Deamons

Chapter 20 The rebel part 1

The rebel

"Rebel slash nonconformist means something. You don't want to be a domesticated animal. Domesticated animals have masters that lead them to slaughter. You know what you need to be domesticated?" Sam Rockwell asks. He is a senior that came out of no where taking a liking to Starke. Starke knows nothing about domestication. He shakes his head no. "You get it dependent on you for food. It needs to be someone not to aggressive. A pleasant disposition and someone that has to have a leader. They can't think for themselves," Rockwell says.

Rockwell says he is not punk rock because that has been done. HE is something that has never been done. He is him. Starke believes it. His new friend follows no kind of rules anyone else does. He is skinny and tallish. Long curly blond hair on top, a narrow face with eyes a little close together but he pulls it all off. Still handsome, and very confident. Starke thinks of what his mother used tell him when she being his mom, "Your handsome, your strong and your smart, you can accomplish anything you want. Use you looks your personality and your smarts and you go wherever you want."

Rockwell is like an artist with little talent but a lot of ambition. He is funny. Turn his book bag over and it says bottoms up. He talks to girls to stuck up for their own good and shames them for their ways. He does not tell jokes, he comments, fearless. Some people hate him and can be bad because he cannot fight. He does not know it, but seriously he cannot fight. Maybe that is why he befriended Starke. Starke got him. When Rockwell said something snide to a jocks girlfriend they cornered him in the bathroom by his locker. Starke come up looking for him when he hears it. "Hey man, come on! She's not that pretty dude!" *CRACK* It is Rockwell's voice. "All come on man! She is not worth all that!" *CRACK* They must have hit him again. Starke runs in. Its three guys from the football team. They hear Starke run in and turn on him. He smiles. He has sparred three men at the same time in the dark bigger then these guys. The tallest, but not thickest approaches him. He throws a crescent kick, his best kick, and it goes just by the tall boy's nose like butterfly kiss. He is still smiling as the other two football players urge the tall one to crush him. Starke's next kick will be an axe kick that will crack his collar bone and rip muscles down the entire way as it travels down the other's body until it rests again on the floor.

The boy looks in Starke's eyes and he can see his fear. No further altercation will be necessary. "Man, you're lucky I don't crush you," he says as he walks by Starke leaving the bathroom. "You're so lucky man if we didn't have a game I would kick your ass myself," one of the other two say as the pass by. "Hey the game ain't til tomorrow we have plenty of time," Starke says. "Yeah motha fucka let us know if you change your mind! Bitches!" Rockwell screams. His teeth are pick from where the blood is running in his mouth. Besides that, he looks good. For steady cracks they must not know how to punch judging by their handiwork.

For the rest of the week Rockwell pulls Starke's spirits up. He makes him laugh. Rockwell speaks to all the girls and all Starke has to do is stand beside him and attention rains on him too. It is synergy. Starke keeps the bullies away and Rockwell compensates for Starke's shyness. Rockwell pushes him. "Come on bro? Say what you think," Rockwell pleads. Starke turns to a girl with a button nose, short curly bobbed brown hair and sparkling eyes and says, "You are just to pretty for even like a Campbell soup ad and you would never like me, but I will tell you my name just in case you ever need your car washed or something like that." She laughs and shakes his outstretched hand looking him square in the eye. He holds her gaze and man he wants to run. So much energy and his mind commands it to lay down. The one thing he cannot control is the sweat. A bead forms behind his ear and rolls visibly down his neck, followed by a few more. She notices. He says, "I ain't going to lie. You are the hottest girl I have ever talked to and you make me nervous."

She laughs, "Bring him to the party this weekend Rockwell." She moves onto class. She is pretty and his heart did race but that was just his shy nerves. She is no Kate he knows. Kate though has moved on. She wants what he wished his whole life he had. She wants a guy that has something with him, like stable family behind him. Good girls want to know about you. He cannot tell anyone about him. It is sad. This popular thing is nothing he really wants, but many would. He yearns for that loving family. Maybe a little support at home to go out for the team. He has done martial arts and knows he can kick even the toughest guy on the team's ass or at least run with him. That does not matter though. He lacks the confidence to try out and that hurts. He walks Rockwell to his next class. He can not be on all the time like Rockwell can. Starke has bouts of melancholy that force him to hide his face from the world. He put on a mask though when he does not feel it and just stand there letting Rockwell be the center of attention. It is quite comfortable in that shadow and if a threat comes up, well melancholy does not affect that.

A fancy girl's party Saturday. Oh lord, oh God how do I handle that. The people there do not know about my pager and running out to collect dead bodies. There will not be any neighborhood guys there.

Starke came home on the bus. No one is home, so he sits. The wind licks up and the rain comes with it. Before long Starke is soaked then he realizes he can go in the shed. He falls asleep in there leaned up next to an old lawn mower. Hours pass and it is dark when awakes. He pushes himself up and must have knocked over some old oil while sleeping. His clothes are soaked where he laid in it and crud cakes and sticks to it.