(Requested by Iloverandomlemons )
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(Word count: 2743)

"I'm home!" I called out from the living room, setting my bag at the front door. I don't even know why I still did that. My mom was a full time surgeon and my dad was a Marine. It's not like anyone else was there with me anymore. Except, of course...

That big black ball of fur we called a dog came running through the hallway, skidding over and jumping all over me. "Alright, alright Scottie, enough!" I laughed, nudging him off of me. He was a huge and strong dog, a Pitbull to be exact, but he always acted like he's still the size of a tennis ball. It sometimes surprised me that he could've straight up murdered me if he wanted, but instead decided to be my best and only friend.

I'm starting off on the wrong tangent aren't I? My bad, I get sidetracked easily. My name's Ash, I was 12 at the time and, like I said, my parents were never home. They were always busy, and all the while my only companion was our family dog Scottie. Everyone kept asking me why I never threw house parties since I was alone all the time and my parents were fairly wealthy. I may be a reckless child, but I still have morals. Besides, I'd be cleaning up the mess by myself.

Anyway, I say I was 12, but that's only because that's when my life fell apart. The problem I have is where to begin with this.

It was around the summer time, mid June or July. It was blazing hot, but I couldn't keep Scottie in all day, so I had him run around the backyard. Our fence stretched to the front of the house next to the street, but I had no worries of him jumping over and getting hit by a car or something. It was the neighborhood kids I worried about.

My neighborhood wasn't the safest place to begin with, but with a bunch of 8 year olds that have no sense of humanity running around doing whatever they wanted, it was a million times worse. Their parents didn't even try to look out for them, so they end up doing some crazy shit. But this time was where they crossed a thin white line.

Scottie was running about, and I stayed outside to make sure he didn't overheat. He would probably start scratching at the door anyways, but I still wanted to look out for him. We had an awning outside, so I tried to stay under the shade of it as much as I could, but when he ran to the front of the house, I had to follow him.

The kids were riding up and down the block on their scooters when they stopped in front of my house. Scottie abruptly stopped running and turned to look at them, making me stop as well. They laughed among themselves for a while before one of them stuck their hand through the fence, waving it about. The other kids were making clicking noises, trying to call him over. I grabbed Scottie by his collar and tried to keep him away, but he was stronger and ran up to the kids. The one with his hand through the mesh then proceeded to slap Scottie's snout as the others laughed about it. I ran over and continuously called the dog's name, trying to drag his attention away from them. The kid kept slapping him until Scottie finally opened his mouth as they brought their hand down again and bit into the kid's flesh.

It definitely wasn't as hard a bite as he could've made, but of course it made the little shit start bawling his eyes out. The group ran off without another word and I rushed Scottie inside the house.

Not even 10 minutes later I hear a knock on the door. Scottie was laying down on his dog bed and I advised him to stay put, though he intently stared at the front entrance. And who else could it be other than the kid's mother, standing there with her hand on her hips like she was the ruler of the world. I've had to talk to her a few times before, and she is the full on definition of a Karen. I didn't even know her first name, but I could bet you 100 bucks that's what it was. Anyway, I knew exactly what this was about, and I knew exactly what she was gonna say, so I didn't even bother listening. Obviously the kid cried to his anti-vax mom about the big doggie biting his hand for "no reason". God I hated this place.

What I wasn't expecting her to say was that she was gonna sue us. I actually laughed when she said that, thinking she was either joking or too stingy to even make it to court. Nope. The next day my mom had to come home from work to hear this bitch complain about our dog and send us to trial. It was court after court after court for the whole school year, sometimes I had to skip entire weeks just to make it and present myself as a witness. It was stupid, and Karen at some point even wanted us to euthanize Scottie. Then the whole case turned into that, a fight to keep my best friend alive. We didn't want any money from her, hell, we said we could pay for a portion of the doctor fees since she didn't have insurance, but nope. We "waited too long". She wanted him put down now.

We lost money not only from paying for lawyers, but also since my mom stopped working as much. It went on for a whole year. I didn't even get to celebrate my 13th birthday or Scottie's 8th because I had to show up. It was a complete waste of our cash and time.

Especially when we lost.

It finally ended the next summer, but we were somehow ruled guilty. And per Karen's request, Scottie was brought to the vet. The worst part was that they wouldn't even let me watch, like I was an innocent child and they were violently chopping his head off. I knew how dogs got killed that way, and I was a teenager now. They let me watch my dad nearly die in the hospital when I was 10, but they wouldn't even let me see my best friend.

I was outcast more than ever since then. Every time those kids came down the road on their bikes the leader would slow down just enough to where he could look at me and stick his tongue out, like he somehow won something for getting Scottie killed. I never looked at his face directly, but down at the scar the bite mark left. Just another reminder of my dog's tolerance level. Until one day I decided my tolerance would be the same as his. And I'd prove it.

The band of kids would always ride their bikes on the other side of the street when they were going away from their house, and would ride back on the side of my street where my house was. Perfect.

My dad owned a variety of guns, but I decided on a less powerful BB gun. I wanted to kill them, but decided to make things a little more painful. I started to take more notes in my science class once the year started, more specifically our physics lessons. I got As in that class since then, but that's not the goal I was aiming for. It was only a nice addition.

Eventually, halfway into the school year I set up a trap. No house on our street had security cameras, not even ours, so that was convenient too. The kids rode their bikes in the morning, the leader sticking his tongue out like usual, but today I just smiled. I looked at him straight in the eye and, for the first time in a while, I smiled. I watched them from the window of my house when they rode back in the afternoon, and I just smiled.

I stayed up almost that whole night, grabbing a long strand of string, the gun, and a few more small items before getting to work. I fell off of a ladder twice and I nearly shot myself with my own gun, but you could send me to jail my whole life just because I did this and I'd still say it's worth it.

Tomorrow he'd have more than just the scar on his hand.

The next day rolls around. It's Sunday and I've only slept for 2 hours. Nonetheless, I walk out to the front of my lawn and stand at the edge of my fence, peering over. I made sure everything was still in place as I put on the glove I previously coated with magnets.

This was gonna be fun.

I looked down the street and saw the kids coming along. Once again, I smiled at them, even giving them a small wave like they were my friends. Of course, they were far from that. The leader turned to me and was about to make that stupid face again when his bike abruptly stopped. It hit the tripwire I put up and sent him flying. Once his face hit the asphalt, his friends stopped and turned the other way, going back to where they came from. He picked his head up, which was now red and covered with blood, from the ground, standing his bike up and pedaling. But what's this? Both of his tires are flat? Oh no, I wonder who could've set up a line of nails for just that purpose. While he's trying to get his bike to go, I climb up to the roof of my house. It was angled, but I stood just fine. There was a stand holding up the BB gun, and I managed to quickly yet precisely aim it right at the kid's face. I jumped down with a rope in my hand, and the second it snapped away from where it was tied, the gun fired. I knew the kid's face was gonna be scraped up, and I figured it would hurt worse than normal, but I got something even better. It hit the kid right in his eye. Now blood was really spraying everywhere, and the kid was screaming bloody murder. But no one else was up this early on a Sunday except for the people that went to church, which was pretty much everyone down the road, and they were gonna be all the way in town for a while. I walked over to the kid, quickly picking up the leftover nails with the magnet covered glove, and I laughed.

"Alright, alright you little shit, enough." I chuckled, kneeling beside him. With the nails in my hand I grabbed his arm, specifically the one with the scar on his hand. "Now, why did you get bit by Scottie last year?"

"Your dog?" The kid fearfully asked. "Because he was-"

I squeezed the kid's arm a little harder. I could feel the metal pierce through his skin. "Nope. Because you were slapping him and he was defending himself. Now, why did you get bit by Scottie last year?"

"B-because..." The kid stumbled on his words, like he never admitted to doing anything wrong before. "...because I was slapping him and he was defending himself..."

"Good, we're getting somewhere." I congratulated him, though he still looked terrified. "Why did your mother sue us and have Scottie be put down?"

"Because she's... bad?"

"Good enough. She's a bad parent and person. So what are you gonna tell her when you get home?"

"That she's bad?"

"Tell her that she's a stupid whore who doesn't believe in practical logic and would rather spend her day on Facebook talking to her equally idiotic friends than educate her son on how to be a better person. Got that?"

The kid nodded and I finally let go of him. I could see the little bleeding holes he had in his arm. He was about to pick up his bike when I stopped him. "Nope. This is mine now. You took something I valued and buried it 6 feet deep, so I'm gonna take something you value and bury it 6 feet deep."

"That's not-" He started, but he shut up as soon as I opened my glove to let him see the nails again.

"And by the way kid, you got attacked and your bike got stolen by the 6th graders two blocks down. Got it?"

The kid nodded and ran back to his house. I cut the tripwire, took down the gun stand on my roof, got rid of the glove, and buried the bike in my backyard. It took me less than 15 minutes to do everything else and burying the bike took almost an hour, but the kid's mother didn't come around this time, so I can only assume what I did worked.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love revenge?

***

It's been a few months since the incident. I rarely ever saw that kid out, and when he was he avoided any kind of contact with me. One day my mom and dad both came home and let me know that we were moving away to a better place. Of course, I was glad to hear that we were leaving this dump behind, but then I remembered we buried Scottie at the local cemetery. So this time I was really saying goodbye.

My dad drove us all over to the graveyard one last time. Walking through the row he was in, I finally got to his gravestone and just stood there for a while. I don't exactly remember what was running through my mind, but I eventually kneeled beside the stone and placed down a stick. Not just any stick, it was Scottie's favorite stick, the one we would use to toss around the backyard when it was spring and the days were nice. It still has his teeth marks engraved on the sides. Now I was leaving behind the last reminder I had of his presence, and all I could say was "Have fun boy."

As we walked back to the car, I swore I could hear him happily barking and prancing around, proud to be holding up the branch we loved.

***

Two days into moving in and I'm still a loner. Not that I don't mind, since I'm pretty used to it. We moved to a small town called Honeydale, and I'm completely convinced that everyone here knows everyone else and their extended family. It's oddly... nice, I guess you could say. We bought a decently sized house and my dad was honorably discharged from the army. My mom still works full time, but the hospital isn't that far away, so we'll occasionally visit when days aren't that busy.

I was sitting at an empty table in the cafeteria, quietly snacking on a bag of Cheetos. I never ate that much sometimes, but I wasn't dangerously skinny so I never worried about it. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed someone else sitting at the other end of the table, so I turned to look at them.  I could only assume it was girl from her long brown hair.  She wore red earmuffs, a red crop top, and red shorts, which was honestly an odd combination but quite pretty.  She looked over at me and caught me staring, so I turned my head and pretended not to notice.  Probably ignoring that, she scooted next to me.

"Hey, you're the new kid, right?"  She asked with a small smile.  Her eyes were a deep blue unlike her bright red outfit.

"Uh, yeah."  I answered.  "Ash."

"Colleen."

"Well, it's nice to know you I guess."

"You wanna hang out after school?  I heard Mason's playing at the night club again."

"Who's Mason?"

"Oh, sorry.  I'm used to everyone knowing everyone.  If you come with me you two can meet up."

"I'm gonna have to start learning everyone's names, huh?"

"If you want to hold a normal conversation, yes."

"Well shit."

We both proceeded to laugh about it for a while.  I have a feeling I'm gonna like my time living here.