Quiet Enlightenment

Part 3, Chapter 2 - Truths

The boy that was unpacking his stuff was the son of Cameron's mother's sister. Sylvester, just barely two years younger than him, had the reputation for being mischievous and a troublemaker. If you could take the bad qualities that Cameron had and combined them with the few good qualities that William had, it would be someone that was close to Sylvester.

Mrs. Elder grabbed Cameron by the arm and pulled him down into the hallway.

"So, why is he here?" he asked his mother.

"Well, he's been getting into a lot of trouble down in L.A. and his mother sent him here to get the benefits of living in a small town."

"Why doesn't she just move to a small town? As in somewhere in California. As in far away from here?"

"Cameron, that's not nice. You know that she's busy with her job in Hollywood and it would be an absolute nightmare for her to commute."

"But why us? Why can't he go stay with Dad? He's got to be lonely after..."

Mrs. Elder immediately got a sad look on her face causing Cameron to immediately feel a twinge of guilt over mentioning William. It would be like someone mentioning Elias to him.

"He's with us because I say so. Besides, he could use a good influence and a 'big brother' to keep him on the right track."

"You're kidding me, right?"

"You used to call everybody 'bro', correct? Now you can do it and mean it!"

With that, Mrs. Elder took off down the stairs and reached the landing halfway down before turning her head up and saying, "And don't let me catch you smoking again!"

Cameron nodded and turned around to see Sylvester standing in the doorway staring back at him.

"Hey." He said to his younger cousin, who politely raised his hand up and said "Hey."

The first words went over well, maybe this was going to work out after all. With a sigh of relief, Cameron turned around and went towards his room. After sitting down on his bed, he got out his phone and sent a quick text. After a few lines back and forth between him and the recipient, he had a weird feeling that was almost like breath on his ear.

"Whoa!" Cameron cried out as he turned around to see his cousin peeking over his shoulder.

"Whatcha doin'?"

"Just... texting someone." Cameron said as he locked the phone and slid it back into the front pocket of his polo shirt.

"I saw that. Sounds like it was kinda steamy." Sylvester said with a smirk.

"No, it wasn't. Leave."

"Who is she?"

"Nobody."

"So, you're texting that to nobody? Schizo?"

"What?"

"Oh, come on. I won't tell."

"You can if you want. There's nothing to tell."

Sylvester started looking around the room at the pictures to see if he could put a picture to the words. He pointed to a picture of Cameron and Elias with the end torn off.

"Is that her? She's kinda cute."

"One: That's a guy. Two: A dead guy. Three: He was one of my best friends. Four: LEAVE."

Cameron took the boy's arm and guided him out of the door before slamming it and locking it. As he heard the younger boy stomp back to his room, he knew that he was probably going to catch hell for that.