A story of a boy...

He was sixteen years old, a junoir in high school. He wore the same wristband over his left wrist every day. His future wasn't exactly "bright". He was failing his courses in school because kids thought it was fun to steal his homework and rip it up and distract him during classes and tests.

He would go home from school every day, waiting half an hour in the bathroom to make sure all the kids had left in their cars and on the busses while he walked. As he waited he stared at the wristband. He walked through the cold streets to get home.

The screen door was barely clinging to the hinges and swung freely open. The boy proceeded into his house and into the kitchen past his mother who was passed out and bruised, sitting in a chair, her head resting on the table.

He opened the basement store and tossed his bag down there. He caught a slight glimpse of his brother, sitting on the couch with a blunt in his hand. He had lost almost all facial expression.

The boy then went upstairs to his room. However, as he reached the top step he felt a hard blow land across his face. He stumbled down a couple of steps and looked up at his father, drunk as ever. His words were slurred and mostly unclear.

"Douf...yes...nus...whutz yez..."

His father stumbled slightly, the boy took this opportunity to push his way around him and go into his room, locking the door behind him.

Although there were two beds for he and his brother, his brother pretty much lived in the basement, so his bed was covered with papers and writing. What he really wanted to do was be a writer. However he knew he'd never become one at this rate. He sat down in front of the desk which was half black as his brother had almost lit it on fire one time.

It all had started over an arguement about smoking. Back three years ago when his brother had just started high school and he was in eigth grade, he caught his brother smoking and tried to stop him. His brother told him to mind his own business, he said that smoking was more interesting than his boring stories. His brother then pushed him out of the way threw the lighter as hard as he could at the desk, it blew up on contact and several of the papers got fire. Shocked by the noise, his father had stumbled into the room, spilling alchohal on the flames. Fortuanately, the boy managed to douse the fire eventually. He started locking his door after that day and stopped talking to his brother and father.

Out of the people in that house the only person he could bare to talk to and the only one he actually cared about was his mother. However his mother had grown silent recently ever since his father started hitting her.

The boy slumped into his chair and looked at the wristband. He was given this wristband on his fourteenth birthday by his best friend. He remembered what happened after that. He was on his way to go see him to celebrate his birthday when his father caught ahold of him and offered to drive him. The boy tried to turn him down but his father forced him into the car.

His father drove drunk to his friend's house. The friend was waiting out front for him when he saw the car. His father killed his friend. The boy yelled at his father to unlock the door but he had passed out at the wheel. The boy kicked the door open, breaking it so it no longer shut properly, he had no idea he was that strong, he didn't usually test his strength. The boy ran over to his friend to see his skull cracked open and his brains oozing out. The boy ran over to the drivers side of the door and pounded on the window. His father grunted.

"Heyz...leaf...meh...unloon..."

The boy cursed as loud as he could, balled up his fist, and punched right through the window, decking his father in the face. It was the first time in his life he had ever raised a fist to someone.

The boy found the wristband in his friend's pocket with a birthday card, he's worn it ever since.

The boy stared up at the ceiling, he had given up on his doing homework, all the work just to have it taken and destroyed. He was silent like the rest of the house. A few minutes later he heard the sound of his father stirring and heading downstairs. Then the sound of struggling and his mother screaming, a few blows landed, a bottle smashed and his mother's body dropping.

The boy began to grow nervous, never before at his father hit his mother out cold. Had he smashed the bottle and attacked her with it? Or had she fought back and broken it, thus him hitting her harder than usual? The boy ran over to his door to make sure it was locked and pushed his body against it. He heard pounding on the door.

"'Ey! Opun deh hill up!"

"Go away!" The boy shouted.

His father kicked the door so hard he broke the lock and knocked it open, throwing the boy back The father walked in with the broken bottle and pointed it at him.

"What did you do to mom?"

His father murmured something incoherent other than the words "bitch" and "lesson".

"You bastard!"

The boy got up and charged at his father who smashed the already broken bottle on his head. The boy collapsed on the ground, blood running through his hair and down the side of his head. He reached his hand up to the wrist band and removed it, revealing several slashes on his wrist. Cut into the wristband on the inside was a small pocket where stored a razor blade. The boy rolled back slowly as his father stood there drunk and climbed to his feet. He then charged his father once more, kicking him in the knee and knocking the bottle from his hand. He then slashed the razor at his father's eyes, blinding him. His father fell to his knees, his hands over his bloodied eyes. The boy kicked at his father until he stopped shouting and moving all together.

Panting, the boy fell back into his chair and stared at the ceiling.

The boy was not in school the next day. Nobody knew what happened to him until his brother came upstairs finally and found his mother's body, her face torn up with shards of glass in it. He went upstairs to find his father's body on the floor, the bloody razor not too far. And, hanging from the ceiling fan was as rope, tied into a noose, and through the noose hung the boy. Blood ran down the boy's wrist over his hand and dripped into a puddle on the floor.

The brother called the police, something he never thought he'd do. However by the time the police had arrived the brother had killed himself as well through fear that they would find his drugs and send him to jail.

And that was the story of a boy...