Dye had slowly descended into a very moody, and angry, kind of person. Day after day he had found himself on his own. With Joss spending more time with Molly and Jenny and Bluestone having more than just lunch dates, Dye fell into a brooding shell of his former self. He barely interacted with anyone and instead preferred to be left alone. Even with the city being as calm as it was, there was no need for the Xenton which, when stacked with everything else, made Dye feel even more isolated. He hadn’t donned his armor since he was back.

He sat in his room bouncing a rubber ball against the wall.

BA BOOM POP! The ball bounced from the floor, over Sam’s bed, against the wall, and back into Dye’s hand.

BA BOOM POP!

BA BOOM POP!

BA BOOM POP!

As he sat there melancholy, he sighed.

Sam came into the room and threw his things on his bed.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey man,” said Dye. BA BOOM POP

Dye didn’t even attempt to look at his brother. Instead he just continued throwing the ball against the wall.

Sam was aware of Dye’s outburst at school a few weeks back. Jason didn’t hesitate to tell Sam what happened as he felt Dye was acting strange and needed to be looked after. What better person to do that than Sam? After all, they shared a room. Sam had been keeping a close eye on Dye at the request of Jason. Nevertheless, Sam had noticed Dye’s emotional decline and found it odd since his brother was usually upbeat, sarcastic and playful, for the most part. Now he was a blob of bottomless sad emotion and it was hard not to notice.

“So you going to homecoming?” asked Sam.

BA BOOM POP!

BA BOOM POP!

“Nah, I don’t think so…” he replied.

BA BOOM POP!

That was it.

That was the conversation. Usually Dye would add to that but reading his body language, Sam knew that was as much as he would get.

“Did you want to talk?” he asked, trying again.

BA BOOM POP!

Dye caught the ball, but this time he didn’t throw it again. Instead, he clutched it and immediately his face went stern. He looked at Sam with nothing but contempt in his eyes; dark splotches under his eyes started to form as though they became sunken

“What! All of sudden I’m not as cheerful and happy-go-lucky and now you think there’s something wrong with me?” he said, eyeing his brother intensely.

“That’s not—”

“All of a sudden everyone gives a damn about me when five seconds ago nobody cared.”

Dye went to throw the ball but to his dismay Sam caught it.

Almost like a growl, Dye said “Give me back my ball!”

“What’s your problem?!” asked Sam.

“My problem is you! Now give me back my ball!”

“Or what?”

Dye snickered. “You really don’t want to test me right now!”

Sam trembled. Did Dye just threaten him?

“What’s going on here?

Corrine and Jason had barged into the room after hearing the commotion. Dye got up. “Nothing, just going to get something to eat!” He forced his way between his sister and brother and went down the stairs.

“Dude, what the hell happened?” asked Jason.

“Nothing, I just asked if he wanted to talk and he just snapped.”

Jason sighed.

“What’s going on? Am I missing something?” Corrine asked. She was unaware of what was going on with Dye. Since she wasn’t in school with them, instead studying for her GED, she wasn’t in tune with her brother’s day to day life.

“While you guys were away, did Dye ever act out at any point?” Sam asked.

Corrine pondered. “No, not really. Why?”

“We think there's something wrong with him.” Jason answered.

“Wrong? Like how?”

“He’s moodier. More aggressive. He just has this — I don’t know. There’s something off about him though.” said Jason.

“Plus he looks like he hasn’t slept in days. Have you noticed the dark splotches under his eyes?” Sam was eager to point out this fact. It was the first time he had noticed. He wasn’t sure if they were there before but he definitely noticed them when Dye suddenly snapped at him.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Dude, maybe we should tell mom and dad.” Jason suggested. “I covered for him at school that day and luckily he hasn’t acted out again since then, but if something is going on with him and he’s not telling us maybe Mom and Dad can get it out of him.”

“No!” Corrine said suddenly. Jason and Sam looked at her.

“Why not?” asked Jason.

“If something is bothering him then having Mom and Dad pry it out of him is only going to make it worse. I say we leave him alone and when he’s ready to talk, just be ready to listen.”

Sam looked at Jason. Both of their faces were concerned. Corrine felt it too but for now it felt as though leaving Dye alone was the best route to take.

“Fine, sure…” said Jason.

Corrine had returned to her room. On her desk was the study material for her GED exam. She had been studying for the most part of the day nonstop for weeks. She was mentally exhausted and all she wanted to do was relax.

But this was important to her.

She sat back down at her desk and resumed her studying. After a couple of seconds she realized that her focus was gone. All the math and reading comprehension seemed like a foreign language to her.

There was something wrong with Dye and a part of her wanted to help him.

Maybe it was just a moody teenager phase. Most of her thoughts tended to that logical explanation, but regarding her experiences, it could’ve been something far worse. She was with him all summer and he never showed signs of anything weird let alone acting strange or out of character. To her, this was probably Sam and Jason overreacting. Then again, she only spent a few months with him. They’ve spent their entire lives with him, and if they said he was acting weird, there was a good chance they could be right.

Homecoming was a couple weeks away. Dye had made up his mind that he wasn’t going. What was the point anyway? Once again, sitting alone at the table he enjoyed his food and didn’t think twice about it.

“Hey bro,” Jason came and sat down across from him.

Dye’s mouth dropped open. He was utterly surprised. Not surprised that Jason came to eat lunch with him, but that he was actually in school.

“You’re actually here?” said Dye, chewing his food.

“Sure, why wouldn’t I be?”

Dye knew that was a stupid question and answering it would give Jason the idea that no one knew he was still ditching.

“Nevermind.”

“So bro, you got a date for homecoming?”

“I’m not going.” Dye said nonchalantly.

“That’s cool…” Jason said, unwrapping his food as the awkwardness started to set in.

“Where are Joss and Jenny?”

Dye shrugged carelessly.

Jason bit into his sandwich, worried if he pried more Dye would snap and cause a scene. He heard Jenny laugh from across the cafeteria. That’s when he saw Dye’s face twitch with ire. He looked over his shoulder and saw Jenny with Bluestone, and that’s when Jason figured it out.

A new kid strolled into school and stole his girl. Jason didn’t say anything nor did he make any indication that he had a clue.

“You know bro,” Jason began, “Just because she may be into someone else doesn’t mean she may not still be into you.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Dye with a hint of irritation in his voice.

“Dude, I may not be the smartest guy on the block, but I’m pretty perceptive.”

Dye heard him and then looked over at Jenny.

“At least take a chance. What’s the worst that could happen?”

Dye thought about it. He knew what Jason was egging him on to. Maybe it was worth giving it a shot.

That evening, Dye was completing his homework in his room. Though focused, his mind was racing with all the possible scenarios in which he could get Jenny to go to homecoming with him. The more elaborate the task of asking her, the better the outcome. This made him really excited and he couldn’t help but smile, which was the first grin he had broken in weeks.

The door to the room opened and Sam strolled in. Dye turned around and to Sam’s surprise he saw that he was trying to hide a smile.

“What’s so funny?” Sam asked back.

“Nothing,” Dye replied. “Just thinking.”

“About what?” Sam sat on his bed, opened his backpack and took out his biology book.

“Are you going to homecoming?” He asked Sam.

“Yep,” he replied.

“You got a date?”

“Yep!”

Dye stared at him. Sam felt the gaze and looked up. “What?”

“You have a date?” Dye said with an astonished tone to his voice.

“Yeah…don’t look so surprised.”

“But I am!”

Sam laughed and it was so contagious that Dye was soon breaking out in laughter.

“Glad to see you’re feeling better,” said Sam, somewhat relieved that his brother was back to normal.

“Yeah,” Dye paused for a second. “Listen, Sammy, I’m sorry for what I did. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“It’s okay. You’re probably under a lot of stress. Sophomore year isn’t easy.”

“No, it is not.” said Dye, thinking about the current status of his social life rather than his academics.

Sam went to work on his homework while Dye closed the book on his and laid down on his bed. The latest issue of Warrior Knight was there on his bedside. He picked it up, removed it from its plastic and began reading.

The next day, Dye spent most of his time perfecting his proposal to ask Jenny to the dance. The whole day he searched for her, trying to find her alone. Nevertheless, whenever he saw her there was Bluestone with his arm around her. This kind of discouraged him but he was so sure she would say yes that he didn’t care. He just needed to get to her alone.

It wasn’t until school was over that he looked over his shoulder to find her all by herself, standing over at her locker. He quickly grabbed his books, shut his locker and walked over to her hastily before Bluestone was able to suddenly appear out of nowhere.

“Hey,” he said.

She turned with a smile. When she saw it was Dye, her smile had lessened. “Hey,” she replied. “How are you?”

“Oh — um – I’m fine. You?” he asked back. There was an awkwardness starting to shadow them like a rising tidal wave.

“I’m good. Just trying to keep up with homework and stuff.”

She nodded awkwardly, as though she didn’t want to talk to him. Dye caught every signal there was but continued on anyway.

“Anyways, listen – I hope you’re not still mad about what I said before to Bluestone. I was way out of line.”

“It’s okay,” she said, grabbing her books and closing her locker. “It’s in the past.” Dye knew she was lying. The tone in her voice said so.

“Good,” he said, smiling, “because I was wondering if you wanted to go,” he paused to prepare himself, “to Homecoming with me?”

Jenny looked away and sighed. She remained quiet and the longer she did the more he knew he had lost her.

“Dye,” she said, thinking of what to say. “I thought it was obvious.”

“What was obvious?”

“Bluestone and I, we’re together now and I’m going with him.”

“Oh — um,” he was speechless. “Right! Right! How could I have missed that?”

His face turned to disappointment and Jenny caught that. She wanted to escape the difficult situation so she blew past him. Everything happened so fast that Dye didn’t have time to register it all. Before he came to the conclusion that he had been rejected, he heard Jenny’s voice call out his name. He turned around.

“I really am sorry,” she said, with what sounded like remorse but Dye couldn’t be sure.

He tried to smile to show he had accepted her apology but couldn’t. Destroyed, Dye left the building, returning to his lonely life once again.