Brothers

[TheFoxxehAssassin]

In case some of you (Like, as in four of you ) were wondering, this is the story I decided to devote most of my time to. I may or may not finish The Perfect Shot.

Anyways, here is a new masterpiece (As I like to think of it) by yours truly. If you like it, leave your comments and blah blah blah.

Oh, and this is just the first chapter. It's not the whole thing, or anything like that!
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Brothers


My eyes cracked open. The buzzing of my alarm clock had awoken me from yet another dream that would never come true. I looked at the clock. It read, “7:22 A.M.” I did not want to get up. The school day would be filled, yet again, with useless and boring work. Even though I was considered the most popular kid in school, I still felt an emptiness inside. I crawled into my mind, and thought back to my past.

It all started fourteen years ago today, on May 12th, 1999. I was in my mother’s arms, when she suddenly stopped breathing. The stress of the childbirths had caused her to go into cardiac arrest. The doctors and nurses shoved me into my father’s arms, and then concentrated on my mother. They tried everything to revive her, but it was to no avail. She was pronounced dead twenty minutes later.

“She had a poor heart,” my father had said numerous times. “She just couldn’t take the stress of twins being born.” Even though I knew it wasn’t really my fault, I couldn’t live with myself knowing I had caused the death of a person I hadn’t even known.

Returning to reality, I jammed the annoying white box with my hand. Turning onto my back, I thought of what life would be like if my mother were still alive. Closing my eyes, I caught myself drifting into a deep sleep once again.

“Hey Nick! Get up! We’re gonna be late for the bus!” My eyes busted open. I had fallen asleep, yet again. My twin brother John was hovering over my bed, with his eyes gazing down at me like a hawk. I peeked over to my clock, and found it read, “7:34 A.M.”

I hadn’t wasted too much time. I swished the covers off of my bed, and jumped out. Running to the bathroom, I heard John calling after me, “Hey! Happy 14th, dude!” I barely noticed his comments, stripped all of my clothes off, and turned on the shower faucet. I jumped in the shower, and quickly washed my hair. I also made sure I had gotten most of my body wet enough to call clean.
Figuring my shower was already, I turned the knob until it hit “Off,” and stepped out onto the floor mat. I grabbed a towel off the floor, and patted myself dry. Looking in my closet, I grabbed a shirt and pair of underwear that were clean, and threw them on. Next, I snatched the same pair of jeans I wore every day, and pulled those over my legs. Finally, I searched the closet until I found a clean pair of socks.

Pulling on the socks, and opening the bathroom door at the same time, I rushed back into my room, and looked at my nightstand next to my bed. Reading the clock, I discovered I had a mere fifteen minutes before the bus arrived at eight o’ clock.

Right as I was about to walk downstairs for breakfast, I sniffed a peculiar smell emitting from the room, and decided to investigate. I ran over to John’s bed, and pulled back the covers. There was a huge yellow spot on his white sheets, and I realized he had wet the bed again, for the second time this week.

Deciding to leave it alone for the time being, I covered the bed back up, and walked out the bedroom door. Charging down the stairs, I hopped off the bottom step, and strolled into the kitchen. John was sitting on the barstool next to the center counter, eating a bowl of cereal.

“Did Dad already leave for work?” I asked him, sitting in the stool right beside him.

“MmmHmm…” he mumbled, eating a spoonful of Lucky Charms. He swallowed. “He said he had a meeting to go to, and that he’d be home at 7:30 or so.” He took another bite.

“Oh, okay.” I suddenly remembered something. “Hey, by the way, happy birthday, bro!” I reached for a bowl, and the box of cereal.
I ruffled his brown hair a bit, and poured a cup of cereal into my bowl. With no time to add milk, I jammed three spoonfuls into my mouth. I stood up from the chair, and carried the bowl over to the sink. I set both the bowl and spoon inside, and washed them out with cold water. John walked over and set his bowl inside too. After washing both our bowls out, we raced to the front door, where our backpacks waited. Without skipping a beat, we grabbed our heavy black backpacks and opened the door all in one swift motion.

I waited as John closed and locked the door, then we raced over to the bus stop nearby. There was a small crowd of kids standing there, all waiting for the yellow bus to arrive. We turned on our brakes as we reached the driveway that acted as the bus stop, and set down our packs.

“Hey John, Nick, happy birthday guys!” My friend Carly shouted. All the kids at the stop turned around, and vocalized their wishes for an awesome fourteenth.

“Thanks everyone!” John and I shouted in unison, completely used to the public attention. We were considered the most popular and attractive guys in school, and every day we had girls practically fainting if we so much as talked to them. We didn’t normally think anything of it, and just continued on with what we were doing. A few of the girls at the bus stop giggled, and we just smiled back at them.

Then, the large yellow bus pulled up to the curb. The words “Hartford Independent School District” were stenciled in large black letters on the side of the bus. The bus screeched to a halt, and the crowd of kids parted, letting us get on the bus first. The doors swung open, and John, Carly and I climbed up the steps.

We heard a couple of squeals coming from the bus, but we ignored them, and walked to our regular seats in row 17. Carly sat in the seat across from us, alone, like she always did. The last of the kids boarded the bus, and the doors closed.

The driver waited for everyone to take their seats, and then shifted the gear to Drive. We felt the bus jolt forward, and pick up in speed. I reached into my backpack and pulled out a book. It was titled, “Twilight.” Carly had gotten me to read it, because she said I looked like the actor who had played Edward Cullen. She had shown me a picture of him online, but I couldn’t see the resemblance. It really wasn’t that good of a book, but she told me it was good, so I reluctantly agreed to continue. John said it was way too romantic for him, and didn’t read it at all.

We continued on the streets until we hit the main highway that connected our neighborhood to the school system. I tried to keep my book still, but the constant bumps were making it very hard to read. Feeling nauseous from the reading, I closed the book, and set it back in my pack.

I pulled my Blackberry cell phone out of my pocket, and checked all of my emails. There were only two new ones. Looking at the first one, it was a message from a girl who liked me. I cracked a smile. ‘Who doesn’t like me?’ I thought to myself. I chuckled, and checked the other message. It was from one of my teachers, reminding me about an assignment I was to turn in today.

Making sure I had completed the paper, I grabbed my binder, and opened it up. There, sitting at the very front, was my report on the water cycle. We had learned about the water cycle for countless years, so this was just basically a review.

I closed up my binder, and put all of my things, except my phone, back into my backpack. I decided to ask John about the “incident” this morning.

I tapped him on the shoulder. He turned his head and looked at me. “Yeah?” he whispered quietly. There was barely anybody even awake on the bus, so any talking would be noticed, especially coming from us. “What’s up, Nick?” he asked me.

“Text,” I whispered. He nodded his head, and pulled out his cell phone. A message flashed up on my phone’s screen.

John: What’s up?

Nick: So, about last night…

John: What about last night?

Nick: Did… “it” happen again?

John: It looks like you saw…Let’s just talk later, k?

Nick: Alright, I won’t say anything.

John: Thanks bro, I owe you one.

We both flipped our phones off, and I looked out the bus window. I was sitting closest to the window, so I could see the city skyline of Hartford quite well. There were a lot of large city buildings, but I had never been in any of them. I had lived in Hartford all of my life, but I hadn’t been in the city ever since my eighth birthday, six years ago.

The bus ride lasted another twenty minutes, before we finally reached the junior high school. It was nearly brand new; it had been built just last year. The bus pulled into the covered port, where there were at least ten other buses in queue.

The bus came to a screeching once again, the noise piercing my ears. The driver waited until the other buses unloaded their passengers, and then, she switched open the doors.

John, Carly, and I all stood up, and walked to the front. We were so well known and liked throughout the neighborhood, nobody ever protested that we get off first, not even the driver. We stepped down off of the bus, and walked up to the back doors.

I ran up, and held the door open for both Carly, and John. She thanked me, and walked in. John just laughed, and followed her in. As soon as both were inside, I followed both in as well, letting the door shut behind me.

We walked up to our lockers, which were right beside each other, as we had requested. I entered my combination, “30-10-15” and the locker clicked open.

I swung my backpack around to the front of me, and pulled out my Algebra 1 book. Since my teachers figured I needed a ‘challenge,’ they gave me high school courses to take. I thought they portrayed me a little bit too smart. John, unfortunately, wasn’t perceived as smart as I was. I stuffed the book into my locker, along with my English and History books. Knowing that was all I needed to put in, I slammed my locker, and waited for Carly and John to finish up.

John soon shut his locker, after putting in his things. Carly, who always took forever applying makeup, was the last of the three of us to finish. John and I laughed at the ridiculous amount of mascara she had put on, and parted ways with her. We walked to our first period, which was Science, and took our seats.

The bell rang, and Mr. Conroe, our science teacher, told us to take out our homework. I reached into my backpack, and pulled my large, green binder. I opened it up, pulled out my assignment, closed it, and set it back in my backpack.

I rubbed my eyes together, and yawned, still not completely awake. This drew little attention from anyone, and the Mr. Conroe continued on. I sat, listening to him drone on about water for almost an hour, when the bell finally rang.

I stood up, collected my things, and waited for John to follow me. Strangely, he stayed seated, as if class were still in session. I went up, and tapped him on the shoulder, in case he had drifted off, as he did sometimes.

“Go on ahead, Nick,” he said. “I gotta talk to Mr. Conroe about something.”

“Oh, alright,” I replied. “I’ll see you at lunch.” I walked out of the classroom, and onto my next class, Algebra. I sat through it, bored as usual, and continued on to the rest of my classes.

Finally, at 12:00, it was lunchtime. I was starving, and knew the cafeteria was serving corn dogs, and pizza today. I rushed along through the crowd to the lunchroom, where there was a very short line. I had gotten there very early, and decided to set my things down at a nearby table. Then, I got in the nearest line, which happened to be the line for pizza. Waiting only a minute in line, I grabbed my tray, and sat down at my table.

Carly had already arrived, along with her friend Sarah. I sat down next to Carly, with one seat left for John. The cafeteria was beginning to buzz with students.

“Hey Nick, what’s up?” Sarah asked, staring at me with a longing look on her face.

“Oh, uh…” I stuttered. “Nothing really, just waiting for John. I haven’t seen him since Science, have either of you?”

“Nope,” Sarah replied, still holding on to her dreamy gaze.

Carly noticed this, and merely laughed. “Naw, Nick, we haven’t seen John since this morning,” she said, laughing at Sarah’s expression.

I heard someone call my name. I looked over to my right, where I say John standing. He was waving his hand at me, telling me to come over to where he was.

“Hey guys, I’ll be right back,” I said, getting up.

“Okay Nick!” Carly called after me. I jogged up to John, standing with a sad look on his face.

“What’s wrong dude?” I asked him. “Is everything okay?”

“No, this isn’t okay,” he said sadly. “I have to tell you something, but somewhere a little more private.

“Oh, okay,” I said, figuring what the conversation would be about. We walked into the Men’s Restroom, which was deserted. “What’s up?” I asked.

“Promise not to laugh?” he asked me. “I mean, it’s kinda embarrassing.”

“Hey, you know me. I would never tell anyone something you didn’t want me to.”

“Okay… Well, see, I’ve kinda been doing poorly in some of my subjects.” I nodded. This had happened before. He wasn’t exactly a Straight-A student, after all. “But, I’m kinda failing. In science. And Mr. Conroe says that if I don’t pass this semester, he’ll flunk me, and I won’t be able to move up to eight grade with you.”

“That’s bad,” I said to my brother. “There’s no way anyone would even look at you knowing that you’d flunked a subject. Look, maybe I can help you with some things, okay?”

“Alright, cool. Thanks Nick.”

“No problem. You are my brother, after all.” Thinking the conversation was over, I started to walk out of the bathroom.

“Wait Nick, there’s something I still need to tell you.” I turned around. I knew what this was going to be about. “About…that thing… I think it’s coming from stress of some sort.”

“Oh, I’ve heard about that. Don’t worry John, we’ll talk more when we get home, okay?”

“Alright, cool.” He grinned. “I think Carly and Sarah are waiting for us anyways.”

“Yep, they probably are.” I patted my brother on the back as we walked back to lunch.


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Now, if you guys like this, I will continue. Thank you, and enjoy your flight.

[junyour]

An excellent star of a story. I hope it lives up to the beginning

[richbaby]

Very nice start, twins are hard to do.

[satyrical]

There is a lot that I like about this story- your narrative flow is great and I love the strong bond between Nick and John. However, I find the narrator to be very annoying, in the way he brags about how good looking, smart and popular he is. It's really hard to believe.

Of course, I do want to see more. I look forward to seeing where you take this.

[baconbit]

Algebra an highschool corse maybe but it isn't unusual for some people to take it in middle shcool.

[TheFoxxehAssassin]

Originally Posted by genbaby

Algebra an highschool corse maybe but it isn't unualal for some people to take it in middle shcool.

Is this what you meant?

"Algebra is a highschool course, but it isn't unusual for some people to take it in middle school."

Sorry, sometimes I have a really bad habit of correcting other people's posts.

Glad you guys like it!

[LittleAdam]

I really enjoyed this first chapter as well. I definitely think you should continue.

[Takashi]

Not bad, please continue.

[richbaby]

Originally Posted by TheSilentAssassin

Is this what you meant?

"Algebra is a highschool course, but it isn't unusual for some people to take it in middle school."

Sorry, sometimes I have a really bad habit of correcting other people's posts.

Glad you guys like it!

I took Algebra in the 7th grade

[Roman]

Continue writing, please