Story: Middle Part 15
[[Continuity Note: Alf is having a lesson when Rock wanders in, apparently looking for his mother, Aliana... I forgot to mention somewhere, but she's not actually 29 but older, she just looks 29. Anyway, Alf is confused and determined to make amends with the boy.]]
All the way home, and all through the next day, Alf thought about what he had seen. Aliana never mentioned anything about her personal life, and it was strange to see a woman usually so happy and full of life so cold toward her own son. While Alf wanted to believe that it was completely Rock's fault and that whatever he'd done must have been awful, something told him that Rock wasn't that awful, and that what happened probably wasn't even his fault.
So when Alf saw Rock the next day after school, he stopped him.
"Wait, Rock," he called.
Rock continued walking, knowing exactly who it was.
Alf ran to catch up to him.
"If this is about yesterday," Rock spat, not making eye contact with the smaller teen. "It's none of your business."
"I wasn't going to say anything," Alf replied, surprising Rock.
"Then what do you want?"
"I sort of," Alf nervously shifted his backpack from one shoulder to the other.
Rock continued walking with no patience.
"I thought we could call a truce," Alf voiced.
Rock looked at him, then laughed in his face. "A truce? What makes you think I'd agree to something like that? I'm the one who started this, remember?"
Alf shrugged, though the effect was lost as he struggled to keep up with Rock's larger strides. "So what? Does that mean we can't finish it?"
Rock looked at Alf with malice in his eyes. "That's exactly what it means."
Alf stopped following, confused. What had he ever done that so irritated Rock? "What did I do?" he called after the older boy's retreating back.
"What did you do?" Rock repeated, turning around and coming back to stand right in front of Alf, invading his personal space and intimidating him with physical distance, or rather, the lack of. "You did everything I couldn't. Can do everything I can't."
Alf looked at him, confused.
Rock rolled his eyes and spelt it out for Alf. "I can't do magic," he whispered.
Alf's eyes widened in shock as he processed this, but Rock had walked off by that point. He'd heard about people in the magical families who weren't able to do magic. Jessica had mentioned that they were generally treated as though they were magical, even if they weren't. She'd never mentioned that there were any in her own family. She'd never mentioned that Rock was her cousin, even. Admittedly, Alf had never mentioned Rock to her either. He had been a bit of a sore point since the way he learned of his magic came up, and the way that Damien had blamed Rock for their friendship's demise.
Alf was suddenly even more determined to get down to the bottom of Rock, and he wasn't even going to let Rock stop him.
[[End Scene.]]
posted by Cedric @ 5:22 pm
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