Expulsion gave Liam Barrett a dangerous choice. Needing to transfer for his final year, he'd known immediately where to go. It was a distantly familiar place that'd taken everything from him; had once ruined him so absolutely and twisted his persona...
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Liam stumbled into the kitchen in nothing but his trousers, using his shirt as a towel to wipe his face after his morning run. His meeting with Rottweiler was that evening so he was edgy and short-tempered. He'd been left alone for a long time so the sudden contact was foreboding. That part of his life was behind him.
ㅤAaron was on a kitchen bar stool, watching him enter.
ㅤ"What?"
ㅤ"How the hell do you know Charlie Bradley?" Aaron asked.
ㅤLiam had expected the interrogation; Aaron was one of the only people who'd butt into Liam's business. Where most people tolerated Liam's bullshit, Aaron wasn't quiet about it.
ㅤ"Weren't you going to your girlfriend's today?" Liam was a good liar but he'd rather avoid this conversation entirely.
ㅤ"Not thanks to your psycho arse decimating that coffee table. Ella thought it was me you crazy fucker."
ㅤLiam smirked. Squeezing out an emotional response, like anger, was the easiest way to derail a cross-examination. Aaron fell for it more than anyone else did.
ㅤ"She obviously thought your track record was worse than mine."
ㅤ"My track record is your track record—you just blame it all on me all the time!"
ㅤTo a seething Aaron, Liam cocked his head innocently. Because he'd always been adept at reading people, knowing how to manipulate their tune and steer their thoughts came naturally. It was a generous inheritance from his father—the cunning of a businessman.
ㅤAs a child, he'd had to compensate with his sociability. His short skinny stature would've been blood in the water to the rugby-obsessed private school boys. He had to appeal and adapt without throwing up with the rest of them in the dark of 6 am, hands stinging on the frost-hardened paddock grass as he'd crawled on all fours. He hadn't the body for it back then. No, instead he'd laughed with them about his own uselessness whilst bridging them to the girls he'd befriended, offering comradery elsewhere.
ㅤExcept, he'd gotten a little too good at it. It'd become as effortless and thoughtless as breathing. It doubled after puberty, growing tall and strong. No longer just his sociability, he was then also on the pitch with the rest of them, sharpening both edges of his sword. His parents had no longer been around to remind him to control himself.
ㅤEven if he'd wobbled a little in his teenage years with the drugs and rich-boy parties, he'd gotten his act together eventually. Unfortunately, he'd stepped off the bad path with the weeds still stuck to him. His disdain for others and slight sadism remained.
ㅤ"Survival of the fittest, midget."
ㅤAaron scowled. "I'm above average, and fuck you for distracting me! Tell me why you're hanging out with Bradley."
