Words

The late spring sun was pleasantly warm on my stringy wet hair, which would have made me a lot more miserable if it weren’t such a nice day. I was so ready for summer to fucking get here. My feet immediately took charge, so as to leave my mind free for pondering and whatnot. Since there where several topics I didn’t really want to touch on just yet, I instead racked my brain for what day it was. The problem was that the days that I did go to school and the days I went a little bit and the days I didn’t go at all kind of all mixed together into what I figured was a good enough education, which made determining the day I was last away from my comforter really, really difficult.

My auto-pilot sneakers lead me through the neighborhood I knew so well, around my elementary friends’ homes and under stop signs and far, far away from crazy Mrs. Ford’s house. My black-clad elbow caught on a bush that had wove its way through the chain link fence that had once contained it. I dug my toe into the chunk of missing sidewalk, attempting to come away with a bit of charred pavement as I had since the charring had taken place, on one particularly drunken Independence Day. I was still fondly remembering the look on Branden’s face as he clung to the firecracker when my feet recognized the crunch of gravel that announced my arrival at the elementary school playground. I made a beeline for the only still-attached swing and made myself comfortable.

I began my lazy swing, back and forth, trailing the dirty toe of my shoe in the dirt beneath me. I dug into my jacket pocket, uncovering with a bubble of joy a half finished and forgotten pack of cigarettes. My lighter was still buried beneath my bed, but since my good friend nicotine wasn’t irritating me to the point of going back for it, I put an unlit one in my mouth. Sucking thoughtfully on this piece of courage, I allowed my mind at last to wander to the topic it was so dying to address.

I did feel her hand on my arm then, but more of a support than a threat. Damn her female-ness, or was it her big sister-ness that caused this stupid compassion? My mind stepped away from this thought and forced itself back to the present, only to find me already halfway through sobbing my troubles into my palms and for Lisa Kroger to see.

I listened to myself blubber on, voice cracking and shoulders shaking, disgusted. I hated her for listening and pulling me down to sit next to her and keeping that sympathetic grip on my forearm, but much much more I hated myself for sucking so terribly hard. I sniveled this into my fingers as well, uniting my brain and mouth by stepping out of physical memories and into my intangible and bottomless well of self loathing. I sucked. I couldn’t do anything without my best and only friend, I wasn’t even expected to be seen without him. I survived the mocking and the violence that should have followed me and my fucking faggy-ness only because he was there to beat the shit out of anyone who even mumbled an insult in my direction. And I couldn’t even realize this until I had forced him away with stupid, stupid, stupid fucking decisions and my fucking goddamn sexuality. I couldn’t even, I started remembering who I was blubbering to at this point, I couldn’t even do a straight relationship right, couldn’t even fuck a woman without making her feel awful and hate me and my stupid faggot guts.

And the best part was, here all I could do was cry into my elbow on the porch of someone who paused in hating me only out of the pity my stupid, miserable self invoked. I sucked. I sucked.