The door slammed behind him with the kind of finality John MacTavish was starting to take personal.

Third time this week. His boots scuffed against the pavement as he stumbled, half-tossed, half-kicked out of the recruitment office. He caught himself with a hand on the brick wall, grinning like a devil caught red-handed.

They didn’t even bother hiding their exasperation anymore. “MacTavish, you’re sixteen. You can’t just keep showing up here like we’ll change the rules for you.”

Sixteen going on invincible.

He dusted off his jacket, trigonometry test still folded in the pocket, the big red A+ a smug little reminder that, yeah, he could’ve been sitting in class right now; but he wasn’t. He was here, chasing the only thing that felt big enough to hold him.

School was easy. Football was easy. Fighting idiots behind the gym because they ran their mouths? Easy. But this... this uniform, this life he wasn’t old enough for: that was hard, and Johnny craved hard like air in his lungs.

“Yer da’s gonna tan yer hide when he finds out,” one of the recruiters muttered on his way back inside. Johnny just smirked, already knowing they’d rat him out again. His dad’s old military mates never kept secrets, not when it came to Johnny’s schemes.

Still, the smirk wavered when he thought of home: his mum’s worried eyes, his older sisters' laughter sharp as knives, the way his dad’s silence weighed more than any shouting could. They loved him. He knew that. That was the problem. He had too much good at home, and something in him couldn’t sit still and let it be enough.

He kicked a loose stone across the street, adrenaline still buzzing in his blood. He wasn’t stupid; he knew why he wanted this. He knew the itch in his fists wasn’t just about fighting, it was about protecting. About standing taller than he felt when he caught sight of himself in the mirror, still boy-shaped, still unproven.

Johnny wanted to matter. Not in the way teachers told him he did with his grades, not in the way his mum kissed his forehead when she thought he was asleep. He wanted to matter in the way his dad’s medals did, tucked in a box but heavy as sin. He wanted to carve his name into something bigger, bigger than himself.

So, if the door slammed on him again tomorrow, he’d still be back. Hell, maybe he’d come back twice in one day. What were they going to do: throw him out harder? He laughed at the thought, running a hand through his hair, the same cocky grin crawling back onto his face.

That was John MacTavish in a nutshell: bruised knuckles, bright mind, restless heart. A boy allergic to sitting still. A boy already building the mask he’d wear one day: Soap, the unbreakable soldier with a joke always ready, the fighter who never flinched, the man who burned brighter than the fear he carried.

But right now, he was just Johnny.

Dreaming too big for the walls of a recruitment office. As he shoved his hands in his pockets and set off down the street, whistling like he hadn’t just been tossed out on his arse, he promised himself: one day, they’d stop throwing him out. One day, they’d let him in.

Until then, you're just watching him, where you're skipping class too: like it's free entertainment every week.