On Thin Ice

37

"Calm him down?" I wondered, stepping into the house, my eyes darting around the room in search for Fox.

Fawn led me into the living room where I saw Fox's dad, Leo, and Robin holding Fox and Wren back from each other while Vanessa and Raven stood in the middle. Fox's face looked angrier than I had ever seen it. His jaw was tightly set, looking as if his teeth would break if he pressed them together any harder. His eyes were dark and formed into slits as he looked straight through his sister and mother over to Wren. I could see a slight bruise forming on his cheek.

"Fox?" I called out.

His gaze immediately turned to me, his eyes widening slightly as if he forgot I was going to be coming over. He shook himself out of Robin's grip and motioned for me to follow him up the stairs without a word.

I took a moment to look over at Wren. He had quite a few bruises forming on his face and his usual devious expression was gone. He looked more defeated and distant.

As I went up the stairs, I heard Leo begin to question Wren but I stopped paying attention as soon as I was in Fox's room where he was pacing the floor and pulling at his hair.

"What happened?" I asked in a curious tone, shutting the door behind me.

"He knows," Fox replied in a raspy tone. It didn't take much thought to figure out what he was talking about.

"Fox..."

He continued pacing around his room, not even looking over at me. I noticed blood on his knuckles as his fist closed on his hair.

"Hey," I called out, walking over to him and grabbing his hand from his hair. "You need to clean this."

"He knows," Fox repeated, this time looking at me with a vulnerable expression. His eyes were wide with worry and a muscle in his jaw twitched as he tightened it.

"It's okay," I assured him.

"No it's not!" he snapped, ripping his hand from mine, gazing at me with an expression mixed with anger and fear. "He's gonna use it against me. He's gonna tell everyone!"

"Fox," I said in an almost pleading tone, firmly grabbing onto his shoulders. "Calm down. You don't know that."

"You don't know him, Elijah!"

I didn't know him, but I could tell by the look on his face downstairs that telling his brother about what he knew hadn't gone as he had hoped.

"Fox, he's know for years," I started. "Don't you think he would have already done something if he was planning to?"

Fox looked at me with a skeptical expression. "How do you know that?"

"Know what?"

"That he's know for years," Fox answered.

It didn't occur to me that Wren hadn't told Fox that he had told me about his knowledge.

I sighed. "He told me."

"He told you?" he repeated back, stepping away from me. "When the hell have you had time to talk to my brother about me?"

I sent him an irritated look. "It's not like that and you know it. I saw him at the skating rink a few nights ago. He talked to me, not the other way around."