Probably cause Mama does it so much and he always has to hug her and make her feel better. “I was s’posed to take care a’ myself,” Tommy replies tearfully, trying so, so hard not to cry. “Ain’t your fault them shitbags thought it’d be funny to pick on a kid half their size.”
“What’re you sorry for?” His brother’s voice is gruff in response. “I’m s-sorry Joel.” Tommy blinks again, trying to keep his eyes dry. His lips are pulled down, so are his eyebrows, like the frown wants to consume every feature on his face. His face is still angry, eyes dark and grim. Tommy follows orders, watching Joel out of the corner of his eye. “Let’s go kid,” Joel jerks his chin and begins walking Tommy off the playground. The other boys didn’t even get a lick in, Joel’s too fast and too strong for some stupid playground bullies to get the drop on him. Then, impossibly fast as always, Joel is at his side again, a hand on his shoulder. The boys are scrambling away frantically before Tommy can even blink. “And that goes for the rest of ya’! Get the fuck home ‘fore I change my mind.” “You fuckin’ touch him again, I’ll do worse than a black eye,” Joel is growling at the ringleader of the group. Even though Joel never hurts him or Mama, it still looks the same. Sometimes when Joel hits people, he reminds Tommy of Daddy in a bad way. He would sometimes try to hit Tommy, but his big brother or Mama would get in the way. This ain’t the first time he’s seen his brother hit someone, but he don’t like it, even when it’s to protect him.īack when Daddy was still living with them, he used to hit Joel and Mama. Tommy looks over just in time to see Joel’s knuckles hit one of the boys. The one time Tommy didn’t listen to him and climbed the big tree in their backyard, he’d broken his ankle and Joel had to get him to the emergency room on the handlebars of his bike because Mama didn’t pay the phone bill and they couldn’t call an ambulance. Joel is always in charge, especially when Mama’s at work, which is most of the time. Tommy nods dutifully, not usually one to disobey his big brother. “No, you’re fine.” Joel shakes his head and straightens out. “Joel, am I gonna d-die?” he whimpers, holding up his palm, sticky with maroon liquid. It’s the whole reason he didn’t call for help earlier when they were teasing him.īut things went a little too far, and he’s never had blood come out of his freakin’ nose before! He’s eight years old now- Joel has been trying to get him to fight his own battles. Tommy points a shaking finger over at the group of older boys who’d pushed him head first down the slide. “Who did this?” Joel snarls, tilting Tommy’s head to inspect the bloody nose. He’s bent over, so he’s close to Tommy’s eyes, when normally he has to crane his neck to look up at him. He’d instead been sulking on a nearby park bench, pretending to leaf through a Batman comic book Tommy knows he’s already read five times.īut now, he’s standing with his hand on Tommy’s cheek, eyes narrowed, nose wrinkled up with anger.
Joel had mostly told him to piss off when Tommy begged him to come play Indiana Jones on the rock climbing wall. He’d been tasked with taking his little brother to the park to keep him busy, an almost unbearably miserable task for a fourteen-year old boy with better things to do on a summer afternoon.
Joel is there in an instant, so fast Tommy don’t even get it. Tommy’s voice is shrill as he stumbles across the playground on wobbly feet, scraped knees and a bloodied nose slowing him down.
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