CECE, DISRESPECTFULLY | rewriting

02: DOGS EAT DOGS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIT

            'Perhaps it's my fault for not outlining the definition better, but I would consider triggering the sprinkler system for no reason whatsoever as intentional destruction of school property.'

Nicolás curdles in the plastic chair beside me. Locs gathered into a knot that droops to the right and dark circles hidden behind his glasses, he's glaringly tired... Or maybe just tired of me.

He accepts his role as damage control, though.

'They've got difficulties curbing impulses, sir. He knows it were wrong.' Nicolás's pretence is thinly veiled, but it's his audacity to keep it up that makes it so persuasive. 'It won't happen again.'

Sprawled on my chair, I trace the BURN IT ALL carving on my lighter and numb their conversation to white noise—I'm a "disruptive influence", I'm "too disinterested", I have "issues with authority". Maybe if they came up with summat new to say, I'd bother to pay attention.

I flick the zippo cap open and shut. Open and shut. Open. And shut. In series of three.

On and on. Just as my thumb brushes the spark wheel, Nicolás latches onto the lighter. Unafraid of my mangled knuckles, he claws my fingers off one at a time until he wrestles it out of my grip and shoves it into his pocket.

Then he smooths signs of physical altercation from his clothes as if the effort will somehow wipe Cobham's short-term memory.

'They're well sorry.' He kicks my shin. 'You're well sorry.'

'Dead sorry,' I echo.

'It won't happen again.'

'It won't happen again.'

Cobham observes us over his desk without a speck of interest.

His attempt to impose a sweltering presence into the office fails. He might be intimidating to a rookie, but I spend more time here than in my bedroom; he's about as scary as a bichon frise.

From the repetitive string of TOO HIGH 5 SCHOOL sharpied onto the rubber around my Vans to the top of my makeshift mohawk, achieved by braiding three cornrows to either side of my head and propping up the middle strip, I can't find a vacuole that cares.

'Cecilio has collected more detentions and isolations in five months than any pupil in this school.'

Without my lighter to fidget with, my fingers tangle into a curl at the centre of my hairline. I stretch it to my nose and let go, watch it snap back into its coil.

As their stares continue to prod, I flash my customised grillz that spell F-U-C-K across my front teeth. 'And haters will still say I ain't never accomplished nowt.'

Cobham's pursed lips don't so much as twitch.

Nicolás is equally unamused. He pushes up his glasses, which he normally won't wear out of the house, and sits straighter, like maybe if he's got a steel rod up his arse, it'll balance out my sagging posture.

Mirroring him, I scoot my chair closer to Cobham's desk. 'Is it possible that's not my fault but a classic case of favouritism?'

In response, Cobham lifts a grey office box onto the desk. It's branded Cecilio Velez Agudelo. 'Let's check.' He grants me a mocking smile and plucks a pale blue detention slip from the surface. 'Failing to complete homework and when asked why, explaining that it's too boring to bother when you could instead get high and listen to Bad Brains for six hours.'

Nicolás whines. 'Why would you say that?'

'You taught me not to lie. This is your fault.'

Probably not favouritism then.