That's What People Do
"People have died."
"That's what people DO!"
When Jim Moriarty is five years old, everything is lovely. He lives in a nice little flat in Dublin with his mother and father and he goes to the primary school down the road. He's the smartest in his class, and his teacher says he'll go far. His parents are very proud of him.
When Jim is five and a half, everything goes wrong. His mother dies suddenly, in a car crash, and his father is devastated. No one really knows what to do.
Jim cries at the funeral. Like a baby. That's what his father says, he's crying like a baby. "You ought'nt cry like a baby, Jim," his father tells him. "People die. It's what they do," he mutters, turning away. This doesn't make Jim feel any better.
After that, they moved to Brighton, where they had a lovely little house and Jim went to a new primary school. It's awful. He's the smartest in the class, and now that they're doing harder work it really shows. The other kids hate him for it. They're jealous, and stupid. The teacher says he shouldn't show off, that he's just asking for it, the way he carries on like he's better than everyone else.
That's not what he's doing. He doesn't think he's better than everyone else, but he's smarter. He know that much because anyone can see it. Jim is always alone in Brighton. His father has flung himself into work, and never wants to spend time with Jim. He looks too much like his mother. Apparently it's painful. Jim hates Brighton.
When Jim Moriarty is eleven years old, his father dies. Heart attack. He worked too hard, according to his aunt. She tells him that it's very sad, and now he's going to London, to move in with her. He doesn't care.
What difference did make? So his father's dead. He'd barely said two words to Jim since his mother died, preferring to spend all his time working. Now he'd worked himself into an early grave, so why should Jim mourn for that. People die.
He's glad to leave Brighton. The place was awful, and he's looking forward to moving to London. "Maybe things will be better there," he thinks.
Thing are not better in London. In fact, things go straight to hell in London. Jim starts at his new school, and he's the smartest, like he always is. For some reason, the kids there take this as a personal affront. Especially Carl Powers.
Carl Powers isn't nearly as smart as Jim. It's not that he's stupid, because he's not. He's about average. It's just that he's mean. Carl Powers declared Jim his enemy on day one, and his opinion didn't change.
Because of this, not many kids wanted to talk to Jim. His only friend was a boy named Neil. Neil was unpopular because he had a terrible asthma that made it impossible for him to play sports. He was always sitting alone on the sidelines, so Jim started sitting with him. He didn't like sports himself, so it was no great loss to sit out. He and Neil became good friends, and Jim was able to forget about Carl most of the time. Not always, of course. Not when he was getting beaten bloody behind the bleachers. But most of the time.
So everything was all right. Until, when Jim was twelve years old, his only friend Neil died. It was an asthma attack. The cold weather aggravated his lungs, and they shut down. There was nothing that could be done.
Jim went to the funeral and watched as his only friend was lowered into the earth. He didn't cry. He just watched the coffin descend.
"People die," he reminded himself. "People die, it's what happens, it's what always happens. This shouldn't be a shock. There's no reason to cry." He told himself this until he could believe it. He was fine. And then he went back to school.
Jim hadn't realized what a difference being alone would make. He hadn't realized what a buffer Neil was against Carl Powers and his friends. When he went back to school, his life turned into a nightmare.
Jim wished Carl Powers dead in all sorts of interesting ways, but couldn't think of anything doable until a few days before the big swim meet. In chemistry, they learned about botulinum toxin, and Jim couldn't help but think how amusing it would be to poison Carl with it. He imagined, for a moment, if poor Carl Powers had a fit at the swim meet. Imagine, the great swimmer, drowning!
Then Jim realized with a shock that he could actually do it. He could steal some botulinum from the lab and slip it into Carl's eczema medicine before the meet. It would be wonderful, the perfect revenge.
So when Jim was twelve years old, he put his plan into action. He stole the poison, put it in the medicine, went to the meet, and watched little Carl Powers drown. As he strolled out of the building with Carl's sneakers tucked in his backpack, he thought, "What does it matter? So he's dead. It happens all the time. Dying, well, that's what people DO."