"So, how much longer are they planning on keeping him trapped there?" Sam asked as he lay lazily on a luxurious king-size bed. A bed that, even with its gigantic size, wasn't able to occupy even a fourth of the hall-like room we found ourselves in.
"Only one more day. I'm hoping though due to how shitty he still looks that they keep him another day. Though with how vocal he is, I really doubt it." I sighed as I continued throwing the tennis ball in my hand against the unoccupied wall in front of me. Something that, after ten minutes of doing so, seemed to finally get a reaction from Sam.
"Mate, you know I like you, but I swear to god, if you keep throwing that ball against the wall then I'm going to lose my absolute shit."
Seeing the frustrated look on his face, I was tempted to continue, but reluctantly I decided against it, not wanting to anger him so soon after we had just made up. Sam released a small sigh of relief the moment I stopped, the hidden tension in his body disappearing as I did so. "Thank you," He muttered before returning to what we were talking about before.
"I'm shocked he's not being held there longer, no offence mate, but he truly looked god awful," Sam said, having seen him the evening before. "Almost as bad as you." He smirked.
"None taken and fuck you," I replied, not even bothering to look up and respond to his juvenile taunt from where I was spinning the tennis ball mindlessly on the floor. "Despite how shitty he looks there's actually nothing wrong with him. All he needs is plenty of rest and food. Things he can do just as easily at home then at the hospital. Add on the fact that he is on the verge of attempting a prison escape, and I doubt they could keep him there any longer, even if they wanted to."
"That doesn't surprise me. The entire time that I've known your dad, I've never seen that man take a break."
"What do you mean by 'the entire time'? You've known him since you were like four. I doubt you were paying too much attention to his fucking work schedule back then." I joked. "I think back then you were still too busy taking care of your fucking array of dolls."
"They were action figures, and you're just saying that because you were, and still are, jealous you don't have any." He huffed in a faux indignant manner that made me chuckle softly. "My point still stands regardless."
Just as I began to reply, I could see from the constipated look on Sam's face that he had something he wanted to say, so I waited until, eventually, after quite a bit of silence, Sam said what was on his mind. "Adam?" He asked cautiously, lifting himself slightly off the bed so he could look at me from my seated position.
"Sam?" I replied, earning a small smile that helped in loosening Sam's tightly coiled nerves.
"I was just wondering. How are things now? You know, between you and your dad." He asked, squirming and looking away as he did. Clearly, to my amusement and confusion, uncomfortable about asking such a question.
I considered not responding, to simply watch in enjoyment as he squirmed underneath my gaze. However, finding such a thing too mean, I decided to reply. "It's going well." I smiled. "After he woke up, we spent all morning just talking. Talking more than I'm pretty sure we ever had before."
"That's good." Sam smiled lightly while flopping back down onto the bed. Whether because he was happy about the news or that he didn't piss me off with his question I wasn't sure. "How did he handle, you know, everything?"
Despite Sam's incredibly vague wording, I knew exactly what he was talking about. "As well as could be expected, I guess. I still don't think it's properly settled in for him yet, but he did talk about taking an extended leave from work so we could be together for whatever time I had left." I replied, trying to do my best to act as casually as possible, as if I wasn't thrilled with the idea of being able to spend some time with my dad, like I had always wanted. Though from the way Sam was grinning at me, it was clear I had failed.
"Wipe that smile off your face, you look moronic." I threw the tennis ball I was still holding at him with all my strength. Or at least I tried to. Unfortunately, my aim was even worse than usual with all my injuries and impacted a good three feet to his left against the headboard of his bed instead. An impressive miss considering how small the distance between the two of us was.
"I would say you throw like a girl, but that would be an insult to girls." He laughed loudly to my annoyance, which only seemed to make him laugh harder.
"Whatever," I muttered. "Keep laughing like that and I'll tear the heads off all your precious little dolls when you're not looking."
"Mm-hmm." He hummed in acknowledgement, not even pretending to take my threat seriously. Sam suddenly proceeded to roll over, not even reaching the edge of his bed in the process, and picked up the pen and stack of papers that were splayed haphazardly around him.
"I swear, if they give me any more homework, I might just have to start a fight and get expelled myself." Sam muttered. Yet even as he complained, he never once stopped filling out the sheets of homework he now held, filling them at a lightning pace, taking only a fifth of the amount of time I would have needed to do the same.
"I don't know why you even bother. It's not like they're going to care whether you do it or not. You're one of the, if not the, smartest kids in our year and all the teachers love you, man. You could probably murder another person and get off with just a slap on the wrist."
Sam just rolled his eyes, or at least I think he did. It was difficult to tell from my position on the floor. "Think you might be exaggerating a bit there mate."
"You're right. You might get detention for a day as well."
"Trust me mate, I don't do all this god forsaken homework and extra work because of the teachers. You know I couldn't care less about them," He replied, not actually disagreeing about being the teacher's favourite.
It was then, as if on cue, that the door to Sam's bedroom burst open and in strided Mrs. Rainwright. An older woman of no less than fifty with a no-nonsense look ingrained on her face. Which, when matched with her hair that was tightly coiled into a bun, made her look like the strictest librarian I had ever seen.
"Hello, Mrs. Rainwright." I said in my politest tone as I instinctively fixed my posture so I was sitting up straight instead of splayed across the floor. Ever since I was a child Mrs. Rainwright had always scared the shit out of me. I don't know whether it was her stern expression or the way she always seemed to look at me with a surprising amount of disgust, but I always used to freeze up whenever I saw her. It was so bad I almost stopped hanging out with Sam altogether because I was so afraid of her.
After ignoring my greeting and giving me a look of annoyance and contempt, she turned towards Sam. "Samael, how is your work coming along? I hope you're not getting distracted."
"Of course not mother, I'm almost finished. I just have a few more pages left to do." Sam replied, his face eerily blank of all emotions.
"Good. Dinner will be at six, so I expect it to be finished by then. You also have violin practice afterwards." And with that, she walked out of the room with her nose held high, without a single goodbye or glance towards either me or Sam.
After a brief silence that engulfed the room as the door slammed closed behind her, I looked up at Sam, who hadn't stopped staring at the closed door. "Say what you want but damn does she know how to make an entrance and exit." I chuckled nervously, not knowing what to say after that frosty talk between mother and son.
"It's alright Adam." Sam yet again sighed, finally looking away from the door and back towards me. "She's always been like that, I'm used to it. I'm sure I've told you before about how much extra school work I do."
"Yeah, but you never told me it was like that bro. I mean fuck is she always so … uh."
"Frosty?"
"I was going to say bitchy but frosty works." I joked before immediately regretting it, realising I had just called my best mate's mom a bitch. Thankfully, however, Sam seemed to find it hilarious as he burst into laughter, which I promptly joined.
As the laughter died down, I quickly scrambled for a topic to mention. Anything to distract from the uncomfortable situation that had just occurred and Sam's home life that I was starting to realise wasn't as perfect as I had always envisioned. Yet I was drawing a blank, unable to think of even a single thing to say. And so in a panic, I said the first thing that came to my mind.
"So how's Helen?"