The young man scribbled something on a piece of paper, and slipped it inside a locker. He'd been doing so for the past hour. Viktor and Amelia both arrived at school earlier than they normally would. Last night, Camilo had gone outside to take out the trash, and never returned. Viktor made sure nobody at home panicked. Both of their parents had been out on business for the past two weeks, and left Camilo in charge. So now that Camilo was gone... Viktor and Amelia were pretty much going to have to fend for themselves either until Camilo turned up again, or until their parents returned home. Their business trip could last anywhere between the next week, or until Amelia's birthday in three months. It was all a gamble at this point.

It was annoying, but Viktor was sure that Camilo just ditched them to hang out with friends for the night, and woke up too late to get back home yet. Even so, Amelia's paranoia and tears led to Viktor writing all of these notes that asked if students had seen their brother. That was all he planted in the lockers.

"Hey man, what's up?" A voice nearby asked, and Viktor turned around with a curious gleam in his eye. The person standing in front of him was a guy a lot taller than himself. This boy was a pasty white, with hardly any meat on his bones. He had freckles dotting his face, like a connect-the-dots page, randomly splattered about. He had such a dopey grin because of his large teeth, and his girlie heart-shaped face didn't help his case. It was easy to see how this kid could be picked on. "Hey Bean." Viktor smiled up at his friend.

They clapped hands, and shook. "Any trouble today?" Viktor asked, and Bean shook his head. "Nah, Justin hasn't seen me yet." The pale boy replied, and glanced over his shoulder. His brown eyes held concern. His face was blood-rushed. A gripping fear always clutched his heart, pounding it until it beat faster, and ached with a pain that screamed 'Save me!' Bean was a skittish dude. He spooked easy.

Viktor shrugged, and started marching down the hall. Ironically, he'd first met Bean a couple of years ago when he tried to get the nerdy dude to do his homework for him. Bean was supposed to 'tutor' Viktor at home, but Viktor had threatened him into doing all the work himself. He never threw a punch, though. Not a smack, slap, or hit, either. A bluff was all that was needed to get Bean to do things for anyone.

He was just a shrimpy, nerdy kid with some problems with his looks and self-confidence. He'd never had a girlfriend, and didn't speak to anyone unless they brought something up. Even then, he didn't say much to anyone but the teachers, in private hush-hush voices.

At one point in time, this kid, Justin, appeared. He started picking on Bean, too. Just much more violently. One tutoring session, Viktor noticed that Bean's eye was swollen, and blackened like the ash from a dying fire. Bean had lied and said it had been a baseball injury. But Viktor had known better, even back then. Bean was afraid of baseball, and he flushed with color every time he lied.

At that point, Viktor went to challenge whoever was hitting his tutor. When he met Justin at last, the other boy just laughed and said that Viktor was no better. Just because he didn't smack Bean around now and then didn't mean he wasn't dangerous to be around.

Hearing that hurt. Like he himself had been smacked upside the head. He felt like he was responsible for horrible things that occurred in Bean's life, and even Amelia's whenever he was harsh with her. So, Viktor changed his tune. Weird to thank Justin for that. So he never did. Forget Justin!

From there, Bean and Viktor developed an actual connection. It wasn't very difficult to become friends after that. They both worked on the homework, and they started going out and doing stuff together. Seeing movies was always Bean's first go-to option, but every once in a while Viktor had convinced him that there was no hazard in visiting a sports game or monster truck show, maybe even a rodeo if one was in town. Bean helped Viktor to become much more relaxed, and calm, and Viktor tried to help Bean man up a little. Neither was one hundred percent successful, but in the end, they were good influences on one another.