Bad Boy

21

It had been a couple weeks since Jace was admitted to the hospital; he was still in a coma. Casey visited Jace at the hospital every single day. It had gotten to the point where the nurses that were in charge of checking on Jace, knew him by name.

It was the end of the school day and Casey grabbed all of his things from his locker. He was going to visit Jace again, but he had to go home first and help Cameron with his homework. Cameron had been struggling with some of his math work and Casey told his father that he could help Cameron. John was grateful, already having a lot on his plate.

Casey started his walk home. It was warmer out, so Casey didn't mind the walk as much as he would when it's cold out. He made his way home quite fast, wanting to help Cameron as fast as possible so that he could go see Jace.

Casey entered the place he called home and took his shoes off, placing them on the shoe mat. "Cam! I'm home," Casey said, throwing his bag beside the door. Cameron came running over to Casey and engulfed his older brother in a hug.

"Casey! I got my test back! Look how good I did, all buy myself!" Cameron squealed, holding up his test paper. True to his word, Cameron has gotten very good on his test. He got sixteen out of eighteen.

Casey smiled at his younger brother. "That's amazing, Cam," he exclaimed.

The young boy nodded, smiling brightly. "I tried a few homework questions by myself," he told Casey, walking over to the coffee table in the living room.

Casey followed his young brother, watching as he sat down on the couch. He walked over and sat next to him, looking at his brother's homework sheet.

"Did I get them right?" Cameron asked. "I went through all my steps and double checked.. but I still don't know if they're right."

Casey looked over the questions and what Cameron answered for them. They were all right. "Yeah, you got them right," Casey told him.

Cameron smiled. "Really?" He asked. "That means I'm getting good at it,"

His older brother nodded. "Yeah, it does. Do you want to try some of the other questions by yourself and I'll check them after?" Casey asked, getting a nod from Cameron in response.

The younger of the two started to do the rest of the questions on his homework sheet, only pausing to ask Casey something before going back to work. About ten minutes later Cameron was finished the sheet.

"Good job, Cameron," Casey said, looking at the sheet of paper. "You got them all right."

"Yay!" Cameron exclaimed.

A few seconds later their father walked in the door, carrying a couple bags of groceries. Casey stood up and walked over to his dad, taking the groceries from him.

"Thanks," his dad said, taking off his shoes.

Casey went into the kitchen and put the bags on the floor. He quickly but carefully put away all of the groceries, wanting to go to the hospital to visit Jace. After putting all the groceries away, Casey walked to the front door and put on his worn black combat boots.

"I'm going up to the hospital to see Jace. I'll be back soon," he said, not even waiting for a response as he walked out the door.