ROCKY'S CARELESSNESS

by Emelie.

Rocky, Colt and Tum Tum were on their way home from school.
Tum Tum was eating from a bag of cheez doodles, Colt was kicking an empty can and Rocky...well, he just looked as happy as ever.
"What are you smiling about?" frowned Colt.
"Haha, you wouldn't even wanna know" laughed Rocky.
"Tell us! tell us!" demanded Tum Tum.
"I just got a pretty high mark on my math test this morning"
Colt looked away. Why did his brother ALWAYS have to be the best at everything? and why did he get all the girls after him?...why was he always number one?
"What was it then?" wondered Tum Tum.
"Full mark. 58 out of 58" said Rocky.
"Wow, big deal!" said Colt sarcastically.
"You jealous or something?" wondered Rocky.
"Why would I be jealous of YOU!?"
"Colt's jealous of you, Rocky. Haha!" cried Tum Tum.
"No I'm not!!!"
"Yes you are! haha"
Rocky sighed, his brothers were arguing all the time.
"Guys, shut up will ya?" he shouted. They went quiet.
"But I thought you liked us talking about your achievements" said Tum Tum.
"Well..."
"Yeah? what were you saying...?"
"Nothing" said Rocky.
They walked up their drive. The car was there so their parents must be there.
Dad was watching TV when they came inside.
"Hi boys!" he said "how was your day...?"
"Boring, as usual" sighed Colt.
"I liked it" said Tum Tum "I actually got picked first for the basketball team"
"How did that math test go, Rocky?" asked dad.
"Ok"
"What do you mean 'ok'? what was your mark?"
"Um...I got all the questions right" said Rocky and blushed.
"Here we go again" thought Colt.
"Well done, Samuel!" said dad, and his face lit up.
"Yeah! three cheers for ya, Rock!" cried Tum Tum.
Colt was the only one that didn't look too happy. He hated seeing his brother getting all the attention because of some stupid math test.
"What do you think of that, Jeffrey?" said dad.
"Whatever"
"Is that all you can say to congratulate your brother?"
"Yeah!" said Colt and walked away.
"He's just jealous" whispered Tum Tum.
Rocky didn't feel too good either. Of course, he liked being praised for all his good work, but what he didn't like was his brother getting angry at him for it.
"What can I do 'bout it?" he thought.
Later that night mom came home from her job, and she wanted to know Rocky's test results just as much as dad had wanted to. She was overjoyed when she heard the answer.
Dad, Colt and Tum Tum were playing some card games downstairs when she arrived.
"He got full marks!" cried dad "isn't that good, or what?".
"Yes, but where is he?" asked mom.
"In his room, I guess"
Colt tried to change the subject.
"Mom, wanna have a go at this? we were just about to start another round"
"Another time, Jeffrey. Where's Samuel?"
"I hope he's gone to hell!" thought Colt to himself as an evil smile spread over his face.
"Rooooocky! Mom wants to see you!" shouted Tum Tum as he gave Colt a look which seemed to say "Haha, now you're gonna be real happy!".
Rocky heard his brother shouting for him. He was just on the last page on one of his fave coming books and didn't wanna be disturbed.
"Hey, why not come down anyway?" he thought and went downstairs.
"Oh, I heard you got the highest mark in math today" mom said the moment she saw him.
"Not excactly" said Rocky, 'cause he didn't wanna get too embarrassed.
"Shut up, Rock" thought Colt "we've heard all this before".
There was nothin' he could do about it. Rocky had everyone's eyes fixed on him.
"I'm going upstairs, ok?" said Colt at last. No one was listening to him.
He was angry at everyone, especially at Rocky. He went upstairs without saying another word.
"What can I do to make them notice me?" he asked himself as he lay on the bed.
He thought about wrecking Rocky's homework, but that would be kinda sad...
so he had to think about something else.
"I always get the blame for everything" he thought. "Maybe I should get Rocky into trouble somehow" but then he thought about all the times when Rocky had forgiven him for all the nasty things he'd said about him. Colt started to feel guilty. "I just wish that Rocky would stop thinking about school too much".
What he didn't know is that this would become true sooner or later.
The next day, a tuesday, everything seemed just as usual. Rocky had packed all his books and stuff last night, while Colt and Tum were still looking for their books.
"Are you finished yet?" asked Rocky as he opened the front door to walk outside.
"Hey! wait up!" shouted Tum Tum. Colt went to stand by Rocky.
"C'mon, Tum!" he said.
"Yeah...I'm coming!"
They walked outside, got on their bikes to go to school.
School was fine, and at the end of the day Colt felt much better than before.
He walked on the school grounds and was surprised not to see Rocky there.
Rocky who ALWAYS was so organized....he wasn't here! Tum Tum was there, though and he seemed pretty worried.
"Colt, you know where Rocky is?" he asked.
"No, maybe he's got a detention" Colt liked the thought of that.
"But he never gets detentions!" cried Tum Tum.
"Yeah, unfortunately..." said Colt so quietly that Tum Tum couldn't hear him.
They had waited there for ages. They always met up at this place after school.
No one was there but them, and there was absolutely no sign of Rocky.
"Maybe we should go look for him" suggested Tum Tum.
"Let's not" said Colt.
"But he could be in danger, y'know"
"Yeah, but Rocky can defend himself just as good as we can, can't he?"
"What if there are loads of guys attacking him, then?"
"Rocky can handle them. Should we go home now?" said Colt.
"Yeah, ok. I was beginning to get hungry".
They were riding slowly on their bikes. What were they gonna say to mom and dad when they got home later in the afternoon? that was if Rocky wasn't home by then.
No, Rocky wasn't there. It felt kinda weird without him, as he was the 'leader'.
"I'm hungry" said Tum Tum.
"Go get some chips, there should be some left" said Colt.
"I ate them all and I'm starving" cried Tum Tum.
"Ok, ok...how about I call the pizza delivery?" suggested Colt.
"Yeah! that'd be great!"
Colt dialled the number and sat down with Tum in front of the TV.
"But where is Rock?" asked Tum Tum.
"You know he's not here, stupid!"
"Hey! who are you calling stupid!?"
They continued shouting at each other. Rocky wasn't there to stop them as he usually did...he was just somewhere else, and where?
Meanwhile, he was having a great time with some 'friends'. Dan Granger had asked him to come hang around with him and his gang round the mall.
Dan was known as the school hard ass, don't ask me why though.
"Sure" was Rocky's reply. Something had struck him just like that. He couldn't figure out what. He went with them.
Dan had also brought some pretty girls with him, they were always hanging around him waiting for him to give them a kiss or some sweet words.
One of them, Suzi Connor was rumoured to have the hots for Rocky.
Most of them seemed kinda drunk. Rocky was offered a drink and said yes. He had always been taught in school to say no to stuff like that, but right now he just felt like something good. He needed to get some fun out of his life, at least that's what Dan said. "Go on, Douglas! have a drink" he said. Rocky was never like this, it was probably something that Colt would try out. Everyone staggered towards the local shops. Dan dared Rocky to throw stones and bottles at Buddy Fisher's jewelry shop. Buddy was a grumpy old man, his good days were over but he did make some fine jewelry. Rocky couldn't resist, and carried out the task. It wasn't that hard, not until the cops came.
"SCRAMBLE!!!!" everyone screamed and scattered everywhere.
Rocky ended up running somewhere with Suzi Connor. They came to a dead end where there was graffiti on the walls, broken wine bottles and old cigarette packets. Rocky was out of breath because of running. He turned to Suzi who had been looking at him all along.
"Y'know, I've always kinda liked you, Rocky" she laughed.
"You must be crazy!!!" said Rocky and started laughing, too.
They were just too drunk, it was easy to tell.
"Oh..we all...are" Suzi said "do you...like me?"
"Yeah, of course I do" whispered Rocky "you look so hot in that skirt..."
They both started laughing. Why was Rocky behaving so...different? He would never say that to a girl, at least not to a girl he didn't know that well!
It was dark already, as not many people were around.
"Where did everyone go?" wondered Rocky
"Don't worry about them" said Suzi "now I've got you all for my own...."
She touched his shoulders.
"Um...let's get outta here!" said Rocky.
"But..." Suzi didn't like that, she just wanted Rocky.
Rocky dragged her outside. There were no cops around. Suddenly Rocky felt weird.
"What am I doing HERE?" he said.
"Why, you're just out in the dark with me honey!" said Suzi.
"And why am I here with you!?"
"Oh" said Suzi "you wanna give me a kiss now?". Rocky looked at his watch.
It was 11 p.m. His parents would be mad at him for being out so late
"Oh man, I gotta go now!" said Rocky and made a run for it.
"Hey wait!" shouted Suzi, but he had already gone.
Rocky sneaked inside his house, everyone was asleep. He quickly got changed and went to bed.

The next morning there was lots of questions being asked. Mostly "Where were you last night!?" and "Why didn't you call us?". Rocky could hardly remember any of it, but he promised his parents not to do it again.
Surprisingly, he wasn't first out of bed.
"Get up, Rock!" shouted his brothers.
"Just leave me alone!!!" he replied. Colt and Tum Tum looked at each other, this was just not how their brother used to be like. He didn't even wait for them that morning, but went to school on his own.
"So what do you think has happened to him?" said Tum Tum to Colt.
"Dunno"
"But something's wrong with him"
"Don't care"
"YOU DON'T CARE???"
"Naaah..."
Tum Tum looked at his brother and thought "Both of them must have gone mad!!!"
Rocky arrived at school pretty late that day, very unusual for him. He didn't listen to the teacher yelling at him and he didn't do the class work he had been told to do.
There was a test that day, and Rocky got all the questions wrong. Of course, he didn't know that until he got the results back.
"I'm not pleased with this" sighed dad.
"Listen, honey" interuppted mom "you can't expect him to be best at everything"
"I know, but he got the lowest in his class!"
"I doesn't matter, at least he tried his hardest...didn't you, Samuel?"
Rocky frowned at his parents. He hadn't tried his hardest. In his opinion, he thought that school sucked.
"I hate school!" he cried.
"What did you say!?" said dad. Rocky had that strange feeling again...it was like he had gone back to normal.
"What did I say?" he said, looking confused.
"You just said you didn't like school" said dad.
Rocky laughed, he had never felt this stupid before.
"I hate school???" he said "I don't hate school at all. I like it"
"WHAT!?" his parents stared at him "but you just said..."
Tum Tum and Colt walked in to see what was going on.
"Rocky...you're back to normal now?" wondered Tum Tum.
"What do you mean? haven't I always been...normal?"
"How about that time you didn't meet us outside school?" said Colt.
"I don't remember that"
"You don't remember it!?"
"What are you talking about? I meet you there all the time". Now they all looked confused....Rocky was just the same as he was before.
This incident didn't happen again. You just need to be careful what you wish for.