CECE, DISRESPECTFULLY | ✓

03: TRIGGER-HAPPY

            'You couldn't last until nine a.m. before being sent home?'

I pull my hood up as I trail after him across the forecourt. Unsurprisingly for November in Manchester, it has started to rain.

'I'm not the one who decided to have an assembly first thing in the morning and then force me to attend.' I am the reason they had the assembly in the first place but that is not the point here.

Nicolás glares as I open the gate. 'You pulling the fire alarm for no reason is my fault, is it?'

'If you're volunteering...'

He knows me too well. I've barely taken a step outside the school gates before he blocks me. 'Get in the car, please.' The request is horribly miserable.

So I hoist my skateboard back under my arm just as I'm about to drop it to the tarmac.

To make sure I annoy him as much as possible, I jostle the handle of his gleaming Vauxhall like I don't know it's locked. Two can play at this game. Nicolás looks for his keys only when he stands at the driver's side, checks all his pockets until he finally finds them, and "accidentally" presses the lock button. I yank at the handle harder.

The air inside is arctic. I throw my rain-drenched jacket into the backseat but leave my backpack and skateboard at my feet. 21 Questions by 50 Cent blasts through the speaker when Nicolás turns on the engine and his phone automatically connects to the bluetooth. He turns it off.

I fold down the visor for the vanity mirror. My eyeliner has smudged in the rain but I don't clean it—it adds to the look, if owt. The mohawk has gone flat. I brush it under my hood, then straighten the horseshoe barbell of my right snakebite to make it symmetrical to the left.

The car heating is flaky and the air still nips at my neck when we turn to Claremont Road. Or that might just be Nicolás exuding so much despair that it frosts the windows up from the inside.

'You're the one forcing me to live with you,' I remind him. He can't blame me for his stupid life decisions.

'You're the one who decided to piss off every foster parent in this city.'

'I consider that an accomplishment.'

'Why is it so hard for you to act like a normal human being?' Nicolás's voice gets away from him. It's a challenge on any day to get him to yell but he edges dangerously near the border now.

Everything bad in his life is your fault.

'Have you considered that I'm not a normal human being, but an evil spirit sent here to torment you?'

The coals lodged somewhere between my lungs and heart broil, spit sparks that don't catch flame but spew smog all the same. Smacking the sun visor up, I knot my arms over my chest. The smoke swells, reaches from my chest to my fingertips, and exudes to my stomach where it feeds the swarming larvae.

Nicolás smacks on the indicator much more aggressively than necessary. 'You're not getting expelled. You're sixteen—you're required, by law, to stay in school for two more years.'

'Like I give a fuck.'

'Well, you need it to get a job.'

'I don't need a job; we're immigrants. I'll leach welfare.'

Laughter blasts from him, a bucket of ice water dunked over my head. 'You can't even shoplift without getting caught–'

'One time!'

'–But please,' he swats away my interruption like a fly, 'show me your hitherto hidden skill for committing fraud.'

The light ahead flicks to scarlet and Nicolás brakes so suddenly we lurch forward. The seatbelt saws my neck.

'D'you know how much paperwork it takes to even apply for benefits?'

I coil my arms tighter, palms so clammy they itch.

No offence to him, but Nicolás is the least intimidating person I've ever met. He follows orders like a dog that doesn't even ask for a treat. He wears seashells and charms in his long locs and the majority of his wardrobe is turtlenecks and printed shirts. It's surprising he don't get mugged every time he steps outside. He'd probably offer to stab himself and say thank you after.

It's a compliment to me, really, that I manage to get him to flash even a sliver of teeth.

'You sabotaging your future ain't gonna hurt no one but you.'

My eyes slit.

'We both know this ain't about my future,' I hiss. 'I'd like to remind the room that I never asked you to drop out of uni, you just did.'

It's your fault.

'I didn't "drop out". I deferred. I get that it's a foreign concept to you, but some of us don't give up the second summat becomes a little inconvenient.'

Everything bad in his life is your fault.

He wishes you had never entered it.

You like hurting him. We both know that.

'Just explain it to me,' Nicolás barrages on, unaware that he's competing with Beewolf. 'You're clever. I know that you're clever. You could be well good at school if you wanted.'

'I don't want to.'

'Why?'

I sink as far as my knees crammed into the glovebox permit. The seatbelt digs into my hipbones and my skateboard presses into my groin, uncomfortable but not painful enough for me to bother to move; I've committed to slouching now.

We reach a red light and he changes gear. The indicator clicks rhythmically. I watch the streaks of the brake lights on the windscreen change direction at each swipe of the wipers. The rain eases up, its incessant hammering slowing to irregular raps against the roof.

Nicolás drops his head back. 'Ain't four schools enough to be expelled from?'

The exhaustion in his voice gouges through my skin where anger couldn't. It wriggles to the base of my gut to wake the maggots from their rest.

I turn my head to watch my dull reflection in the side mirror. My eyes glint in the black void of smudged eyeliner.

Maybe it's because he's only twenty-three, or maybe it's the fact he's my brother no matter how hard he tries to be a parent, but Nicolás never manages to be angry for long.

But don't misunderstand: he hates you.

'Do you want attention? Cause flunking college is not gonna bring Mamá and Papá back.'

A single second of deafening silence follows.

It's fractured by the click of my seatbelt. Beewolf clacks its wings with glee. I grab my skateboard and backpack and climb out.

'Oi! What–?'

I slam the door behind me.

The lights turn green and Beewolf drowns into a chorus of car horns. Without glancing left or right, I flip off the impatient drivers as I stalk across the road. Rain still clings to the air. My hoodie's damp by the time I reach the pavement but my jacket's in the car and I'm not about to go back for it now.

I unravel my earbuds from around my phone, drop my skateboard onto the tarmac, and kick off.

Notes

College: Further education where pupils are aged 16-18 and complete year 12 and 13. Not university. For Americans, this is the equivalent of your last two years in high school.