The Boxer (editing)

The Boxer

Chapter One

Silence. My favorite sound. You know why?

Because that is the sound of sleep. Sleep was something I wish I could do forever. I don't mean to be dead, you know, but just safe and comfy in a soft warm bed with no one to bother you.

Too bad that was never what my life was like.

The stinging sun poured through the slits of my window shades, stabbing my poor eyes. There was something else pestering me, a sensation that was directly contrasting against the sun. A prickling wet chill ran its way down my back and the chill only turned worse. 

Ice. Oh HELL no. My first day of senior year was supposed to be cliché excitement and rushing out the door to see all my friends. Okay, let's be real, I had like three friends. But ice? Definitely not what I was hoping for.

My twin brother, Alex, stood next to my bed with a grin the size of a cheshire cat. In an instant, my stomach knotted up into a pit of fiery anger. 

With all the restraint, my teeny tiny body could muster, I spoke calmly, "Alexander. You have ten, no five, seconds to leave this room before I send you to the ER before you even make it to school."

"It's time to wake up, dummy!" Alex hauled ass out of my room with a laugh that was half maniacal sibling torture joy and the other half was terror. He knew I was true to my word.

Just to get it out of the way, the two of us only had each other for immediate family. Three years back, my parents died in a car crash. The loss of both my parents was difficult, more for me than Alex it seemed. Before their accident, I was warm and open to people. After, I became much more closed off and defensive. 

No one wants to be the freshman who loses her parents. The friends I grew up with went to other schools and with my parents death and our distance at school, they all sort of faded out. The new friends I had made seemed to fall back into the shadow too, they could not understand how to talk to me or help me through it. Slowly but surely, I slipped into loner-land. Other than Alex, I had as many friends as you could count on one hand. Alex and I suffered the greatest amount of trauma kids can go through and the two of us lost a lot of trust. 

A very disinterested aunt became our guardian, she'd financially support us but she really let us live our own life and figure ourselves out. The two of us only had each other but he really took control when I shut down. The two of us have lived alone in the house for three years. We biked, took the bus or walked to wherever we had to go. We were survivors and we made our lives work.

Without Alex, I wouldn't eat, I wouldn't talk, leave the house, nothing. He encouraged me to keep living. Always in my room to comfort me when I cried, Alex was the dream twin. He was the perfect guy. Although we lost the two most important people in our lives, Alex never faltered or let anything kick him down. He was the dream student, polite, smart, kind, with charisma that took his (my) suspensions (my suspensions) into detentions or a warning. I never was a bad student, in fact Alex and I are constantly at the top of our class, I just never stopped being poorly behaved.

As much as I loved Alex, I still was annoyed better yet, vengeful. First day required not much in clothes. For the first day, I wore a simple denim romper. The best part of a romper is that you don't have to coordinate a whole outfit. I let my auburn hair hang down my back in a braid. 

Alex sat at the counter eating my cereal, my special cereal. 

I never thought that this morning could get any worse.

"You bitch," I shoved him off the stool and sat in it, "Don't ever eat my food. It is my food, mine." The warning look in my eyes only prompted Alex to laugh.