockets.
         "Like hell you are. Get back here." Greg stood up and moved after Scott.
         "I'll be back," Scott told him. His hand was gripping the door handle when Greg came up behind him and spun him around. He pushed him up against the car so hard that the handle stabbed at his back painfully.          
         "Give me the keys," Greg said. His arm pressed against Scott's chest, pinning him to the car.
         "Fuck you." The handle was beginning to really hurt his back, but he didn't let it show. He couldn't let Greg see him.
         Greg pressed against his chest still harder. Scott could hardly breathe.
         Scott pulled the keys from his pocket and Greg snatched them from his hand.
         "Good boy," Greg said.
         Scott fell over onto his knees, trying to catch his breath.
         "Don't get so cocky," Greg said. "You don't do shit." 
         "And you do?" Scott replied. He pulled himself to his feet. "All we have in the world is that shithole house and the only reason we have that is because of the money that mom left us!"
         Greg advanced on Scott, grabbing his collar. "Look. Get this straight. Mom didn't leave us shit except a bunch of debt and a drug addiction. Mom left us here to die. You get that?" Greg pushed Scott back so roughly that he fell to the ground. Greg got in the car and sped away, the tires kicking dirt all around Scott.
         Scott struggled to his feet and watched the road. It wasn't so far. He could walk to Daniel's house.

American Dreams for the Damned

         It was almost midnight. Hazy grey clouds coated the black sky. There were no stars that night, but the moon shone bright enough to light the entire world. Joshua sat in a chair next to his window, his forehead resting against the cold glass. Kelly was sitting on the floor on the other side of her bed, her homework spread in a circle around her legs. Every few seconds he could hear her inhale loudly. He knew she was crying. But he also knew that acknowledging it would only make her feel stupid.
The only light in the room was from Joshua's stereo in the corner which was playing some symphony score; one of Kelly's CDs. On the other side of the door was shouting. His mother and his step father did this a lot. It was usually around the time of the month when the money started running out.
"Why don't you make him get a job? Its not like he does anything around here!" His step-father was talking about him, again.
"He has a lot to do! Football and schoolwork...You were the one that wanted to move to a bigger house!"
"You couldn't raise a family in that shack you were living in when I met you!"
Kelly's cries were getting louder and closer together. Joshua couldn't take it anymore. The tension was building up in his chest, tightening just around his heart. He got off the chair and walked right past Kelly without looking at her. When he swung open the door his mother and his step-father both stopped immediately and turned to him.
"Joshua, honey, just go back in the room with your sister," His mother was standing across the kitchen, still in her work clothes. Black tears had stained the length of her face.
"I'm not going to let him talk to you like that." Joshua's teeth were gritted. He stared at his step father.
"This is none of your business Joshua. Stop sticking your nose where it doesn't belong," his step-father said.
"I'm pretty sure it belongs here." Joshua didn't even notice that his football-player fists were clenched at his sides. His blood was pulsing through his thick veins.
"I'm pretty sure it doesn't. Now go back in the room." His step-father stepped towards him, pointing towards the door that was still open.
"Fuck you."
         "Joshua, baby, please," his mother cried. Her face was buried in her hands. It was like a needle had just punched through his heart.
"If you aren't going to listen to my rules, then get out of my house." His step-father had moved his hands to the front door. It seemed stiflingly close yet far enough to be in another universe. Joshua glanced over his shoulder and saw Kelly standing in her doorway. Her entire face was red and tear-stained. Her blonde hair was crumpled and stuck to her cheeks.
"Fine," Joshua said to his step-father. He walked over and grabbed Kelly's hand. She didn't say a word, but followed him out of the house. He tried with everything he had in him not to look at his mother as he walked through the front door.

"Where are we going?" Kelly asked after five minutes of silent walking.
"Where do you want to go?" Joshua asked. He hadn't even thought of where he was going to end up. Kelly shrugged and picked up her footsteps, leading him away.          
Somehow they had ended up in front of the church, the only holy place inside the War Path limits other than the small St. Augustine Chapel. There were a lot of churches on the other side of Arbordale, but only one on their side. It was Roman Catholic, but if you believed in any God, you went there.
         Kelly gazed up at the steeples of the church. She thoughtlessly played with a silver cross around her neck. It hung hopefully from a cheap silver chain.
         "Can I go in there?" She asked. She tilted the front of her head towards the church doors. The building itself looked as desperate as the rest of War Path. It was built by old brown brick, and the cementing was all but gone completely. The heavy wooden doors clasped desperately to their rusted hinges. The look on Kelly's face was like she'd never seen anything so beautiful.
         Joshua had been staggered by Kelly's question. She never asked if she could do something. She always just did it.
         "Mmhmm," Joshua mumbled. Kelly left him, walking slowly up the steps and into the church. The creak and slam of the heavy door echoed into the darkness. Joshua felt chills sliding down his back.
         Arbordale was sort of eerie at night.
         He could hear footsteps coming up next to him, the heavy dragging footsteps of teenage apathy. Joshua turned his head. One of his football buddies, Rory, was walking towards him with his hands in his pockets. Rory jumped when he turned his head up and saw Joshua. His eyes shifted from Joshua to the church, and confusion stretched across his face. Rory decided to ignore it.
         "You coming to my party tomorrow?" Rory said. He was a large boy, stocky, with a thick neck and small beady eyes. His best friend was Ryan Davila, so they should have been enemies. But Joshua didn't mind Rory so much, and he had always thought it best not to put his bad side on a guy who blocked two hundred pound meatheads from tackling him.
         Joshua shrugged. "I don't know much about it. Y'know?" He felt awkward, out of place. He wasn't going to ask why Rory was walking around by himself at night, and Rory wasn't going to ask why he was standing in front of the church by himself at night.
         "It's a bonfire, kinda like a turning of the tables sort of thing, you can bring your friends if you want." It was reluctant permission. Rory new that Joshua wouldn't go anywhere without Scott and Daniel, whether they were wanted or not.
         "Yeah, sounds cool. I might make it." Joshua said slowly. He really didn't have any plans to make it to Rory's party. Unless, of course, if Scott wanted to.
         "Try to-" Rory stopped. The heavy church doors slammed shut behind them. Kelly was standing at the top of the steps. She was watching them. Rory laughed. "And bring your sister," he added. Joshua said nothing as Rory turned and began to walk back the way he came.
         "Who was he?" Kelly asked as soon as she reached Joshua. Joshua looked at her.
         "No one."
         Joshua started back towards their house. Kelly trudged along. "I don't want to go back." She said suddenly, stopping dead in her tracks. Joshua turned around to look at her.
         "We have to go back, Kel, you know that."
         "No, we don't. We can go somewhere else, somewhere different. You can get a job and we'll find an apartment or something. We won't ever have to see him again." Kelly turned her face away from him, clearly ashamed at how naïve she knew she sounded. Joshua's heart was slowly falling into his stomach. He was lost. He was angry at his father, angry at him for leaving him to take care of his family before he was ready.
         "You know we can't do that," he said. Kelly was starting to cry again.
         "Yes we can, Josh. If Scott can live by himself,"
         "We can't leave mom there with him. If we leave, she comes too."
         Kelly frowned deeply. She wasn't even bothering to wipe her tears away.
         "She didn't care about us when she married him. Why should we care about her?"
         Joshua was amazed. All that strength and piousness that she'd been showing was casing nothing but fear and disappointment.
         "We have to care because she's our mom and she really loves us. She's trying Kelly. Some people just don't get good hands." Joshua looked down the empty street.
         "Okay," Kelly said. Joshua grabbed her hand, gripping it firmly. Kelly wrapped her arms around his waist. Joshua knew that, slowly, he was falling apart.