𝗦𝗜𝗗𝗘 𝗦𝗖𝗘𝗡𝗘 ⨾ vernon

02 | 𝗵𝗮𝗻𝘀𝗼𝗹

Okay. I'm doomed.

"Chew, where are my fifty bucks? You said you took them. Where are they now?"

If God ever gave me a superpower, I'd wish for an inherent capability to toss my brother away from me whenever he tackles me. I'd maybe wish to give me this ability where I'd just touch him and he'd fly away, far away from my eye-sight.

Oh, well. About eye-sight. I don't really know if that's gonna work since now I'm getting punched right where I have been given the fundamental ability to see. By my brother who thinks I'm a punching bag.

What has he taken in for breakfast today, though? His knuckles scream unwanted power.

About Darren Jisol Chwe, you only need to know one thing—that he's a douchebag.

"Here," I say, and show him my middle finger.

Jisol quickly grabs the finger and bends it the other-painful-way.

"Here. Say Ow. Say it, fucker." Jisol pushes me against a recently whitewashed wall. It sucks that The Birthgiver is out to get paint. Fucking paint, it had to expire itself right when Fucking Jisol was around the radar.

Actually, I'd wish for some other ability. Something to make me vanish. Completely. Forever.

"Leave. Me. Alone." My finger gives off and he finally leaves me. I bend down and pant unevenly, grabbing the now-bruised-finger of mine. Maybe I shouldn't have showed that to him at all. Or maybe I should have. He deserves it anyway.

"You and your fucking ass will get my money back to me, I don't want no excuses, you hear me, Chew?"

"It's Chwe, not Chew, you traitor."

Our family name doesn't come in much of liking for Jisol. He hates it here. He'd better go back to his half-sucking college and stay as a half-sucking student over there studying half-sucking—no-fully-sucking Architecture in Florida. I doubt he even gets grades. His teachers must pity him.

"Speak loudly."

"Fix your ears," I bark.

"Fix your mouth—and how you use your bloody fingers."

"Fix your existence, you asshole."

"What else you got in there, Chew? How much you hate me? Where is the money?" Jisol grabs my collar again and looks at me with this intensity that these villains with bad acting do in action movies. I feel like those weak heroes who save children.

His blue eyes are still the same. It's hardly believable that this same guy used to peel the paper wrap from the ice creams for me. Now, though, he looks like he could peel my skin.

"I ate cheeseburgers with that. Had fun," I say and don't break eye contact.

I hate my brother. I do. A lot. But I don't want him to slack off. Not with his non-prescribed meds at least. If I had his talent and looks and scholarship and that extrovert-instinct, I'd never lock myself up in my room, cut off school from my life list and beat up my brother for not giving me money for getting high.

"With fifty bucks?! Are you crazy?" He laughs, looks away, stares again, "You crazy shit, you give me my money back, I give you your pretty chime back." With that, Jisol does something I'll never forgive him for.

See, this is beyond silly, but I keep a locket. It's for girls. It was my mom's. It was my life.

When Jisol snatches it away from me, I feel this jolt of nerves getting electrified and short circuited. In my heart, everything of what I've left of her is shattering. He's heartless, but I'm not.