I'm the King of Shame

And, to be frank, Cody wouldn’t even mind the bickering at this point. Radio silence from Zack with the heavy, awkward air compacted within the walls was beginning to suffocate Cody.

God, Cody had half the mind to start a fight just to get Zack to speak.

“Cody,” Zack spoke, making Cody flinch and almost slip a hand off the steering wheel. He didn’t use Cody’s name gently, Zack; it wasn’t a greeting of sorts, nor was it toned as the beginning of a question. It was all solid, with nothing timid about it, and Cody wasn’t sure why he was suddenly peeved about it. He wasn’t sure why he wanted Zack to be quiet, now.

Still, Cody took in a breath to ease the turmoil, because he was the mature one of the two of them. “Yeah?”

“Can we go to the gas station?”

Cody had to force his grip on the wheel to remain loose. “What?” He snapped his eyes to Zack, whom was simply lounging with his feet planted upon dash.

[… putting a thing here to shorten the excerpt 😭 …]

The anxiety always rolled in whenever it wanted. It crept up to him in the middle of class, while he was playing video games, or even while he was laying in bed about to fall asleep. Sometimes, Cody understood why he would feel it sometimes. Other times, it would make no sense.

Like right now.

For some reason, Cody felt a burning sensation of Zack glaring down at him, but, really, Zack was looking out the window, akin to a wondrous dog.

But, dogs were always unpredictable.

“Why?” asked Cody, after realizing he was quiet for a minute or two. He glanced at the screen before the wheel, and saw that the car was good on gas—Cody bit the inside of his cheek.

“I just need to grab a couple of things,” Zack answered, vaguely.

Cody’s eyebrows jumped with disbelief. “A couple of things.”

“Yup.” Zack smacked his lips, then picked at his teeth with his nails—Cody couldn’t keep down his cringing shoulders. “Said that loud and clear for ya.” Finally, Cody felt Zack’s gaze on him, and he forced his head to remain forward. “Unless you’ve learned so many foreign languages that you forgot english, I don’t see how you couldn’t understand what just came outta my mouth.”

Cody knew that statement was tongue-in-cheek, as all things were with Zack, but he sensed a severe undertone to it. Zack was poking fun at Cody’s intelligence. He always did, but Cody’d come to learn that it came from a place of envy. Zack wasn’t good at hiding jealously: it was in his face, his actions, and his jokes. Zack always grimaced whenever Cody got an A, used to push Cody around and ruin his things, and made fun of Cody for his entire life. For their entire life.

Zack was the one who made their life’s existence a competition.

Really, Cody was playing by the rules that were set by Zack.

So, he didn’t feel guilty when he told Zack, “It’s not my fault you’re too dumb to learn and comprehend things.”

Zack hesitated for a moment before retorting, “It’s not that I’m dumb, it’s just… unnecessary.”

“Unnecessary?” Cody wanted to laugh in Zack’s face. Obviously, he couldn’t, because he was driving.

And because he was the more mature one of them.

Obviously.

“How is learning other languages unnecessary? You can literally communicate with more people, get to know them better, and learn more about different cultures.” Cody smiled bitterly and shook his head. “You know, you’re really ignorant for saying—”

Zack laughed, rearranging his footing upon the dash. “Cody, chill. It’s fine that I only know english.”

“You barely know english.” Cody then glared at Zack’s shoes. “And put your feet down. If we get into a car crash—”