You can find advanced chapters on my patreon.
Patreon.com/simpysensei
___
Michael stopped in the entryway, the heavy silence of the house pressing down on him.
Standing in the center of his parents' living room were his late father's sister, Madeline Wuntch, and her husband, Keith.
They were dressed in cheap clothes they had clearly tried to iron to look wealthy, sporting fake, greasy smiles that didn't reach their eyes.
Michael looked at them, his face an unreadable, emotionless mask.
"They still look like shit," he thought coldly.
Without uttering a single syllable, Michael completely broke eye contact.
He walked directly past them as if they were nothing more than ugly pieces of furniture obstructing his path.
He walked straight to Janet, wrapping his arms around her trembling shoulders in a warm, comforting hug.
Then, he turned to Terry, embracing him.
"Michael, darling!" Madeline shrilled from the couch, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness. "Oh, look at you, all grown up! We saw you on the television, giving all that money away like a proper gentleman. We are just so immensely proud of our little nephew!"
"Absolutely," Keith chimed in, puffing out his chest. "Your father would be weeping to see the man you've become. Blood will always tell, won't it?"
Michael didn't even twitch.
He didn't look at them.
He didn't acknowledge the sound waves hitting his ears.
He turned back to his mother.
"Mom," Michael said, his voice calm and entirely normal. "Evans is going to actually die of starvation. The jet lag is brutal. Do we have any food left?"
Janet blinked, completely thrown off by his sheer indifference to the intruders. "I-yes, sweetheart. There's grilled chicken and potatoes in the kitchen."
"Perfect," Michael nodded.
He turned to Terry. "How was your day, Dad? How's that new driver treating you on the golf course?"
Madeline's fake smile twitched, threatening to crack. "Michael? Sweetheart, your aunt is speaking to you."
"The driver's fine, son," Terry said, his jaw tight as he threw a venomous glare at the couch. "But the atmosphere in the house just took a nosedive."
Keith's face flushed a dark, ugly red.
He slammed his hand down on the armrest of the couch and stood up. "Are you deaf, boy?!" Keith roared, the cheap facade instantly crumbling. "We are talking to you! We came all the way out here, and you ignore us?!"
"Is this how this woman raised you?!" Madeline shrieked, pointing a wicked finger at Janet. "To disrespect your own blood?! To ignore your real family?!"
In the kitchen, Janet let out a quiet gasp, her hands beginning to tremble as the trauma of her past dealings with them resurfaced.
Terry's eyes darkened with absolute disgust.
He immediately stepped away from Michael, wrapping a protective arm around Janet and pulling her close.
"Don't you dare speak to my wife that way in our house," Terry growled.
On the adjacent armchair, Evans sat back, crossing his legs elegantly. He looked at Keith and Madeline with the detached, mildly disgusted amusement of a king looking at a pair of disease-ridden peasants begging for scraps.
Michael slowly turned his head.
His eyes were glacial.
He walked past Terry and Janet, stepping into the kitchen.
"Bring Evans and me the food into the living room, Mom," Michael said softly.
He reached toward the dish rack on the counter.
His long fingers closed around a heavy, thick-bottomed glass cup.
Terry, seeing the lethal shift in Michael's posture, stepped forward. "Michael, what are you-"
He didn't get to finish the sentence.
Without a flicker of hesitation, without even a change in his breathing, Michael spun on his heel and hurled the heavy glass directly at Keith's head with terrifying, major-league velocity.