Fighting Family

21

Callum's POV

"Did you buy Weylyn a new book while you two were out today," I asked Ryder the second I got downstairs. He and Liam were putting away the groceries while Jax looked over the budget.

Ryder only stared at me for a second before sighing.

"Yes I did but come on Callum, one book isn't going to hurt. It was like 20 bucks."

"I don't care about the price," I said, trying to keep myself as calm as possible. "I care about the fact that I set up a rule for him and you not only disregarded it but actively chose to go against it behind my back. Why would you do that? We're all supposed to be a team here! You can't just ignore things you don't like without at least talking to me first."

"His punishment was unfair," Ryder said with a small glare. "You gave the two of them the same punishment even though one of them clearly did far worse than the other."

"It's not your place to decide that," I scoffed.

"I thought we were a team."

"Not when it comes to deciding punishments. They are my brothers, not yours. If they were your brothers I would let you do whatever you thought was best, the same way I hoped you would have done for me."

"I'm not going to just sit back and watch as you treat them unfairly," Ryder said as he put down a bag and came to stand chest-to-chest with me.

Liam and Jax watched us like a tennis match. The second one of us stopped speaking they would turn to the other to see the response, waiting to see if they needed to step in.

"If you thought it was unfair then you should have talked to me! Not go behind my back and do what you thought was right."

"Okay, fine, I think you're being unfair," Ryder said as he stared up at me. His arms were crossed over his chest, his brown eyes glaring at me with more hate than I had seen from him in a while.

"It's too late for that now," I seethed. "The damage is already done! Why didn't you tell me sooner if you had such a problem with it?"

"Because I thought you would be able to open your eyes and come to the conclusion by yourself! Reading is a coping mechanism and he has gone through a recent setback with the whole Andrew thing. He needs to have comfort right now and you denied it!"

"I didn't take away all of his books! I just said no new ones."

"And have you seen him read any of those old books recently," Ryder asked with a knowing glare. "He was going through a book in three days and yet he hasn't touched any since his grounding. Some people don't like re-reading books, especially when they literally just finished it. How often did I re-read the same books at camp?"

"He's not you," I said, trying and failing to keep my voice at a reasonable level. "He used to read the same books over and over despite having new ones sitting there waiting for him! I made this his punishment because I knew it would be okay."

"People change! You haven't been around him in a while. And that doesn't change the fact that it's unfair! Axel cussed out a teacher and threw a book at her and yet Weylyn is being punished in the same way just because he agreed to switch classes! It wasn't even his idea! Weylyn even told me he didn't think it was fair either!"

"Weylyn should have known better than to go along with Axel's plan!"

"Weylyn shouldn't be punished for Axel's mistakes!"

"If Weylyn hadn't agreed, none of this would have happened!"

"That doesn't mean they get the same punishment! Why can't you just accept that what Axel did was worse? I would understand if you made no new books or legos for a month the punishment for both of them switching classes but Axel should have gotten an add-on for everything else that he did!"