At the very back of their homeroom classroom, tucked in the corner, two friends sat whispering to each other, excitement laced in their voices.
"I'm doing it today!" Max proclaimed to Cas, then quickly glanced up to make sure he hadn't drawn any attention to himself.
Cas and Max had been best friends for as long as Cas could remember. Max was the kind of jokester that made everyone around him smile–or sometimes cringe internally.
"You said that yesterday," Cas said, rolling his eyes. "And the day before, and the day before that, and the–"
"Alright, I get it!" Max hissed. "But today, I'm really going to do it."
Of course, the subject of their discussion was something one would expect from two high school students, whether or not Max would find the courage to ask the girl he liked out.
When Max had first confessed to Cas about finding his "eternal love", he couldn't help but burst out in laughter. A laugh that was fueled further when Max had told him who his crush was–Alice Sinclair, the most sought-after girl in their grade.
Though fairly good-looking, Cas doubted his friend would be able to secure a date with that gem of a girl. Alice was everything a guy could ask for. Funny, pretty, fit, and of course, extremely rich, with her father being the owner of a large construction company.
"Maximilian," an annoyed feminine voice called out from the front of the classroom. It seemed their teacher had finally noticed they hadn't been paying much attention. "Do you have something you wish to share with the class?"
Everyone's head turned toward the back of the classroom, and Cas struggled to keep his expression neutral as laughter threatened to escape him, which would no doubt cause their teacher to get even angrier than she already was.
"In fact, I do, Miss Williams," Max stated matter-of-factly.
He then glanced at Cas, throwing him a devilish smile that could only be interpreted as trouble.
Cas stiffened. This would not be good.
"You see, my friend Cas here has been having some man problems if you know what I mean," he said, gesturing below his belt, "and I was just–"
"Enough!" Miss Williams shouted, cutting him off, her face painted red in anger. "Detention for both of you after class today."
Cas's eyes bulged as he processed what was just said. "But I–"
"Nothing else from you, Cassius!" she boomed before continuing her lecture.
Cas's mouth hung open as he blankly stared forward.
He shot a glare at his friend, who was dutifully pretending he was deeply engrossed in the lecture.
Cas sighed, covering his face in his hands as he thought about having to spend an extra hour at school today.
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After a torturous two hours of silence in detention, Cas and Max left the building and began their walk home just as the sun was setting below the horizon. Max lived right down the street from Cas, which was great as it allowed the two to converse about the events of the day as they walked.
"You know, I think you intentionally got us detention so that you could procrastinate asking Alice out," Cas said.
"Pfft," Max laughed. "As if I would be afraid of asking out a girl. I'll do it tomorrow. Watch."
"Sure, sure," Cas said sarcastically. "Anyways, did you hear about..."
Cas and Max continued to chat about random things until just before they reached the street they both lived on.
That's when they heard a high-pitched scream of a young girl.
Glancing at each other, they nodded and bolted towards the sound of the scream.
Looking down each nearby street and alley, Cas and Max frantically attempted to find the girl.
"HELP!" The girl cried again.
This time, they were close enough to pinpoint where the scream had come from, a dimly lit alley a couple of blocks away.
As they arrived, they saw four men surrounding a young girl on the ground, her knees pulled tightly to her chest. Dirt caked on her face.
"Hey!" Max shouted from the end of the alley. "Leave the girl alone!"
The alley went deathly quiet as the men slowly turned to see who had just interrupted them.
Cas's heart skipped a beat. These guys were no joke; they were all extremely muscular, and Cas was even able to make out a few scars on one of the men's faces simply due to how large they were.
Glancing at Max, Cas could tell he was a little nervous by the subtle shaking of his hands, but he was surprised to see a grim determination set on his friend's face, which motivated him to feel the same.
He clenched his jaw. Him and Max would likely be taking a nice trip to the hospital after this, but it would be worth it if they could save the girl.
The man with the scars–likely their group's leader–spoke up in a deep, harsh voice. "If you leave now, we'll pretend like we didn't see you, and won't cave your faces in."
A shiver ran through Cas at the threat, but he quickly composed himself.
Projecting a confidence he didn't know he had, he retorted, "If you don't leave, we'll be adding a new scar to your collection. Or maybe you'd like that? Do you use them to hide your ugly face?"
Through the corner of his eye, Cas could see Max's lips twitch up into a half-smile. However, the man with the scars didn't seem as amused. In fact, he seemed to be quite furious, clenching his jaw and opening and closing his fists.
"Stupid kid, you're going to regret that!" he yelled, then charged at him like a wild bull.
Cas quickly took out a handful of small stones he had thrown in his pockets while they were running here, not wanting to be completely unarmed, and began throwing them at the wild man.
A few of the stones struck the man in the face, tearing his skin and drawing blood, but the scarred man seemed completely unfazed.
Seeing that Cas's rock-throwing effort was doing little, Max took a gamble. Neither Cas nor Max would be considered muscular by typical standards, and they definitely didn't know how to fight, but they were both tall and carried a decent amount of weight to them, so as the man charged in, completely tunnel-visioned on Cas, Max slammed into his side, driving him into the alley wall.
Cas, who had been preparing for impact, blinked in surprise but quickly recovered. Taking advantage of this opportunity, he jumped on top of the scarred man, tackling him to the floor, and began wildly punching as hard as he could.
It was at this point that the scarred man's lackeys–who seemed to be caught in a daze after witnessing two high schoolers pounce on their leader–realized they should probably get involved.
"Cas, we got trouble," Max called out, nodding in the direction of the three men now approaching.
Cas, upon glancing down at the scarred man–whose face was now streaming with blood from his nose and several large gashes–decided the man was probably incapacitated for the rest of the night.
He had never intentionally caused physical harm to anyone before, and he felt like he should have felt something after badly beating a man, but the adrenaline pumping through him kept his focus sharp, and he stood to help Max.
He examined the three remaining men. They weren't as large as the scarred man, but they were still much larger than him and Max.
They had gotten lucky in antagonizing their leader to attack alone, but their luck had run out.
One of the men smiled wickedly as he pulled a knife from his belt, the blade glinting as the soft light from a street lamp reflected off of it.
CAs supposed they should run. It was one thing to take a beating on behalf of someone else, but risking his life was another. He was just about to voice this to Max, but paused after spotting the young girl still huddled in the corner, observing with anxiety painted all over her face, tears running down her cheeks.
He knew then he couldn't run.
He silently mouthed, "get out" to the girl, hoping she would see, and then took a deep breath.
What followed was a brutal beating. The two friends fought valiantly, scoring some punches and kicks, but the other men were just too large, and the numbers were not in their favor.
After what felt like forever, the beating ceased. The men hoisted up their boss from the cold stone, and the alley fell into a peaceful silence..
Cas found himself bloodied and beaten, slumped up against the cold alley wall, a sharp, intense pain throbbing in his stomach. Placing a hand where the pain resonated, he felt the warm sensation of blood on his fingers, causing a deep tremble to run through his body.
He tried to look for the shape of Max's form, but his eyes were so swollen that he could barely see.
He wanted to call for help, but he was so weak he could barely manage a moan.
"That you, Cas?" A faint voice rasped from his left, which he was barely able to discern as Max's.
"Yeah," he croaked out.
"We did alright."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah," Max whispered. "A couple of kids, giving a gang of toughies a run for their money."
Cas could barely think straight, but he managed a soft smile.
"Max?"
"Yeah?"
"You think the girl got away?"
"I think so," Max smiled. "I didn't see her when I glanced in that direction after those guys started laying into us."
"Good," Cas let out a slow breath.
The alley fell into silence for a while before one of them spoke up again.
"Hey, Cas?"
"Yeah?"
"You think Alice would have said yes?"
Cas let out a weak laugh that turned into a coughing fit. "Absolutely not."
"You piece of shit," Max chuckled.
Another long silence followed.
"Max?"
"Yeah?"
"You know you're basically my brother, right?"
A tear dripped down Max's face. "Yeah, unfortunately for you."
Cas smiled faintly. "Next time, Max," he paused, taking a deep breath, "try not to get us into any more trouble."
Max huffed out a weak laugh. "No promises."
The alley fell quiet as both boys' eyes closed.