"It's Complicated"

Childhood

Tw: Fantasy violence, child neglect, arguing parents, child abuse (mental and physical), yelling, skipping meals, lying about child abuse

Roman bounced his ball over to his twin brother, yelling, "I turn you into a lizard!"

The ball is a spell, but they're not allowed to directly throw it at eachother, since they may get hurt. So they bounce it over and catch the spell- which is irritating to them because you don't want to get hit by a spell.

Remus huffed, "If you're gonna insist on following the rules, then lets just not use the ball. It's basically just playing catch while yelling at eachother; so for us, it's just catch?"

Roman stopped and thought about it, "Yeah, okay."

Remus dropped the ball and let it roll down the driveway, carelessly. He started to come up with a concept, "Okay, you're a prince and I'm a duke-,"

"Why a duke? We can both be princes."

"I am technically a prince, but we all agree that I would burn down the kingdom, so we refuse to acknowledge it. Plus it sounds like dukey."

Roman shrugged, "Okay."

Remus smiled, "Anyway, we're fighting a mighty dragon terrorizing our kingdom, and we have to kill it."

"Okay!" Roman smiled and got in a position where he looked like he was holding a sword and shield, looking up and an invisible foe.

 Remus did the same, but held both of his hands in front of him, gripping a sword with a baseball bat, like, handle. Remus jumped off of Roman's shield and Roman pushed back, springing his twin into the air to slash at the scales of the beast. The dragon's scales clacked against the blade, but there wasn't left much more than a scratch.

Remus scowled, back on the ground and rushes behind Roman's shield, helping him hold it.

"It did nothing. If attacking it's scales won't work, then what?"

Roman studied the dragon from over his shield, "We need to find a week spot. Your sword is too big, but if I aim right, maybe I can slash into its eyes."

Remus nodded, "Worth a shot, how will you get up there?"

Roman handed his shield to Remus, as he did so, the red turned to black and the gold to green as the design changed to fit the holder, "Same as you."

Roman ran at the shield after backing away, jumping off it and Remus propelling him higher. He was just about to stab it in the eye when the dragon's clawed paw wacked him back. Roman fell down as the illusion broke around him and his brother. The "claw" resting on him in the form of the runaway ball they weren't paying attention to. Remus rushed over to his brother. Roman wasn't hurt that badly, but it scared him and he was still shocked from the jolt out of his game. Plus, his tush and hands did sting a little and the ball hit his stomache. So, natural as a six year-old- he started to cry.

Another boy ran up, apologizing profusely, "I'm so so sorry! I didn't expect that to happen! I called out to you, I thought you heard me! I'm so sorry!"

Remus, who knows his brother isn't hurt more than he was shocked, but he's just as protective and dramatic as his twin.

"Watch what you're doing! He could've gotten seriously hurt! What if he died?"

Roman snuffled at that and started calming down, fully aware that Remus was being too harsh. "Ree, it's fine, I'm not gonna die from a small stumble. I'm small, I don't have far to fall."