Those two and a half weeks til November began were filled with more than a bit of anxiety for all of those affected by Curt’s crimes. Yet, the days somehow still seemed to speed by too quickly. Then it was finally the day of his eighteenth birthday when all involved worriedly stared at their phones. Trying not to also think about him getting that cast off in another two weeks as well, they all waited to hear how awful the remaining six weeks until the trial would truly be for all involved; assuming they survived those six weeks even.

Then word came that Curt would not be sent to an adult prison until his scheduled trial date of December 18th. Instead, he would be placed on house arrest; with the understanding that even one violation of that house arrest, or any of the restraining orders now in place, or any other breaking of any other law would result in his immediate incarceration in an adult prison until his trial after all. And none of his victims were sure, still, if this was good news or not, as trusting the legal system or authorities to keep them safe did not come easily to any of them at this point.

When Curt’s parents brought him home that evening, they didn’t say a word to him on the trip from the juvenile detention facility to their home in the richest part of town. Instead they pulled into the garage and headed inside to get ready for a fundraiser they had scheduled that night. That was finally when his mother spoke to him as he somberly followed them inside with his handy new ankle bracelet in place blinking green as they arrived on the property.

“We have that fundraiser thing with your dad’s company. You and Phoebe can order take out or something for dinner” she told him briefly as she turned toward the stairs her husband had just started up.

“It’s my eighteenth birthday! And I just got out of that place! And you two are going to some fundraiser?” he asked, appalled.

His father glared back as his mother attempted some response, “we have to keep up appearances, Curt, especially now” she added more quietly.

“And I think you lost your right to a celebration of any kind after about the third or fourth girl you raped!” he bit back at his son.

Curt glared back coldly, “so you woulda been ok with the first two or three?”

“I don’t have time to beat the shit out of you right now! But open your mouth again, and I’ll make time” Mitchell retorted with a growl before heading up the stairs as his wife sighed heavily and moved to follow him.

Once his parents left for the evening, Curt stopped his frantic search of every social media site he had ever gone to, and glanced at his bedroom door. He then moved to go down the hall to Phoebe’s door as she also sat at her computer that night.

“You lose your phone or something?”

“What?” she asked, not bothering to look back at him, simply offering a scowl at him opening her door with no invitation or even a knock, but that was usual for him, even before all of the allegations against him came out.

“I tried to call you” he told her with a glare.

Phoebe just scoffed, “when was that?”

“While I was in that place” he bit back.

“Sorry, guess your call got lost between the ten or more texts I’ve been getting every day for the last month, asking me how my rapist brother is” she returned coolly, still not looking back his way.

“Oh poor you. Your life is so bad compared to mine, huh?” he told her angrily as he stepped into the room and showed her the ankle monitor.

“What’s wrong Curt?” Phoebe asked smartly as she finally looked back at him, “someone rape you in there or something? You know what they say about karma” she shot back, the cast that still remained on his arm somehow fueling her bravery.

Though as big as he was, he didn’t need his right arm as he reached out with his left and grabbed her by the back of the neck. He then slammed her head into the desk hard enough to knock the chair out from under her, causing her to fall to the floor, struggling to remain conscious after the force of the blow.

“And you say one fucking word to mom and dad and you’ll get worse than all those girls, and that fag!” he warned her icily as he left the room with a slam of the door.

That Thursday, the day between Curt’s eighteenth and Kole’s eighteenth, Kole found himself heading into school after he and Sky’s pre-class cigarette, to heed nature’s call. A moment after he unzipped and began the task, he groaned slightly as Scott entered the restroom as well.

Kole just shook his head and looked away, mumbling, “we gotta stop meeting like this.”

Scott simply scoffed as he moved to the urinal next to Kole, causing Kole to raise a brow but he said nothing more. Instead, Scott decided then was a good time to try to make conversation, “so I take it you heard about the house arrest crap?”

“Yes” Kole said shortly, then added, “and are we friends now?”

Scott just scoffed again as he allowed himself a glance over at Kole, not able to help an even quicker glance downward. He then was so taken aback, his stream of urine even faltered as he tried to force his eyes back up to Kole’s face, “what is up with your dick?”

Kole almost choked on that question, as he was so used to the piercings himself, he had forgotten the reaction seeing either of them usually got upon first viewing. “Up with my dick?” Kole had to smirk as he finished, looked down at Scott’s own penis pointedly, and moved to push himself back inside his tight pants, Scott’s eyes not able to stop from watching as Kole covered himself and hid his metalwork once again.

“Shut up” Scott retorted as he too finished, cursing himself for the partial hardness that had started in him at the sight of those two tiny beads on the upper and lower side of the head of Kole’s penis, which was actually only one of Kole’s modifications, unbeknownst to Scott. As he awkwardly pushed himself back inside his own jeans, Scott made himself speak again in the hopes of covering his embarrassment, “seriously though, what the fuck is goin on down there?”

“Your concern is touching” Kole stated wryly as he moved to wash his hands, “and it’s called Apadravya, look it up” he stated as he turned toward the door, then looked back at Scott once more, “but after you look it up, please curb the urge to call me. I’ve already got three other people who are taking full advantage of ‘what is up with my dick’” he added with another smirk as he left the restroom and the other flustered boy behind.

“How the fuck do you even...” Scott mumbled as he got out his phone, shook his head, then let auto-correct answer his unfinished question. His eyes widened as he read the page that popped up and he swallowed hard. He then took a breath and sent off a text.

A few minutes later, after the first bell of the day had already rang, Regan covertly entered the boys’ restroom and gave Scott a questioning look as she held up her phone, “what exactly is a restroom emergency? Get it caught in your zipper, or what?”

“C’mere” he stated a little breathlessly as he reached for her arm and pulled her into the nearest stall with him.

“Ok, this is an unexpected turn of events” Regan responded warily as she watched him close the stall door after them.

“You’ve been bugging me since summer about us not doing it. So, I guess this is step one. If you can constantly blow a jerk like Curt, then...” he just shrugged as he gestured to where he was still partially aroused underneath the jeans.

“You texted me for a blow job in the boys’ room?” she repeated with a raise of her brow.

“What? You’re always complaining that we’re not doing it; so that means you wanna do this, right?”

“Yes, giving blow jobs in a dirty boys’ bathroom stall is every little girl’s dream” Regan replied sarcastically.

“What? You just told me a couple weeks ago about constantly blowing Curt just to distract him from tryin to put it in your ass too. This has gotta be an improvement, right?” Scott argued.

Regan just shook her head with a smile of disbelief, “I’m not appalled by the idea of giving you one, as much as... confused by what brought this sudden urge on” she stated pointedly.

“Does it matter?” Scott asked awkwardly, to which Regan just shook her head, sighed, and reached for his fly.

A moment after she finished that task and stood once more, wiping at her mouth, Regan’s text message alert went off.

Still breathing heavily as he recovered, Scott spoke again, “you’re looking at your phone right now?”

“What? I’m fine. You’re the one who’s having trouble standing at the moment” she smirked as she read the text and narrowed her eyes before calling up her social media account. “Fuck” she said a moment later.

“What?” Scott asked, still a little breathless as he pushed himself back into his jeans once more.

“Look at this shit Phoebe posted” she whispered with disbelief.

“Curt’s sister Phoebe?” Scott asked, “she’s on your friends list?” he asked more questioningly.

“Just look” Regan complained as she showed him the phone.

On it was a picture of just a girl’s forehead with a huge, fresh welt across it. The picture was captioned, “sitting in the school guidance office right now, afraid to even go home again. #CantChooseYourFamily.”

“What the fuck?” Scott asked worriedly.

“How can she post shit like that?” Regan asked, appalled. “If her dad sees that” she just shook her head.

Scott scoffed, “you think her dad did that to her?”

“I’ve seen his temper firsthand. Back when we were fourteen and Curt and I got caught fucking... The normal way; before Caitlin” she added pointedly. “Their dad’s an ass. Trust me.”

Scott just looked back at the phone then back up at Regan warily, “still, it might not have been her dad” he stated nearly under his breath.

Then Regan scoffed, “well you saw the hash tag. And it definitely wasn’t their useless-ass mother. Hitting her kids would require her to put the wine glass or credit card down.”

“Didn’t Curt just get out yesterday?” Scott dared, pointedly, “and Phoebe is a fourteen year old girl, just like Caitlin was, back when this all started...”

“Shut the fuck up! He wouldn’t do that!” Regan retorted angrily, though her voice did drop a bit as she added, “at least not to his own sister, right?” She then moved to leave the bathroom stall with another upset look back at him, as Scott just sighed with further worry.

The rest of the day, both the middle school and the high school were abuzz with news of Phoebe’s rather inflammatory post. All of them assumed the picture was of Phoebe, with a few assuming that her father was the culprit, cause that’s what fathers like Mitchell Spencer did to their children. But most of them assumed, and rightly so, that it was Curt who had done that to his younger sister. And most were also speculating about what else he may or may not have done to her on only the first night of his house arrest, all things considered.

At lunch, the four of them quietly sat in the cafeteria as they listened to the snippets of conversation going on around them in school that day. Sky then sighed, “I guess I should be happy something finally took their attention off of me and the other victims today. But I’m somehow... not” he added more quietly.

“I definitely think we’ve started to get to him” Star added sadly.

“Come on guys” Kole interrupted, “yeah, we fucked with him, but he did just get outta juvey. Everyone knows that prison tends to make criminals worse, not better” he rationalized.

Star and Sky sighed back at him, not really able to dispute the fact. Sky then spoke again, “it still doesn’t make me feel better about what may happen to another girl now. I’ve never even met her, but she’s a fourteen year old girl trapped in a house with that monster. And he already did that to her, even with the cast still on. He possibly did more even. And who knows what else he could still do in the next six weeks?”