He would never ask for help. If he fell off of a jungle gym and split his knee open, he wouldn't go limping and wailing to the bench where his mother sat, reading a book. He'd just sit in the dirt, sniffling, wiping his eyes with his sleeve until the stinging went away, until he heard his name and knew it was time to go home. For this reason, coupled with his clumsiness, he was always covered in bruises and untended injuries as a child. The only time his parents could coax a smile out of him was when they tickled him, but even then he would start to cry if they didn't stop when he squealed, then storm off as if his trust had been violated. He would read every word on every label on anything that was put into his hands and he rarely spoke. For a while, they feared he was autistic.
He never approached other children, but he was always polite and articulate when they approached him. They got bored quickly, though, and moved on to other playground inhabitants more interested in throwing sand at each other and playing tag.
He can still vividly recall the day Matt moved in next door. Their mothers did the whole meet-and-greet-and-exchange-Jello-molds thing. Matt stood in front of his, arms at his sides, already sizing up the shorter boy. Simon had the fingers of his left hand in his mouth, the others in the front of his hair, as he peered out from behind the safety of his mother with those big blue-grey eyes that overwhelmed his face.
"Say hello, Simon." He felt a gentle nudge at his shoulder and he nearly lost his footing, then awkwardly removed his hand from his mouth.
"Hello." He pressed his lips inward and lowered his head.
"Hi," replied Matt, his mother patting his head as he smiled and puffed out his chest. Simon tried to mirror the smile, though it was tight and shaky and forced.
To save money on babysitters, they were frequently dumped at each other's houses. Simon was pleasantly surprised. Days were full of shared homemade cookies and blankie forts that Simon tried to draw constellations on with chalk. At the age of five, making friends is fairly easy because you have almost everything in common. Their only conflict of interest was that Matt preferred trucks over dinosaurs. Simon, already a doormat, made a mental note to ask his parents for more truck toys.
When first grade started, Simon was equal parts apprehensive and thankful. Thankful to know that Matt would be somewhere in the building. Thankful to have the familiarity of a uniform that was to be worn each day. Thankful to have an orderly schedule. Apprehensive, of course, about things like recess and lunch and bus stops. All the gaps in the learning process, the unpredictability, the social situations.
Matt, who made a pack of friends within five minutes, allowed him to sit with them at lunch. Simon was never a part of their conversations, but he was grateful nonetheless. He excelled in his studies, overcame his public-speaking stutter for the sake of presentations, and only got beaten up about once a month. Things were good.
One summer, when his family could finally afford to go on holiday in the Isles of Scilly, Simon was less than thrilled. People, including his parents, primarily went there for the beaches. Simon had never been a fan of sunlight. For most of the duration, he sat pouting under an umbrella thrust in the sand, his arms folded over his chest as he wondered why his mother hadn't let him wear a shirt.
There was one highlight, however. Lily. Lily was a little girl his age whose family had chosen the same hotel for their vacation. Their parents met by chance in the lobby, got along, and even did a few tourist-y things together as a group. Lily was talkative but not in an annoying way, and Simon flinched every time she would reach for his hand to drag him over to look at some particularly pretty flower. Two days before her family was going to leave, he bought her a candy bar from the hotel vending machine, stared at his shoes and asked her to be his girlfriend.
"Awright," she said through a mouthful of caramel nougat. He grinned sincerely, shook her hand, and ran away. Months later he would wonder if sustained communication was a requirement for being boyfriend-girlfriend. Oh well.
Upon his return, he decided to tell Matt. He'd figured out this was how men bonded: talked about sports and women. He was even more clueless on the former topic than the latter, so he gave it a shot one day as they sat on the floor of his room in the midst of an intense Pokemon Gameboy battle (which was going well, as Simon had a level 64 Blastoise and Matt favored his Moltres too much to properly level up the rest of his team.)
"I've got a girlfriend," Simon said with a rare ounce of confidence, a hint of a smirk revealing one of his sharp canines.
"You got a girlfriend?" Matt realized his shocked intonation was rude as soon as the words left his mouth, so he patted Simon's shoulder in a congratulatory manner to cover it up. "Who is she? Did you kiss? With tongue?" His eyes were lit up now.
Simon's smile faded fast. Those thoughts hadn't even occurred to him. He had only been thankful for the company, and a bit intimidated. She held his hand and he figured that was enough to warrant asking her out. He'd seen Matt kiss girls on the cheek at school before but never thought that it was such a vital accomplishment.
"N-no..." His confidence was drained. "Her name's Lily."
"Wha? Well, why not!" Matt had set aside his Gameboy and was thoroughly interested now. Maybe he shouldn't have brought this up.
"I just didn't... We had fun..."
"Yeah mate, fun with a girl is called kissing." Matt rolled his eyes and smirked. "Really, why didn't y-"
"M-maybe I don't like girls."
Silence. Oh shit.
"...what?" One of Matt's thick eyebrows raised up and his lip curled in confusion.
"I don't know. I just know that some boys like boys. Mum says I'm not supposed to ask about that, so I don't. But I know it happens."
Matt stared back with an unchanged expression.
"I... never mind, okay? I don't have to... I... That's not what I meant. Just, maybe I don't like anything." Simon was flustered now, picking at the carpet with his stubby fingers and hoping his face wasn't red. Honestly, he didn't know what or who he liked. He knew what he was supposed to like, but nothing was visually appealing to him. The idea of being homosexual was something he did not have to entertain just now, but something he would not put completely out of the question either.
Matt turned his head slowly to the side but did not take his eyes off Simon, a gesture that meant he held him under suspicion.
"I said never mind." Simon picked his Gameboy back up and gripped the sides tightly.
"No no, I'm getting to the bottom of this," Matt said, shaking his head and leaning forward on his knees. Simon stared up with watery eyes and before he knew it, Matt had crawled on top of him, hands planted on either side of his head.
"Well?"
"W-what?"
"D'ya wanna kiss me now?"
Simon frowned, then Matt palmed at his crotch and he yelped, shoving the taller boy off of him.
"N-NO!" he barked, scooting backwards across the floor. Matt only frowned back. Simon's mother suddenly opened the door, having heard the commotion.
"Everything okay?"
It took him a moment to steady his breath and his voice.
"I lost the battle... Got upset. Sorry." Simon was glad his back was to the doorway, so she wouldn't see how fiercely he was blushing or how half of his shirt had been untucked. The door clicked shut and he heard her walk down the hall.
Awkward silence. Matt broke it.
"Right, so, I believe I was in the middle of pummelin' your Alakazam..."
They never spoke of it again.
At the age of eleven, something started to go wrong. Matt had been a bit distant that summer, going on camping trips with friends from school, but he was still cordial toward Simon and they saw eachother often. When secondary school began, however, Matt's social circle nearly quadrupled. His conventionally good looks and outgoing manner made everyone gravitate to him. He made friends with upperclassmen, and suddenly he had drug connections.
Simon studied his schedule in the hall on the first day. They didn't have any classes together. He suppressed the odd heartbroken feeling in his chest and instead made plans to bump into Matt in the halls. Every single time, though, Matt was flanked by guffawing boys patting him on the back or girls giggling at bad jokes. He was always talking loudly and seemed oblivious to Simon's existence, even when he tried to throw himself into the middle of his path. He must be busy, he thought. Best not to follow and interrupt his conversation. Simon smoothed his hair, looked at the floor then back up at the group of boys walking away, then back to the floor.
Perhaps it's time to get more friends, he decided. Smiling was friendly, right? He would stare intently at people in class until they turned around to meet his eyes, then he'd try to force a crooked smile that he believed appeared inviting. This was not a good strategy and just ended up disturbing his targets. He knew that talking was supposed to be involved in the process of befriending people as well, but he could never bring himself to say the first word. It felt as if there was a permanent lump in his throat, pressing down all the words, threatening to make him choke or cry if he tried too hard to be rid of it.
Maybe someone would approach him. Maybe he would get paired up with someone for a class project, forced to cooperate. This was what he hoped. But no, no one ever talked to him. In science class, when asked to pair up, there was always someone who would sneak to the back to join their two friends and make a group of three, and the teacher wouldn't notice, and Simon would be left to work alone and would still finish the experiment faster than any of the groups. Sometimes if he saw someone sleeping during the in-class project, he would write their name next to his on his report so they wouldn't get a zero. He was good with names.
Within a month, he became a target for the older boys. He got stuffed into trashcans, but only after they found out he wasn't quite skinny enough to fit in a locker. Anything he was carrying would be knocked out of his hands, so he learned to cram everything in his bag and to turn in posterboard projects at 5am before anyone could find him. He stopped taking the bus, because on the bus there was nowhere to run and the driver didn't give a shit. Even then, as he walked home every day, the senior students with their own cars would drive by and throw their soda cans or bottles at him.
After the first few times these incidents occurred, he stopped squirming. Stopped resisting. Never said a word of protest. Just tried to get on with life. Instead of the assailants relenting when they didn't get a reaction, they seemed encouraged, relieved in the knowledge that they had a punching bag. Things got worse, violence increased because they knew he'd never have the balls to tell on them. Split lips and black eyes were abundant, and he hesitantly started to like the taste of his own blood in his mouth. He had to buy at least five replacement calculators, as they'd get smashed to bits when his bag got stomped on. That was a weekly occurrence.
When his parents questioned him about all the rips in his new clothes or the cuts on his face, they could tell he blinked back tears when he declared "nothing."
When things didn't look up in Year Eight, he finally confessed what was going on to them. Bad decision. His father was merely annoyed, saying he should stick up for himself, throw a punch or two. His mother said she would call the parents of the bullies in question, but he begged her not to.
Things persisted. Teachers and counselors were no help, claiming all the other children were "well-adjusted" and "unbothered by typical hazing activities." It was a lost cause, but he managed to keep his grades up.
At fourteen, his parents bought him a computer for schoolwork. He didn't leave his room that summer. Somehow, he became simultaneously happier and quieter for those three months. He felt like he had a cocoon to stay in, like happiness was at his fingertips. He giggled at videos of puppies and pictures of cats that looked like Hitler. He discovered that thing about liking the taste of blood was not all that odd at all, nor were some of the other thoughts he'd been having in his little teenaged mind. He bought a webcam and spent many a late night lurking chatrooms until someone said something that interested him. He opened a account and discovered that people on Chatroulette and other such sketchy sites would send money to it if he took off his shirt, ate a lollipop, rubbed honey on his tits, or all of the above simultaneously.
Easy money. He felt alive.
He also bought a lot of lollipops.
The following years were a torturous haze. More of the same. More dashed hopes. More of watching everyone else get drunk and get girlfriends and get STDs, in that order. He began to feel like a ghost and longed for the simplicity of the first half-decade of his life.
They graduated. Simon didn't attend any of the afterparties. He spent the start of his summer attached to his computer, telling his parents he was looking into the best film schools to apply to, which was partly true.
. . .
The music actually stopped booming in his ears as time seemed to stop, and he wasn't sure if his face had turned white or crimson. He only felt numb.
The night air was colder than he remembered and he immediately regretted leaving those two beers on the table. He wanted to see if the expression "drown your sorrows" was something that was actually possible, wanted to see what all the fuss about alcohol was anyway.
He spent all the money in his wallet on vodka. Absolut 100 Proof. Inexperience with drinking combined with having eaten nothing but Hot Pocket crumbs out of the keyboard earlier that day led to him getting really fucked up. The whole nine yards - yelling at passersby, making beepy noises with his mouth that mimicked his favorite Kraftwerk songs, flipping off overhanging tree branches that he ran into.
On the walk home, the bottle slipped out of his grasp and shattered. He stumbled, breaking his fall with his hands but landing on the broken glass. The traces of alcohol stung the cuts as soon as they opened and he hissed, rocking back to lean against some stranger's fence.
The tears came quick, for more than one reason. He thought about how his life had become so empty, with no one to blame but himself and his crippling shyness.
He'd lost Matt, the only person in his entire life he could've considered a friend, and he wasn't sure exactly when or how. He suddenly realized he hadn't been truly happy since that day, ten years ago, unless you could count the times he watched a new episode of Doctor Who or laughed at amusing things on the internet. Well, the first half of that day, at least. Once the subject of romance came up, the downward spiral began.
That was another thing. He just wanted to be held, to be told "everything will be alright." Maybe have some common interests to build on. And apparently that was too much to ask of anyone. Many a time, he'd tell himself love was overrated... probably...
He choked down more sobs and wiped his nose on his sleeve, and somehow found enough balance to stand and continue walking home.
He found the lighter fluid in the cabinet under the sink, the matches in the drawer, and tore off a fistful of paper towels. His vision was blurring as he walked through his front yard. The world was vibrating in time with his pounding headache, and his eyelids kept twitching in attempts to close, but still he stumbled forward.
Reaching the front door of Matt's house, Simon leaned against the brick outer entryway. He held the box of matches between his teeth as he thoroughly doused the towels in lighter fluid, then shoved them through the letterbox and quickly dropped a lit match in after them. He saw the vibrant colors begin to spread. A tiny satisfied smirk bloomed in return.
But, oh fuck, there was a cat inside, a cat on the windowsill, a cat looking out at him with huge inquisitive eyes, and he stared right back, shocked. It flinched and looked down as the carpet caught fire, then he saw it bare its fangs as if meowing loudly. Simon pressed both palms against the window, watching as the cat ran across the living room to hide under a table. Fuck. No, no, no. Not the kitty. The kitty didn't do anything wrong. Simon chewed his lip, his head spinning, then ran back to the letterbox. He did the only thing that came to mind: he pissed out the fire. He had to press quite close against the door to reach all of it, with the side of his face smushed against the door's glass, but it seemed to be working.
At this point, he heard a car door shut, then a shriek. In the driveway stood Matt's mother, looking on in horror. She seemed too shocked to form any obscene words to shout at him; she just charged forward. Simon tried to shove himself back into his trousers and step away, run, but she was too close and his head was still spinning and the vodka still sloshed in his empty stomach and he could hear his heartbeat in the back of his skull and something was pushing up past his ribs, something hot, up through his throat and - oh. Vomit. Right. That was typically how drunken nights ended. He forgot to expect that part.
So he simultaneously vomited all over Matt's mother and pissed down the front of his own pants, then fell over backwards and blacked out in the hedges.
When he woke up, he was curled in a ball under a blanket in his own driveway while his mother talked to police outside, next door. The lights from the police cars made his headache come back, so he crawled inside and sat on his couch until they questioned him. His hands stung and needed to be cleaned and bandaged. He was still too drunk to remember that he needed to change clothes, so he merely sat motionless, staring out the large front windows, his face bathed in alternating red and blue light.
He wondered if things would ever look up.
No, they would not. How silly to hope so.