“I fucking quit!”  My brother slammed the front door as he walked into his house and immediately walked over to the liquor cabinet.  He didn’t bother with a glass, he just started drinking whiskey straight from the bottle.

“What?”  I leaned up from my sitting position on the couch.  “What happened?”

“Those fucking kids.”  He took a large gulp of whiskey.  “They’re nothing but a bunch of assholes.  I’d rather go dig ditches than deal with their shit.”

“Are you making up for lost time with profanity, bro?  I don’t think I’ve ever heard you curse this much.”  I walked into the kitchen and got a beer out of the fridge.

“The school board doesn’t care.  The teachers can’t do anything with them.  I would need armed guards in the hallways to deal with half the shit they do.  I’m done.  I can’t take this anymore.”  He walked over and sat down on the couch as I walked back into the room.

“It sounds like a shitty situation altogether.”  I joined him on the couch.

“Today some stupid bitch pulled down my pants when I walked out of the bathroom.  Could I do anything about it?  Hell no.  I can’t lay a hand on them.  I can’t even suspend them.  If I even raise my voice, I have a parent show up and threaten my job.  Well fuck the job—if they want it, they can have it.”  He guzzled more of the whiskey.

My brother continued drinking until he was an absolute mess and could barely stumble down the hall to his room.  I felt bad seeing him that way.  I was one day removed from prison and I had my shit together better than he did. 

I crashed on the couch and the next day, he didn’t get out of bed.  The hangover was definitely hitting him, but he also seemed incredibly depressed when I tried to talk to him.  I sat on the couch and thought about his predicament, wondering how a man with such a bright future had let the world burn out the light in his eyes. 

Part of that was my fault.  I might not have been the only person fucking his wife, but it was a betrayal that I regretted.  She could have calmed his nerves and said things that made him get out of bed—I couldn’t. 

Around lunchtime, I decided that I had to do something about his situation.  I might have been a shitty brother, but I was the only one he had.  I took some money out his wallet and headed into town to get a haircut and a shave.  I returned to find him still in bed, but I finally coaxed him into the kitchen for some food.

“Nice haircut.”  He blinked a couple of times.  “I haven’t seen you that cleaned up since middle school.”

“Yeah.”  I nodded.  “It was time for a change.”

“I need a drink.”  He walked to his liquor cabinet and grabbed a bottle of whiskey.

“What did you tell the school when you called?”  I fixed two sandwiches and pushed one over to him.  “Did you quit?”

“No.”  He shook his head and sipped the whiskey.  “I almost did, but I decided to just sleep on it instead.  I told them I was sick.”

“Good.”  I nodded.  “How are you feeling now?  Are you ready to go back tomorrow?”

“Fuck no.”  He shook his head back and forth.  “I’m probably going to call in sick tomorrow too.  Maybe I’ll just call in sick until they fire me.”

“I got another idea...”  I smiled and sat down at the table.

“I’m not getting caught up in another one of your schemes.  I don’t need more problems than I already have.”  He sat down at the table and chased the first bite of his sandwich with a gulp of whiskey.

“Hear me out.”  I put my sandwich down and looked over at him.  “You need a break—call it a vacation, even.”

“I get that every summer, but it’s never long enough.”  He lifted the bottle again.

“Hold up.”  I reached over and took the bottle.  “I need you sober long enough to hear what I have to say.”

“Fine...”  He released his grip on the whiskey and I sat it down on the table.

“You need a vacation and I’m not doing jack shit right now.”  I smiled.  “We’re twins and with this haircut, you can hardly tell us apart.”

“Yeah, if I spent a few years in a tattoo parlor and actually went to the gym—maybe.”  He shrugged. 

“The tattoos can be easily covered with a long sleeve shirt like you wear every day.”  I held my hand over my wrist to demonstrate where the shirt would stop.

“What are you getting at?”  He narrowed his eyes at me.

“I’m saying I want your job, bro—just for a month.  You take a nice vacation, I’ll take your place at Grantham University.”  I shrugged and picked up my sandwich.  “We’re twins after all.”

“You have to be fucking kidding me.  You’re serious?”  His eyes opened wide and he reached for the bottle of whiskey.  “Now I really do need a drink.”

“You said you were quitting.  You said you would rather dig ditches than work there.  Why not take a vacation, give me a shot at this whole principal thing, and if you decide you’re ready to go back, you’ll find a much different school waiting on you.”  I smiled and took a bite of my sandwich.

“You don’t understand what these kids are like.  You’ll be wearing handcuffs every day.  You literally can’t do anything to them.  If they piss in your face, you just have to wait until they’re done and then go wash it off.  You won’t run the school; they run everything—them and their rich asshole parents.”  He guzzled more whiskey.

“Let me worry about that for a while.”  I nodded.  “You just take some time off.  If it is as bad as you say, I’ll probably be running for the hills after one day anyway.”

“You know what.”  He shrugged and sighed.  “Maybe it’s just the liquor in me that’s even considering this, but fuck it.  If you want to go see what the nightmare I live is really like, be my fucking guest.”

***

THE NEXT DAY I WAS up early.  My brother slept in while I showered, shaved, and got ready for the day.  His shirts were a little tight on my biceps, but once I had a suit jacket on, it wasn’t noticeable.  The shirt covered my tattoos, so I didn’t have to worry about them.  I really did look exactly like my brother once I put on the costume of civilization he wore to work every day.  The main difference was that I didn’t have black circles under my eyes or hopelessness in my reflection.  I never gave a shit about school when I was a student and I certainly didn’t have my brother’s education, but it didn’t seem to be doing him any good at all.  I finished getting ready and took his keys from the counter.  It took me a few trips around the parking lot to find his spot, but I finally got the car parked and started towards the front door.  It was still early, so there weren’t many teachers there.  Most of them looked away when I tried to look at them.  My brother had made me a cheat sheet with names and a brief biography of each person.  I spent the evening trying to memorize faces in the yearbook, so I didn’t have to ask each teacher what their name was.  I hoped it would be good idea.

Okay, here goes nothing.

The first thing I did when I got behind his desk was fill out an application for a position as a janitor and push it through the system.  If I was actually applying for the job, they would have done a background check, but I was able to get through all of that and waive the requirements with my brother’s access.  The job was a necessary cover since my release did require me to have a job within a few weeks. 

I waited until the students arrived and walked out into the hallway.  It was literal chaos.  It actually reminded me of a prison with no guards.  There were no kids at the school—most of them were clearly adults.  The actual college portion was separated and in a different building, so all of the students I was responsible for were the ones that couldn’t even pass high school. 

I started to see why my brother had such a difficult time.  They seemed to be doing whatever they wanted and when the teachers walked down the hallway, they cowered in fear from the students. 

I waited until the bell rang for the first class and watched as some of the students didn’t even bother to leave the spot they were in.  It was going to take a lot of work to turn all of that around, but if I learned one thing about prison, it wasn’t that you picked the biggest guy and kicked his ass—you humiliated him.

“Hey!”  I took a step towards a group of guys huddled around a locker.  It was clear by the way others treated them that they were a clique and they commanded respect.

“Fuck off, Mr. Thorne.”  The one at the center of the group stepped forward.

“Get him, Braden!”  One of the guys next to him immediately egged him on.

“The bell rang.  You boys should be in class.”  I put my hands on my hips and glared at them.

“I’ll go when I’m ready.”  He scoffed at me and wrinkled his nose.  “Go hide in your office like you do every day.”

“I’m not going anywhere, but you are.”  I narrowed my eyes at him.  “You can go to class, or you can go to my office.”

“Yeah I’ll go chill in your office, fuck-face.”  He took a step towards me and flexed, but I didn’t move.

I had my first victim.  He might not have been the only king of the school, but he was definitely one that the others bowed to.  The group that surrounded him in the hallway didn’t have his ego or his brazen lack of respect.  I could see the way they looked away when I told them they should be in class while he immediately took charge.  All I had to do was show them that he wasn’t in charge anymore.  I was going to have to make an example of Braden and while my brother might be afraid of all the backlash parents would bring down on him, I didn’t give a shit. 

Braden reminded me a lot of myself at his age, but I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth.  I had to fight for what I got and I earned it.  Everything had been handed to him.  Braden walked into my office and before I had a chance to enter, he sat down in my chair.  I was going to take pleasure in breaking him.  It was pure necessity—there could only be one alpha male at Grantham University and it was going to be me. 

“Out of my chair, jackass.”  I motioned with my thumb.

“Maybe I’ll change my grades while I’m here.”  He leaned towards my computer.  “What’s your password?”

“I said—out of my fucking chair.”  My tone intensified and I saw surprise register on his face for the first time.

“Chill out.”  He looked at me with his hard demeanor fading.  He stood up and walked to the other side of my desk, taking a seat in the chair across from mine.

“Things are going to change at Grantham University.”  I took a seat in my chair and glared at him.  “It’s time for someone to clean this place up.”

“The only thing you clean up is the shit in your pants.”  He folded his arms.  “You can’t do anything to me—I’m fucking untouchable.  Do you know who my father is?”

“Honestly?”  I shrugged.  “I don’t give a shit.  You’re suspended.”

“You can’t do that.”  He shook his head back and forth.  “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“You disrespected me, you disobeyed me, you even tried to hack my computer.”  I motioned to the screen in front of me.

“What the fuck?”  He shook his head again.  “You’re delusional.”

“And of course—the fucking profanity.  I think three days at home sitting on your ass would do you a world of good.”  I picked up one of the discipline slips that hadn’t been touched in so long they had dust on them.

“My father will hear about this. He’s going to fuck you up, Mr. Thorne.  You don’t know what fuck you just did!”  Braden’s voice got louder and he stood to his feet.  “Or maybe I’ll just fuck you up myself.”

“Take a swing.”  I stood up and put my fists on the desk.  “You won’t be walking out of this school, you’ll be going straight through the window.”  I motioned to the window next to my desk.

“You know what—fuck you.  I’ll let my father deal with you.”  He sneered at me and started walking towards the door.  “You’re fucked, Mr. Thorne.”

It wasn’t over with Braden.  I knew he would send his father to the school to deal with me, and I was fine with that.  My brother cowered in fear of the students and their families, but I wasn’t going to do that.  It had brought him nothing but torment.  Braden was just the warning shot, but the warning shot did the job just fine.  I followed him into the hallway and watched as he exited the school.  The second I turned towards the group that was still huddled around their locker, they broke rank and started scurrying towards their classes. 

By midday, word seemed to have spread around the school.  Teachers that passed me no longer looked at their feet and picked up their pace—they actually nodded to me.  A few of them even smiled.  After lunch, they started sending a few students my way for discipline issues.  I spent time reading through the handbook, trying to figure out exactly what I could do to them.  Some of them got suspended, some of them got in-school suspension, and a few of them got detention.  By the end of the day, I was exhausted and my eyes were heavy.

“Mr. Thorne!”  I heard a voice echo through the front office as the last bell rang.

“Yeah?”  I walked out of my office and looked towards the door where I saw a man in a suit glaring at me.

“What the hell did you do to my son?”  He nodded to his left and I saw Braden with a smile on his face.

“I suspended him.”  I took a step towards the duo.  “He was acting like an asshole.”

“Do you know how much money I donate to this school?  Do you know how much of your salary I pay?”  His face flushed with rage as he spoke.

“Money got your son into this school—it doesn’t mean he runs it.”  I took another step towards them.

“He can do whatever the fuck he wants as long as he’s not at home.  You’re supposed to give him a diploma and send him to college.”  He put his hands on his hips.

“So he doesn’t have to earn it?”  I raised my eyebrows.

“He’ll be running my company one day, so if he wants to run the school in the interim—so be it.”  He took a step towards me.

“Sorry, it doesn’t work that way—not anymore.”  I shook my head back and forth.  “Your son can come back to school in three days.  If he’s respectful and does what he’s supposed to do, he can earn his diploma.”

“Let me tell you how this going to go.”  He took a step forward and poked me in the chest with his finger.  “You’re going to apologize to Braden, you’re going to tell him that you’re sorry for disrespecting him, and then you’re going to beg me not to call the school board to report this misunderstanding.”

“I would advise you to take a step back.”  My blood was boiling, but I tried to keep my cool.

“Or what?”  He poked me in the chest again.

I grabbed his finger in my right hand before he could drive it into my sternum a third time.  I tightened my grip and twisted it.  His eyes opened wide with shock as the pain shot through his body.  I pushed his finger backwards towards his hand until his knees went weak and his lip started to tremble.  He tried to get away from me, pulling against my grip with all of his might, but I had him firmly in my control.  He tried to swing with his other hand, but I pushed his finger further which caused his fist to drop in midair as he fell to his knees. 

Braden took a step back, afraid to even step up and save his father from what was happening.  I locked my eyes on him as his father whimpered in my grasp.  His father was his hope—the one thing he relied on when he got in over his head.  I watched that hope fade from Braden’s eyes.  I had asserted my dominance and that was the clear message I needed him to walk away from the encounter with.  I looked down at the man whimpering on the floor, twisting his finger a little more to bring a cry of agony from him before I finally released it.

“Your son is suspended.”  I adjusted my jacket and walked back towards my office.