Twist of Cain - Part 2
#2 of Twist of Cain
Cain's elbow ached terribly the next morning. As expected, when he went out to the living room, he saw his mother passed out on the couch, her mouth hanging wide open, snoring loudly. Shaking his head in disgust and sorrow, he put on his clothes for another day of school, not that he was looking forward to it. He went back to his room, selecting a shirt and a pair of pants to wear. He'd been so upset the night before, he opened his backpack to make sure that he had put his homework inside. It was indeed there. Throwing the bag over his shoulders, he groaned in pain when the heavy bag accidentally hit his injured shoulder. In pain, he heard the school bus horn honking outside. Swiftly, he rushed from his room and out the front door. The school bus was starting to pull away when the driver saw the small coyote The bus stopped, The driver opened the doors, giving Cain a nasty look.
"Watch the time, Carson," he growled, closing the doors.
Going to the middle part of the bus, Cain sat down on the right side next to a meerkat. "Hey, Harry," said the coyote.
Harry Middleton was Cain's only real friend in the world. Though the two had others they associated with at school, they had been friends since they were in kindergarten. Unlike Cain's family life, Harry came from a very good home, with wonderful, loving parents. The coyote tried to go over to his best friend's house as often as possible, not just to spend time with him, but to get away from his drunk of a mother. Harry, who was very tall for one of his species, was nonetheless thought of as being in the nerd class, though he'd proven on more than one occasion that he could fight when necessary.
"Hey, Cain," said Harry, pulling his earbuds out. "You okay? You look like something's wrong?"
Cain rubbing his injured shoulder had not escaped the notice of the meerkat. Harry knew that his best friend had a pretty screwed up home life, and it pained him that he couldn't do anything about it. "Oh, Mom got mad at me last night and threw a beer bottle at my elbow."
"Damn," said the meerkat, shocked that Cain's mother would go that far. "You need to find a way to get out of there, man. How you gonna survive four more years of school like that?"
"You tell me," said Cain, looking at his injured elbow. "I wish I had an answer, but I don't," he said, hanging his head down.
"Hey, I'm here for you, man," said the meerkat, patting Cain's shoulder.
A weasel directly in front of their seat turned around, giving them a nasty smirk. "Oh, aren't you two just the cutest couple ever? Why don't you get a room?"
Harry gnashed his teeth at the weasel. "Can we get the room your Mom uses to service all her tricks?" Several other students on the bus heard this and laughed. The weasel snarled at the stinging insult, but Harry put his right paw up, making it into a fist. "You'd better turn around and shut your mouth, or you're getting an uppercut right here, right now."
The weasel did as he was asked. Only last week, Harry had punched one of the weasel's friends outside of school when the friend was trying to pick a fight. Harry was so fast, that the weasel's friend didn't even know what hit him.
"Thanks," said Cain.
"No problem," said Harry. "He's just a cunt."
The weasel heard those words, but knew better than to turn around again.
Inside the school, the halls were filled with cell phones ringing, lockers opening and closing, as well as the chatter of hundreds of students. Through some stroke of luck, Cain and Harry managed to get side by side lockers, so they could still be together until first period. Harry would be going to Social Studies, while Cain went to English.
"Hey," said Harry, opening his locker. "You wanna come over after school today?"
"Absolutely," said Cain, feeling his elbow throbbing from the thrown beer bottle. "Your Mom and Dad okay with that?"
"Yeah," said the meerkat, throwing some of his books into the locker to lighten the load in his backpack. "You gonna call and ask your mom?"
"No," said Cain, lightening his backpack load too. "I really don't want to talk with her right now--not sure if I ever want to talk with her again at this point."
"I still don't know why you can't go live with your Dad," said Harry.
"Like I've told you before, my Mom has custody of me because her lawyer argued that my Dad had been cheating on her."
"That's bullshit," said Harry, putting his backpack over his shoulders. "But you're almost fifteen right now. I bet you could find some lawyer that could help your Dad get custody of you; especially if you told them what your Mom's really like."
"Yeah, and I'd still have to live with her in the meantime," said Cain. "Could you imagine what she'd do to me in the meantime? I'd have more than just a sore elbow for sure."
"Guess you're right," said Harry, coming to the realization that his friend was in a no win situation at the moment. "Wish you could live at my house."
"That'd be awesome," said Cain, walking down the hall side by side with his meerkat friend. "But I doubt your parents would want to do that."
"Probably not," said Harry. "Well, I'll see you in art class, okay?"
"Yeah, see ya," said Cain, heading off to English.
English had always been a subject Cain excelled at. He was actually in the advanced class, so the classroom was a mix of mainly sophomores, as well as some juniors and seniors who'd flunked the subject in previous years, but had to pass it in order to get the proper number of credits to graduate. Cain got out his English textbook and notebook, ready for class to begin. He looked behind him, seeing the beautiful Caitlin Smith sitting behind him. She was the most gorgeous female coyote in the entire school. Caitlin saw him looking at her and gave him a friendly smile. He wanted to talk to her, but somehow couldn't. Maybe it was because she felt so far out of his league, or maybe it was because she was the girlfriend of another coyote, Bruno Marshall, who was a very imposing figure. Though not a jock, he had the build of a tough football player, and had been thrown out of school several times for fighting. Mr. Marquez, a jagaur, came from off his desk to the front of the room.
"Morning guys," said the jaguar, straightening his neck tie. "Everyone ready for the book I've chosen for your assignment?"
Moans and groans went up from the students, but Mr. Marquez just laughed. "Wow, you guys are a tough crowd to please, huh? Well, like it or not, you're gonna have to read it. The jaguar took the book in his paws and held it up for all the class to see. "This is what you'll be read, Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut." He paused, looking around the room. "Anybody know what it's about?" Cain raised his paw. "Yes, Mr. Carson?"
"It's a war story with science fiction in it. It's about the bombing of Dresden during World War 2," he said.
"Very good," said the jaguar. "I guess you guys will want to copy of Mr. Carson, wont' you?"
Everyone laughed at Mr. Marquez. He went on, explaining in greater detail wha the book was about, but not so much that everyone could go home and write their report about it. "We'll be reading this for the next three weeks. After that, I'll expect you to write a report explaining what it's all about." Again, moaning and groaning filled the room. "Hey, it's not that long of a book, guys. We could read War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy if you'd like. That one's over a thousand pages." Everyone was silent. Nobody wanted to be forced to read a thousand page book in just three weeks and write a report on top of that.
"So I can reason with you. That's good," joked the jaguar. "Okay, I'm going to pass out the books and we'll spend the rest of the period reading. Tomorrow we'll spend some time reviewing the first few chapters for everyone's benefit. Don't worry, it's a fun book--even has some dirty language in it, but don't tell your parents that."
Again the class laughed at Mr. Marquez as he passed out the books. As Cain took a copy, he passed the remainder behind him, seeing Caitlin giving him a smile again. He blushed through his fur, quickly turning around and sticking his muzzle in the book. He'd read it years ago, but he had to keep his mind off of Caitlin, fearing that he would say something stupid to her, or that she might tell Bruno that some guy was flirting with her in English class. That wasn't something he wanted to deal with . . . at all.
Harry's house was more like a home to the coyote than his own. Mr. and Mrs. Middleton had always treated Cain like one of their own children, and he really respected that. Walking through the door after the bus dropped them off, Mrs. Middleton greeted them as she sat out in the living room reading.
"Hi honey, hi Cain," she said, putting her book down. "How was school today?"
"Fine," said Harry.
"It was good," said Cain, relieved to be in a functional household.
"Where's Dad?" asked Harry, putting his backpack down next to Cain's.
"Your father's still at the office," said Mrs. Middleton. "Now, what would you boys like for dinner? Pizza?"
"Um," said Cain, not wanting to be rude. "Actually, anything but pizza would be fine with me." The coyote had practically lived on that stuff, since his mother was always bringing them home, along with a twelve pack of beer.
"Alright," said Mrs. Middleton. "How about we get some Chinese food instead?"
"Sounds good to me," said Harry. "Cain?"
"I'd like that," said the coyote. "Maybe some General Tsao's chicken and some pork friend rice?"
"Same here," said Harry.
"Hi Cain!" called out a smaller meerkat as he entered the living room.
"Hey, there little guy," said Cain, leaning down and tickling the little meerkat. The little guy was Kevin, Harry's four year old little brother. Mr. and Mrs. Middleton were told years ago that they would never be able to have more children after Harry, due to numerous problems Mrs. Middleton experienced during her pregnancy, but almost five years ago they got the unexpected, but joyous news that she was pregnant. It had almost been a miracle that she experienced no problems during her pregnancy this time. Kevin was born happy, healthy and was just the sweetest kid in the world. Cain thought of him like the little brother he always wanted.
"You staying here tonight?" asked Kevin as Cain let him go.
"Just until after dinner," said Cain, thinking about what his mother would be like when he got home. "Good to see you again."
"You too," said the little meerkat in a squeaky voice.
"Hey, let's go back to my room," said Harry. "Let's do some homework."
The two friends fetched their backpacks and went upstairs. Harry's room was pretty large, so they had plenty of room to study, but studying wasn't on the coyote's mind at the moment. He still hadn't told Harry what had happened to him in English.
"So, what do we work on first? Geometry? English?"
"How about talking?" said Cain.
"I'm not taking that subject this semester," joked Harry.
Cain glared at his friend. "Actually, that's called Speech, and we take that next year, wise ass."
"So I'm a wise ass," said Harry. "What do you wanna talk about anyway?"
Cain shut the door, making sure that neither Kevin nor Mrs. Middleton would hear what he was about to say. Harry looked at his friend, seeing his nervous demeanor.
"The weirdest thing happened in English today," said Cain in a whisper.
"Cain, man, you don't have to whisper. It's not like we're under surveillance or something," said the meerkat. "Just tell me what's up."
"You know Caitlin Smith?" asked Cain.
"Yeah," said Harry, sitting down on his computer chair. "She's that hot coyote."
"The hottest," said Cain. "She smiled at me during English today."
"Is that all?" asked Harry.
"She smiled at me twice," said Cain. "Whadda ya think that means?"
"That she's polite," said Harry.
"I think there's more to it than that," said Cain, sitting down on Cain's bed. "I really like her."
"So does Bruno Marshall," quipped the meerkat. "And he'd pound your ass into the ground if he saw you flirting with her."
"I never flirted with her," said Cain. "I just smiled back."
"He might still pound your ass into the ground," warned Harry. "I'd be careful with her, Cain. I might be fast, but I sure as hell can't hit as hard as that guy."
"I know," said Cain, lying down on the bed. "I also know that I really want to fuck her."
Harry shook his, face palming as he heard those words. "Oh god, you're going to get yourself in trouble over her, aren't you? Come on, use your head, not your dick, stupid."
"I can't help it," said the coyote. "She's . . . she's just perfect for me."
Harry knew there was no reasoning with his best friend, and he was dreading the day that this all blew up in Cain's face.