Until. We. Die

.5.

Day two of our 'detention' was less miserable than the first. We both sat on the opposite sides of the room, Hunter had his lunch and I had mine. We both sat with homework out, Hunter actually was eating while working while I was doing neither.

I couldn't muscle the want or need to do homework right now. I'm tired. My head is throbbing, I ran out of the medication I was given. I wanted something to numb all the muscle aches other than the over-the-counter stuff I had to use now.

It wasn't working therefore I couldn't muscle the strength; physically or mentally to even look at the sheets and book in front of me. My head was pounding along with my right leg. All night I had been up practically barricading the bathroom until my dad passed out. I hadn't gotten any sleep, my body was only starting to heal itself from the previous days.

The bruises were now fading yellow all over my body, my muscles starting to relax again. I was able to walk with the small limp again. That was the first thing people seemed to notice today. Yet everyone knew about my knee injury and no one batted an eye at why it wasn't healed yet.

It all went by slowly without us arguing for once. Every now and then Hunter and I would glance at each other, but he hadn't said anything to me. The silence that I wanted wasn't right. I hated when he didn't argue with me and I hated when he did.

He had earbuds in and I could somewhat hear the music playing through them, some band he listened to blaring their soft music through the earbuds as he worked. His music taste hadn't changed much over the years.

He loved that artists and others like this one, their music was more calming to him. Softer music usually blared through whatever he was listening to at the highest volume.

He didn't need it to be loud music, he needed it to be loud so he could think. That's what he would tell me when I told him that the volume he had it at would damage his ears later on. When we started middle school I forced him to listen to music more quietly cause I thought he was already going deaf.

He acted like he was going dead a lot, zoning in and out and had selective hearing growing up.

I guess he still does that.

His music is calming though, I always enjoyed it growing up. It was different from the country and rock music our parents listened to at home and in the cars. We both hated rock, I still can't stand it. And lord knows he needed calming music when he was a kid. He had major anger and separation issues as a kid. Him playing piano helped with it all too.

I guess people could still say he had some anger issues now.

I can remember most times he blew up at something or someone, it mainly felt when people were with me. He really hated when I hung out with other people, mainly because other people ended up being mean. He was so defensive as a kid with me, always dragging me away from groups when he saw the slightest bit of harassment or form of it.

Part of it was separation anxiety, or something like it. I always called it separation anxiety because it was close enough. Part of it was him always saving me from bullies or kids who were just naturally mean.

I remember the one time it really came out, was when we were twelve, it was recess and we were on the swings at the school playground. We were fine, until some kids came up and asked if we wanted to play in the kickball game happening. Clear as day, Hunter pulled us up and to the field where there was a large kickball game happening. Both of us were relatively active and were more than willing to play as long as we both did it.

The line up had us separated, we were about ten people apart, Hunter kept looking back at me to make sure I was still in the area with him. When Hunter went up to kick, there were still a lot of people in front of me. I was alone in the line as some older kids came up to me. I was on the smaller spectrum of size for in our grade, and these guys were a grade or two above us.