Connor had never particularly liked Mondays. Mondays always dragged on forever. They were the day of the week that held no promise of the weekend coming anytime soon. Even Tuesdays were better because at least he had one day of the week under his belt, but Mondays didn't have that luxury. It especially sucked because this Monday was the first day of school.
Like every first day, though, Connor dutifully rose to the sound of his alarm, groaning in frustration and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He had just barely slipped into a quasi-peaceful sleep after several hours drenched in a terror sweat induced by the multitude of nightmares he had endured over the past couple of years.
He swung his feet over the edge of the bed, starting as his bare feet touched the cold masonite floor of his bedroom. His room was by far the coldest in the house. Connor sometimes wondered if it was because even the warm air didn't want him.
He stood up, quickly putting on some socks before putting on the rest of his clothes. Although his family was rich enough to buy him designer clothes and fancy shoes, Connor bought all his clothes from thrift stores.
He told himself it was because he didn't support the cruel conditions endured by children making new clothes in sweatshops who didn't even make enough to feed themselves let alone their families. In reality, he just wanted to make his parents angry. They never tried to help Connor, so he figured he would be as difficult as possible.
He donned a pair of dark grey skinny jeans and a dark denim jacket over a grey vest and black t-shirt. He laced up his beat-up combat boots and paused for a second in front of the mirror to check how bad his bedhead was. He finger-combed through the worst of it, letting the rest of his long chestnut hair be its unruly self. There was one strand of his hair that was sticking up and wouldn't go down, no matter how much he tried to make it bend to his will. He started to get angry, threatening the innocent strand with water if it kept sticking up.
"Connor! Breakfast is ready," Connor's sister, Zoe, shouted through the closed bedroom door.
"JESUS CHRIST, I'm coming! Leave me alone, bitch!" Connor shouted back aggressively. He heard Zoe sigh, then stomp downstairs. He decided that this would have to be good enough. It's not like anyone cared. Connor didn't have any friends that would tease him about his hair and everyone laughed at him anyway. Everyone thought that Connor was a freak, and for good reason.
He couldn't control his anger and he wasn't very good at school. His grades weren't great and his teachers wouldn't help him because he would get frustrated if he didn't understand something and would become violent. So, he was put in remedial classes with the rest of the losers and scum nobody wanted to deal with.
Connor started smoking pot sophomore year. He met his dealer through one of the people in his remedial math class who was forced to sit next to Connor. Connor found that pot relieved some of the blind fury he always felt. It soothed him in a way no other person had been able to. He felt just a little bit lighter when he was high like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. It didn't lift all the pressure off of his back, but it gave him a little break. Coming down off of the high was the worst part because it meant his break was over and he would have to go back to the realm of reality.
Connor tried not to get high too much because of both his small allowance from his parents and because he didn't want to completely destroy his already incompetent brain. He heard something in Health class about marijuana destroying brain cells. Connor couldn't really afford to lose any.
