LANCASTER AND MAXWELL ( ✔ )

chapter four.

Chapter Four.

IT all starts with a swing on the playground.

The year is 2006 in Mobile, Alabama, and Sullivan is seven years old. He likes to pretend as if he doesn't remember anything from his childhood, but that would be a lie because his memory is impeccable — he knows pi to the fifteenth digit and the longest word in the dictionary and would gladly tell anyone if they wanted to hear. 

The young boy has just had his front tooth pushed out from his last fall off the jungle gym and now had a wide gap in his mouth he showed to whoever dared look. It's the third week of school and he has on his favorite blue Transformer shirt with Optimus Prime on the front, and he has finally gotten a swing for the first time that year. He takes no more than four swings before an older boy by the name of Greg Nowicki pushes him, just gets up and fucking plucks him off like he's a piece of lint and there goes Sullivan-Jaymes falling into the dirt. The ginger laughs meanly and plants himself directly in the newly vacated seat. All his little mind can focus on is the bleeding scratch that's now on his knee, and he pouts. Being the only kid to skip the second grade and obviously the smallest in school, everyone can take what they want from him and he can do nothing but sit and watch. He likes to think he's mad, but he soon realizes he's nowhere near as mad as a bystander was.

His teary eyes can only see a blur of blonde hair move past and straight to the culprit in front of him. The kid in question, Arthur Lancaster, is the new third grader on the block and had only been to school for a little over a week; even then, he had a known reputation for disliking bullies and letting everyone know it.

"Give it back!" Arthur protests, his lips pulling into a gnarly frown. "You can't do that!"

The young boy only watches as the strange blonde boy stands up for him, but the grown ass man that is Greg Nowicki soon grows tired of the bickering child and pushes him too, in the ground. For the first time in his short life, Sullivan-Jaymes feels the undeniable urge to act on the rage that sits in the pit of his belly. "Hey, get off him!" The tiny voice is ignited with passion as he grabs a handful of rocks and tosses it at the bully's face. After that, a whole fight ensues that ends with a trip to Principal Wilgus' office.

The boys sit side by side on the wooden bench outside the door, the blonde holding an ice pack to his bruised cheek and Sullivan with a lens popped out of his specs with tissue stuffed in his bloody nostrils. His sense of bravado left as soon as he steps inside, and his timidity comes back in waves. In all honesty, he just wants to sit in silence and regret what he's done by himself. Unfortunately, the blonde boy sitting beside him won't let it happen so easily.

"Why'd you just let Greg take your swing like that?" Sullivan turns his head to the older boy beside him who looks almost irritated with him, so he doesn't feel bad when he snaps back at him.

"I didn't let him jus' take it. He shoved me out of it, didn't ya see?"

"You didn't fight for it," he countered.

"I'm the smallest shrimp in the school, how far you reckon fightin' gonna get me?"

"That don't mean nothing if you didn't fight for it. Being small can only be an excuse if you lose."

"You're actin' like a jerk right now." If his voice wasn't so nasally, Sullivan would've actually sounded as mad at the boy as he intended to seem like.

Arthur quips back with no hesitation, "And you're being a little punk."

The boys sit in silence, both too stubborn to admit defeat, but Arthur can be grateful in the right places. "It was really cool of ya," he starts hesitantly, "That you helped me out."