Freaks: Year Two

The Twisted Tree

Jasper's eyes widened as he had started to shout and before he could get another word out, Toby whipped around and said, "Just go to that school, I don't care. There is nothing you can say or do that can fix anything! You can't fix everything so it doesn't matter. Nothing matters! Nothing will change if you stay here or you leave. Nothing will change."

Jasper slowly got up and said in a shaky voice, "If you feel that way t-then I-I'll stay. If n-nothing changes then...I'll stay. Because then I can be here all year and stop some of the things that...happen. Maybe things can go back to the way...they used to be...with us, I mean?"

Toby's glare was so intense that Jasper felt himself shrink back. "No. No, I don't think it will. I don't think anything will ever go back to the way things used to be. Just go. I don't care. I said it, I don't care. You got lucky and now I am asking you to leave because I don't care anymore. I don't care about you. Go to your great, amazing school and I will stay here and just care for the others, and who knows? Maybe I'll just wither away."

Jasper had tears in his eyes. "Don't say that–"

"I hate you."

The words hung in the air.

"You hear me? I hate you! I hate you for leaving and I hate you for being magical! We'll all just die in here and it will be your fault! Yours! I hate you and your magic, you freak!!"

How did everything turn so badly, so quickly? Why? Why? Why? What had Jasper missed? What had he done, going to Hogwarts, leaving his brothers like that? It was all his fault and now Toby hated him. All he could hear was: how could you let this happen, Jasper? This is all your fault Jasper? You're so stupid, Jasper. You're a freak, Jasper. Jasper. Jasper? JASPER?!

Jasper shot up from where he had been lying against the wall on the floor right by the window where he had been waiting for the letter, shaking. The letter that obviously was not coming and he knew that now, and he was just so stupid, how could he have let all this happen? Why was he so stupid–

"Jasper, are you alright?" said a recognizable voice.

Toby. It was Toby's voice.

Jasper felt tears spring to his eyes. "T-Toby, I'm s-s-sorry – no, don't that, that doesn't fix anything, n-nothing, it fixes nothing but - but I - I p-promise I won't leave again. I understand you aren't magical and I shouldn't have left you here and I under...I...understand wh...why you're mad and - and y-y-you have e-every r-right to h–h-hate me and–"

"Jasper, Jaz," Toby said quickly, steadying his brother's shaking shoulders as Jasper's cries got progressively worse. "Jasper, shhh, shhh, it's okay. What's wrong? What...what's wrong? Don't cry. Why are you crying? Did you have a nightmare? It's okay..."

Jasper kept saying how it was not okay and how it was okay that he hated him and that he wished he could fix the mistake he had made and Toby had some sort of an idea forming in his head of what the nightmare could have been about.

"Jaz – Jasper," Toby said in a more firm tone of voice and Jasper slowly looked up at his brother's face. "I don't hate you. I don't. Whatever that horrid nightmary version of me said, it's not true. I love you."

"But – what?"

"It was a nightmare," Toby assured him and he brought his thumbs up right to where Jasper's tears were falling and he started to wipe them away just as Jasper had done for him countless times in the past. "Just a stupid nightmare. I don't hate you because of your magic or anything. I know I am not magic but I'd never hate you for it. You're my brother, I love you."

"I-I love you too."

Toby gave him a small smile as he dropped his hands and Jasper quickly rubbed his hands over his face, trying to get back to reality. It was just a nightmare. Toby doesn't hate you. It was just a horrible nightmare.