smiling critters

chapter 30 - an odd question

“So, what did he say?” donna asked her husband.

“He said he was indifferent about his parents and that he’d meet them if he had the option.”

“Ok, i’ll let him know, thanks for asking him for me, hon.”

“No problem, sweet cheeks,” he smiled and gave her a peck on the cheek before settling in bed and going to sleep.

kai POV-

Kai quietly snuck back into his room to hear his parents arguing about something random. The norm at this point. He sat on his bed as he took a second to listen to what they were getting upset about.

“It’s not the first time he’s done this.”

“Oh really, how are you so sure?”

“I caught him sneaking out at like 1 am a few months ago, and he saw me and left again and i couldn’t find him until he came home the next morning.”

“Well maybe that’s because you’re constantly picking fights.”

“Well maybe i wouldn’t be picking fights if you weren’t going out for hours in the middle of the night!”

“I told you a million times before, i’m doing aerobics classes!”

“What aerobics class takes place at 7 PM?!”

“It’s hard to get in and they offer late classes so i took that opportunity!”

Kai groaned and took out his phone to text mom that he was home before flopping onto his bed and covering his whole body with his blanket as he heard mom say ‘holy shit, thank goodness!’ and rush up the stairs into his room.

“Hey,” he mumbled as mom walked over and sat on his bed and dad walked in.

“You’re grounded, you know that right?” she asked him as she gently pulled his blanket off his face.

“Yea, i figured.”

“Now i wanna discuss the constraints of this punishment. You’re gonna be moving to your brother’s room for two weeks and you’ll only be allowed into your room to get clothes and go back into your brother’s room to change, we’ll start working on getting you into therapy, you’ll be helping out the church every day after school for two weeks, and, though you wouldn’t see this as much of a punishment, you’ll be spending the night with bryson tonight. He rubs off on you good, and maybe he’ll keep your anger in check until we can get you into therapy, ok? Your anger management issues have gotten pretty bad again and we wanted to try and help you deal with that, ok?”

“What?! You’re sending me to therapy?! I’m not crazy, i don’t need therapy!” kai protested.

“We were never saying you’re crazy, we just don’t want you to attack anyone else and therapy will help with that.”

“It was one time! Don’t need therapy!”

“Well too bad, because it’s either therapy or a mental hospital!”

Kai backed down at that before thinking of something else.

“Fine. but on one condition!”

“Which is?”

“You two go to couple’s counseling!”

“Alright, we’ll talk about it,” mom sighed. From there, he packed some stuff for a sleepover and once he was done, he was on his skateboard and off to bryson’s house. Mom and dad had talked with bryson’s grandfather, so he didn’t have to worry about surprising him with his presence. Bryson’s sister welcomed him in and he immediately went into bryson’s room. The african elephant was at his desk in front of a piece of paper with a pen in his hand.

“Hey,” he muttered, not looking away from the paper. Kai shut the door and threw his bag on the floor.

“I can’t fucking stand my parents!” he angrily plopped on bryson’s bed. Bryson looked up from his desk and stared at his friend.

“And why is that?”

“Because they’re basically trying to kill each other, then they turn around and get mad at me for trying to get out of the house so i don’t have to deal with their bullshit! Like, i get getting mad for punching someone at church, but trying to not get involved with their screaming matches is what they’re upset at?! Like come on!” he shouted as he flopped his head down as his paws gripped the foot of bryson’s bed.

“It sounds like they’re just worried about you. Also they probably don’t want you punching someone.”

“Worried?! If they were worried they would try to sort out their problems amicably instead of squawking at each other over every little thing! ‘Oh, i’m taking an aerobics class but i could only get classes super late,’ ‘i don’t believe you. You’re cheating on me again,’ ‘no i’m not. I’m just working out.’ y’know, dumb shit like that! It’s so fucking petty, i’m sick of their bullshit!”

“Cut them some slack, maybe your mom just doesn’t want you to go through a chunk of your life with split parents.”

“Them getting divorced would be 1000 times better than this!”

“Ok, fair enough. How about we change topics? Why did you punch someone at church?”

“Because it was the guy that fucking filmed neil! And like, that’s not the first shitty thing he’s done! He’s talked about you, bobby, dylan, everyone! It seemed like if I’m friends with someone, he’d talk shit about them. I’ll just use you as an example cause it’ll feel like i’m talking bad about them like he was. He’d say shit like ‘i can’t belive you’re friends with him, he’s such a nerd,’ ‘dude, you knew that fatass since you were 2? Talk about embarrassing,’ ‘dawg, how can you be friends with someone who doesn’t believe in god?’ and other stuff. And like, i never said ‘hey man, stop talking about my friend like that, or any of my friends for that matter. I don’t like it,’ but my dumbass stayed quiet about it for like four years and let him talk shit about you and just not said anything! How much of an idiot could i be to let it happen for so long and not tell you guys? Or cut him off?”

Kai went on a rant about how he wished he’d done something and maybe simon wouldn't've filmed neil.

“Do you want me to read you moby dick?” bryson suddenly asked, holding a book with his trunk. A common pastime for them was bryson reading to kai, it gave bryson an opportunity to work on his speech and helped kai relax since his mom used to read to him as a part of their nighttime routine but as he got older she stopped doing it, thinking he grew out of it. If it wasn’t for them doing this, kai wouldn’t be able to say that moby dick was his favorite book since he was never able to stomach big books like that, but something about having a big book read to him made it a whole lot more digestible.

“Yes,” kai snarled, crossing his arms like a pouty chick. Bryson started reading and slowly, kai started to relax and ended up falling asleep an hour into bryson reading, allowing him to get back to his A.M.P.E.D. work.

1986 words

sorry this was a few hours late, my school had standardized testing today and posting this just kinda slipped my mind during lunch (which is when I normally post these) mwah mwah have a nice day :3