The days he spent before the man came were some of the most carefree of his, or, for that matter, just about any life.
With the gentle heat of the late spring sun against his back, he'd spend hours roaming through the waist-high grass interspersed with ancient pine trees, constantly tailed by two stray cats and a wandering dog. When he got tired from aimlessly running, he'd topple to the ground with his scrawny chest facing the sky, where the dog would lay panting from chasing the boy. He'd laugh, petting the dog's head, while speaking out to the setting sun.
Other times, he would follow the cats across a rickety chain-link fence. He'd see how far he could walk, keeping his balance, before he fell, scaring the cats behind a tree until distracted by a lizard or bird. Eventually, he'd make his way to what seemed a mountain of boulders lodged in a hillside and scramble atop the largest of the rocks to sit or dance or throw stones or shout pointless words to a world that refused to hear.
When it got unbearably hot, or he'd just spent too much time running around, he'd sneak some water from a pump in the nearby town. On these visits, he could spend the rest of the day jumping between rooftops and watching the townspeople. He could make up endless different stories for the same person, as he tended to do, since forgetting who he had already observed and who he had yet to came to him as easily as his idyllic youthfulness. On the rare occasion that he was spotted, the man who had caught him there would usually chase him from the perimeters, seeing as he quite often stole small portions of the people's food. However, he usually laughed and grinned as he was chased. Most would just assume that was because he was too young to fully understand the situation, or that he thought it was a game of sorts, but in reality he was fully aware of everything.
It was custom for the women of the town to continue their housework, simply shaking their heads whenever they witnessed one of these chases. The children, if they were much older than him, had a tendency to join the hunt, but those relatively close to him in age either attempted to help him out in some small way or ignore him completely along the very few of those younger than him.
He always managed to escape unscathed, sometimes barely. Well, they never did mean to harm him, just drive him out.
Some part of him was irritated that they so violently drove him from the town when all he did was snatch miniscule rations of food, barely enough to survive on, which is exactly what he was doing. They obviously had more than enough food to go around, and were living in comfort to some degree. He lived in an a shack that at one point in its life must've served some purpose or other, but was now abandoned and essentially collapsing. What little furnishings he could make with stolen supplies from the town weren't exactly the epitome of comfort, but they served him well enough and, he figured, they weren't particularly disagreeable once you got used to them.
When the man first arrived, he was merely a traveler passing through the town. He stayed for a bit longer than the usual passerby, and was one of those few who never once participated in hounding the boy from the streets, rather smiling back at him when they passed him, but nobody thought anything of it.
The boy was intrigued by this strange man, an adult with a childish yet somehow ominous air about him.
His daily routine remained much the same, with the exception of more frequent visits to the town.
Until, that is, the day the boy spotted the man outside the town. He was standing casually in the middle of the field where the boy usually played, seeming to be admiring the way the sun illuminated the edges of the trees.
The boy just stood there in the ever-taller grass whose golden color provided ideal camouflage, for his hair and eyes reflected the same gentle shade. Both were silent.
"Where do you live?" the man asked nonchalantly. The boy was taken aback, as he had provided no reason for the man to notice his presence and he hadn't seen him turn his head to see him.
"How did you know I was here?" he questioned in reply.
Finally, the man turned his head to look at the boy. "I just knew," he said with a winking smile. They continued to stare antagonistically at one another, enveloped by the scenery and a strangely comforting quiet, until the man asked the boy if he had any parents, to which the boy shook his head.
"I live all by myself, over there," the boy told him, pointing vaguely across the field.
"Ah, I see..." The man turned suddenly distant, before just as suddenly returning to normal and wishing the boy a good day as he headed back to the town.
The two had several more similar encounters, both wanting to know more about the other, yet an awkward tension kept them from either's information. Eventually, they grew more comfortable around each other. The boy would include the man in his games along with the dog and cats, and the man would read aloud to the boy stories from whatever book he himself was reading at the time.
Once, the man asked the boy why he only had one eye, for indeed he did, with a clean, empty socket where the other should be.
"Why do you have two eyes?" the boy refuted.
The man laughed. "Fair point. I was just born with them, as were you I suppose?" The boy nodded.
Over time, the boy uncovered that the man was called McG, and he was from somewhere across the country. In return, McG determined the boy had no known name and, from what he was told, that he had lived alone in the shack all his life, although he held the latter part with the utmost of doubt.
"Well I need something to call you," McG sighed one summer evening upon hearing of the boy's apparent namelessness, to which the boy shrugged. "Mind if I call you William? It's the name of an old friend of mine, and I feel it suits you."
The boy shrugged again, appearing to have no opinion in the matter. After all, it wasn't so most children were allowed to chose their own names. In fact, he did find the name quite tasteful, no matter it's commonplace.
"Will it is then!" McG announced. They both smiled.