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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The gentle caressing breeze offered little comfort to Liam's rigid body. The sun was equally concerned for him, fighting to peer over the horizon and drawing red blood in the sky.
ㅤThrough the different streets and alleys, brick walls were increasingly vandalised with graffiti and bin bags piled higher along the pavements. Damp air thickened each step closer.
ㅤHood obscuring his face, Liam watched his surroundings cautiously. An old hunched woman scowled at him as he walked by, the skin of her face stretching over her skull and her grey hair wisping from her thin scalp. When Liam glared, she retreated back into her crumbling house with one last dirty look.
ㅤHe eventually reached the old industrial estate where concrete warehouses crumbled into ruin, stumbling over cracked tarmac. It was a few minutes till eight o'clock still and he was itching so he leant against a grotty wall and patted his pockets for a fag and lighter.
ㅤIt quashed his nagging crave, smoke filling his lungs and lulling his thoughts.
ㅤMore than four years had passed since he'd cut Rottweiler off and he'd never looked back. The place Rottweiler put him in had been no better than where he'd been and it'd taken him months to realise that.
ㅤRottweiler was sneaky. He approached teenagers and children from broken and vulnerable homes and encouraged them to distribute all sorts of drugs and illegal substances around their schools. The first occasion, no matter how reluctant, stamped their criminal complicity. Blackmail, abuse, rumours of even rape; leaving was difficult and painful. Rottweiler had friends in high places. Those who escaped across county lines were greeted by his business associates across the shires.
ㅤLiam had been one of those teenagers. He'd been fourteen when approached and promised thrills and distraction from his depressing life. Money, security, and drugs—eventually he too got hooked on what Rottweiler was making him sell.
ㅤHe'd been a favourite of Rottweiler's, going through the blurred orders without awareness and hurting children who'd wanted to leave too. Everything after his parent's death had been painful but Liam displaced that pain onto others. Some of them had only been ten or eleven years old, and Liam had been one of the older kids who'd forced them to stay.
ㅤIt was irredeemable and unforgivable.
ㅤLiam had insultingly escaped himself after several months by pure luck. The others hadn't been so fortunate.
ㅤBuzzing in Liam's pocket cut his self-hatred. Mia was ringing him. After one last drag, he flicked the cigarette to the floor, confident that the locals wouldn't mind the litter.
ㅤ"Yo, you wanna talk to me now?" Ever since their skirmish, they'd avoided each other, taking shifts only when the other wasn't.
