you knew what your best friend, lana rucker was going through. when she would come to school with a bruise here or there, or didn’t want to hang out after school because her father was in a ‘mood’, you knew.

you’re other friend, Julie, might have believed her little cover up stories or excuses, but you didn’t. You didn’t know the whole story, but you knew that whatever happened in the rucker house, stayed in the rucker house.

and it wasn’t just their house, at school, lana would get made fun of tremendously, or even bullied in most cases. you tried so hard to protect her from mean people. and the only other person who could protect her was her older brother, dallas.

he had a reputation of fights, which most were for his sister, but he also had a reputation of smoking, and hanging out with ethan hollis, the biggest drug dealer in the school, since he was in the 7th grade.

dallas was three years older than you or lana, so when he went to high school, it was hard for him to protect lana from her bullies, but you tried. anytime a kid would even think to say something about her you would shut it down immediately.

one day, after one of Dallas’ baseball games, you, julie, and lana were all starting to walk home together when a group of boys started harassing all of you.

they ripped Lana’s jacket, stole Julie’s candy bar, and starting trying to get to you.

you tried to push them away, but you didn’t get far before a fist came straight into the face of one of the boys.

it was dallas, of course.

he didn’t hit the boy hard enough to cause bad damage, but it was definitely enough to run them off.

after they had run off, julie was crying so you had to comfort her while also checking on lana, who was in a conversation with her brother.

“Look- it’s fine. use my jacket, I barely use it anyways.” Dallas says, putting his jacket on Lana’s shoulders.

lana didn’t say anything, but it wasn’t smart, what he did. he would be freezing his ass off.

until you got an idea.

the next day, you brought an old jacket that your brother used to wear to school.

all day, you looked for Dallas around school until finally, at lunch break, you found him smoking god-knows-what under a tree.

“what is that?” you say cautiously, sitting next to him.

you swear you see his lips twitch slightly before responding, “relax. it’s just a cigarette. aren’t you Lana’s friend?”

you nod slightly before continuing, “uhm- thanks for running off those boys yesterday. I have something for you.” You look through your bag before holding out a black jacket to him.

he looks down at the jacket, his face hardening slightly, “I don’t need your charity.”

you sigh and throw the jacket in his lap, “stop being so stubborn and take the jacket.”

he huffs, but doesn’t move the jacket and takes another puff from his cigarette.

after a few minutes he finally says, “I’ll return the favor.”