A Lion's Roar

Chapter 4: Monday Blues

Chapter 4: Monday Blues

"See you, Halt! Bye!" I could hear Dad showing Halt out. I jumped into the shower and was out before Dad finished clearing up and came up to my room.

"Nick, you alright?" I jumped and hurriedly dressed as if I hadn't known he would be coming. My dad was a pretty nice guy. He was an author, and mainly wrote books about fantasy worlds where the hero was always a person with no powers in a world of super powered people. In the end, the hero always won, precisely because he had no powers.

But he had banished my mother. I had heard him. And I could never, ever forgive him. For now though, I held my peace. It's not wise to bite the hand that feeds you, or in this case, feeds, clothes and houses you.

Later I would understand. Later I would realize. But not until it was too late. "Nick! Hey, you stoning or something?" I glanced up and shook my head. "It's alright. I'm good." He sat on my bed, grinning at me. "How are you really, though?" I placed my perfectly crafted false smile on my face. He seemed to accept it, although we both knew perfectly well that it was fake. He stood awkwardly, his lanky, fair frame brushing the low ceiling. Stretching his hand, he ruffled my whitish hair, grinning ruefully. "I haven't been that great a dad, huh? I'm sorry, Nick." I shrugged, non-committal, although the one thought that ran through my mind was: I wish I had different hair. I didn't know why, except it would save me quite some trouble with the bullies. But for me, that was a good enough reason for anything. Figures, huh? My father's having a whole guilt trip thing and all I can think of is my freaking hair.

Well, as they say, TGI Friday, that's for sure. I knew I was going to sleep in the whole weekend. Literally. But of course, first I had to finish my homework.

Eventually, I gave up on my last piece of Math homework [Anyone with me?] and tossed it aside. Forget it. Jumping into bed, I allowed the suppressed exhaustion of the whole week overcome me and peacefully drifted into the dark oblivion of sleep.

"BLINGGGGGGGG!!!" I shook my head sleepily and grabbed my alarm clock, pulling the easy-off lever I had installed a few weeks earlier. It sure beat throwing the alarm clock across the room.

Glancing at the clock, I barely registered that it was 1 pm and slumped back into my warm bed before stretching and stalking to my door like a crabby cat. Lifting the large cat flap that was nearly the size of the bottom half of my door, I looked out. Sure enough, there was a tray of food, half breakfast and half lunch. I grabbed it and backed into my room, where I sprawled on the padded floor, my computer open and logged onto YouTube.

After finishing my lunch, I stalked to the door and shoved my tray out. You see, my father and I have an agreement. He leaves me alone during the weekend and I leave him alone during the weekend.

Jumping into my bed, I curled up to listen to music until it was time to sleep. The rest of the weekend basically went by the same way and it was only on Monday morning that I realized.

I was washing my face, brushing my teeth and just cleaning up when I glanced up and almost choked on my toothbrush. WTH happened!? I stared.

My reflection stared back. It was the same. Almost. My gaze travelled up. The same face, the same blue eyes, and- What!?

My hair was... Black! Well, half. It was a jet black from bottom up, but halfway it changed abruptly into familiar pale blond hair. Shizuoka! What on earth!? Whoa... Now I looked even more like a freak.

Two minutes and a phone call later, I was exempted from school for another two days. I grinned, at least most of my hair would be black by then. Maybe the bullies wouldn't be so harsh after all.

~Two Days Later~

"Hey! Look it's the *bleep*er! He dyed his hair! Loser! Haha!" So on and so forth. Cringing, I continued to walk through the schoolyard. The bullies caught up with me though. They always did.

"Whassamatter? Didn't have enough dye to do all your hair?" I flinched slightly. It was true that my hair hadn't turned completely black, there was still a line of white blond at the top.

When I arrived home, my father took one look at me and didn't say anything. I thought at the time that he was ashamed of me, and that he was angry because he thought I had used dye. But, later, again much too late, I realized that it was understanding. He had a vague knowledge of my Gift, just what my mom told him, but he could tell it was developing. But at the time... At the time he didn't say a word.

"Dad, I'm going to Halt's." I looked out the window as a lone figure stood at the edge of our property. He merely nodded, and I felt a needle of rejection pierce my heart. As you can probably guess, my father and I had a rather distant relationship.

I grabbed my bag of essentials (phone, wallet, water bottle) and ran towards Halt.

I hope the audience is enjoying this, but I just wanna say something. This is an apology in advance.

I hope you're enjoying this shower of updates, but I just have to say that around August, September as the deadline for HoH draws closer, I may not be updating much, it's like a cram time so yeah, I really have to finish it up and do the editing once it's back.

~R

P.S. To ReallyRandomReader and AmberStarling, you guys already know what HoH is, but if I tell you, you'll know who I am, so I'm sorry but I can't say it right here.