Page 120 of Grin and Bear It

“Knox, is that your phone?”

Ellie bustled over with a slight frown on her face, her hand held out expectantly. Knox didn’t want to give it to her, didn’t want her to see what was on the screen, but she saw that reluctance and then misinterpreted it.

“Just until the end of the lesson,” she said. “You know the rules.”

He watched the teacher walk away, heard the snickers coming from around the classroom as she did and felt something Knox never wanted to feel again.

Powerless.

That had been driven home the night they got the call about their parents. Nothing he did, screamed, cried, howled, or roared changed the fact his parents were gone and he remained. Then there was Nash. He’d felt his uncle’s withdrawal, subtle at the start, then more pronounced, drawing further and further away, no matter what Knox did. And now…? He looked around him, searching the faces of kids he’d known, grown up with for years and, instead of seeing friendly faces, saw he was on the receiving end of hard, knowing stares.

“OK, so this is the historical source we are analysing today,” the teacher said, pointing to an old newspaper clipping projected on the board. “You have a copy of it on your desks and some questions to consider. Let’s have a go at answering them on our own, and then we can discuss some possible answers.”

She didn’t seem to see it, the way kids picked up the pieces of paper with thinly veiled contempt. Even the nerdy girls at the front of the class grabbed the worksheets with obvious reluctance, as if afraid they’d be tainted by it.

Something’s wrong, Knox said into his twin’s mind.

No fucking shit.

Knox’s eyes jerked down as he heard a low screech, his brother’s fingers, no, claws, scratched at the table.

Mads, keep it together!

I’m trying!

Ask to go to the toilet. Go!Knox urged.

I’m going.

Sure enough, Maddox got to his feet, his legs feeling like rubber.

“Yes, Maddox?” Miss Jennings said as she looked up at him.

“Just need to go to the toilet,” he replied and while her eyes narrowed, she just nodded.

“Me too,” Knox said, the minute Maddox was out the door and before the teacher could protest, the twins were fast walking down the hall.

“What the fuck is going on?” Knox asked, pacing back and forth when they reached the boys’ bathroom. “Why is there all this shit about the uncles and Miss Jennings? People were giving us shit, but—”

“Something’s going on…” Maddox groaned that out, hands slapped down onto the sink, and that caught at Knox’s attention, because as he approached, he saw his brother change. Those brown eyes turned to honey gold in the mirror, then back again, fur rippling across his brother’s skin.

“Fuck, I’ve gotta ring Nash,” Knox insisted.

“No…” Maddox took a shuddering breath in, then another. “He’s close. I feel the bear all the time, but now? Something’s wrong, Knox. Everyone’s being real weird, worse than before. It’s not just that Miss is dating the uncles. It’s something else.”

“Something like this?”

Knox had pulled away from his brother slowly, drawn by a more recent scrawl across the toilet wall. Boys wrote stupid shit all the time there, more often than not obsessed with drawing dicks on every available surface. But what they saw, in hastily drawn black, block letter, was far more than that.

Jennings is a whore, someone had written, and beneath it was a crudely drawn figure of a fat woman with a great big gash between her legs.

“No…” Knox whispered, moving to the sink and grabbing great handfuls of paper towel and soap, then moving over to the wall, doing his level best to scrub the graffiti off. “No.” But the marker wouldn’t budge, only fading slightly under his onslaught. “No!”

“Everything alright, boys?”

Mr Jacobs was the school principal. They didn’t see him that often, usually only at school assemblies, but Knox turned around abruptly, putting his back between the graffiti and the man.

“Fine,” Maddox replied quickly. “I mean, I was feeling a bit sick and Knox was making sure I was OK. My uncle cooked some fish last night that was a bit dodgy so…”

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