Devon Garner

It was 5 AM and Devon woke up to the sound of his mom yelling to him from down stairs in the foyer.

"I'm off to work! Be sure to take care of Arthur, okay? I'm counting on you for dinner tonight, so just make something or order delivery, whatever you think is best."

"Okay, mom!" His voice cascaded down the stairs from his room travelling to his mother, Jacqueline. He grew tired of taking care of his brother all the time. It's not exactly his duty to clean after his brother, wake his brother up, send him off to his school, make dinners, clean the house, put his brother to bed. Basically everything a child would need a parent for, but he does it anyway because he wants to be good for his mother and not make things 3 times as difficult. As he was walking down the stairs he noticed the front door was slightly ajar and assumed it was his mother when she left the house, after all she was in a rush to get to work. He went towards the door to close it, feeling the slight breeze that was being let in by the open door and shivered a little, as he took a glance outside at the beautiful autumn trees. Oh? What's that in the distance? It's a bit of a blur but he could make out a shape and he didn't know what it was but he wanted to be able to find out, so he called out to the figure, assuming it was a person, and they were just lost or something.

"Hello? Are you lost?" The trembling voice barely escaping his lips. Who is that man?? He thought. Another question, when were they gonna decide to answer him?? Will they just stand there? As Devon took a step towards them to see what their deal was, he all of a sudden saw the world blur, almost as if it was getting away from him. He was dizzy, starting to stumble where he stood and got a cold sweat down him. Even though the whole world looked massively fucked, the man still stood; clear as day.

"Wha- Who are you, mister?" Devon hasn't felt this fearful for his life in a long, long time and he was not about to have that feeling again.

"Hey, uh, do you hear that noise? It's uh, it's pretty loud. It- it hurts!" Ding! Ding! Ding! A weird bell sound, blaring outside his door from all directions. It's almost as if he's being capped by the deafening dinging. Then with a blink of an eye, and a slight tumble back, the person was gone and the repetitive dinging came to a complete silence. He stood there for a while, trying to calm himself down, until he felt more confused than scared. It's almost like the little confrontation slipped away from him just like that rando did. Almost to the point where he forgot why he was standing at the door in the first place, but it's probably nothing; right?

"Yo, dude! I found ya!" Olivia exclaimed leaping towards Devon, her arms stretched out, reaching for a big bear hug. She was the sweetest. She had such a big bright smile, she could lighten up a whole room by merely walking in; he envied her for that. Her golden locks with strips of beautiful brown looked especially divine in the sun, glistening just like her precious grey eyes. For a color as bland as grey, she can still manage to make it look like the most elegant color out there.

"Yeah, yeah, you found me." He said with a slight chuckle in his tone, rolling his eyes at her silliness.

"We better get going or we're gonna find ourselves in detention for being late!"

"What? What time is it- OH MY GOD! We have 15 minutes until the warning bell rings!! We're gonna be late for sure!!"

"Wow, sarcasm? Okay, I see how it is." He peeks over at her, her face lit with the morning sun; her small giggles making him smile. Oh how he wanted that moment to last forever.

Riiinnnggg! As the warning bell shouts out, all the kids drag their way back into the sad excuse of a school, Stonien high. It's not really the best school ever, but I mean, it's a public school for goodness sake! What did you expect? Walking down the teen infested halls, lockers to the left and right of them. There's Jim Yammer to the left, getting pushed into the lockers by Gabby Gorana; and there's Leslie Cordeven and Gavin Delos; they just got back together again. Devon never really enjoyed that place, or the kids there.

"Oh shit! Olivia, I need you to meet someone real quick! It's the kid I met at the movies!" He shouted, dragging Olivia by her wrist over to Bruce with the grip of a gorilla.

"Dude, I'm coming! Loosen your grip, will ya?" She asked, chuckling at how excited he can get sometimes. When they finally reached him though, he couldn't even talk because of how much he was huffing and puffing. Bending down with one hand on his knees and the other one had the index finger up trying to keep Bruce there while he was trying to save his lungs from dying.

"Uh, you okay?" Bruce questioned bending down in front of him, trying to see his face."

"Oh he's fine, he's just a little- Ow! Hahaha what??" He stepped on her foot, desperate for her to not finish that perplexing sentence. He lifted himself back up after that and took one last deep breath before introducing them to one another.

"Olivia, this is Bruce. Bruce, this is Olivia, but a lot of people call her Liv."

"Hi! It's so great to finally meet this infamous Bruce I've heard so much about!" Olivia exclaimed beaming her welcoming smile to him. Devon started getting even more mad at her, telling her to keep it to herself, while she was dying of laughter because of his embarrassment, but poor Bruce was still trying to understand everything. Wha- Wait, isn't that that one dude from the bathroom? He questioned as his head was filled with confusion.

"Devon, was it?" Bruce asked, his voice small, and quiet. Devon immediately started smiling when he saw that Bruce remembered him.

"Yeah! Good job Bruce!" He exclaimed, patting his fluffy, curl covered head. Bruce sent a deadly glare up to his new friend, that made him shiver with fear. He slowly pulled back from the tiny time bomb that was in front of him, as he awkwardly chuckled. Riiiinnnng!! The school bell shouted, as all the students got situated in their class. Bruce was resting his head in his arms, wishing he were in his bed away from all these annoying kids, as the teacher was stumbling in, clearly hungover from a long night of drinking and partying her sadness away.

"Hey kids… I have a headache today so don't talk to me. Do what you want, and if you see the principle is someone else coming, you know what to do john." She grumbled, throwing herself into her rollie chair, falling asleep almost immediately. The loud history class, used as Bruce's white noise. Laughter, conversations, the nerdy kids yelling at the others to shut up because unlike all the other normal kids, they actually try to do work.

"Hey Bruce! Whatcha doin'?" Olivia asked leaping towards tired Bruce, her smile beaming brighter than the sun. It' s so shocking for Bruce to see people happy at school. It's like seeing a kid cry at Disneyland. It's so confusing to see kids enjoying themselves at a place as terrible as school, and talking with all the other kids like it's nothing. It's so easy for them, isn't it?

"Hellooo?? You up?" She asks, bending down to try and peak through the walls he made with his arms. She starts poking at him to try and get him to lift his head, which seemed to do something, because he lifted up his head, looking more grouchy than ever. His hair was messy due to the laying down, and his eyes were half shut, trying to survive the harsh lights. Looking at him like this almost made her laugh. 'He looks drunk' she thought to herself, almost unable to control herself.

"What?" Bruce muttered.

"Oh, uh, I just wanted to hang out. How are you?"

"Fine."

"Cool.. Cool.." There was like a minute of silence before he finally spoke up and asked her back, which she responded to with an 'I'm good, thanks!' smiled, and held out a little thumbs up to the boy. He did it back and smiled a little smile before going back to laying down, hinting to her that the conversation was over.

"Okay, I can take a hint." She laughed as she walked away to her group of more outgoing friends to talk and talk and talk to. He kind of wished he was like those kids. He did enjoy being quiet and unnoticed, but he also wondered what it's like to be the main character every once in a while. After a while, he ended up drifting off to sleep and didn't wake up until the bell rang.