Human - phan

Twenty Four

I slipped through the front door, catching the letter I'd left on the way between my thumb and forefinger and crumpling it into a ball. The stairs were dark and the house was silent.

A strange calm lay over my heart with a heavy sort of silence. All the fear and anxiety was gone, and it was as though my body was struggling to find something to fill the gaping hole it left behind. So I just felt nothing, for a while. The door closed behind me with a muffled thud and I sat down on the edge of my bed.

I realised then what my body was experiencing. It was a totally overwhelming and all consuming sense of 'Now what?' I had walked out of that door. I had walked out of that world. And Knuckles was right, I shouldn't go back. There was nothing I could do, I would probably just end up getting myself knifed or taking cocaine or something and Knuckles had set me free, I should grasp that opportunity with open arms. But what now? Where should I go, who could I speak to? What was I going to do? Phil would never talk to me again, that much I was sure of.

Ahh, good. There was some emotion. Slowly yet surely I was filling back up. Only now I was filling with pain.

I lay back on my bed with a huff and screwed my eyes shut.

Knuckles had thrown me forcefully out of his world. Jake and Gabes were dead. Phil would never talk to me again. Nor would Chris or PJ.

Fuck.

Just as things were finally starting to look up, I was left completely and utterly friendless again. I was going to have to get used to walking through the corridors in circles every lunch and break, and maybe make it up to the librarian who'd screamed at me. The thought sent a wave of shame through my gut. But, slowly and steadily the shame too was replaced with pain. Because my problems were consuming me completely and utterly, and there was nothing I could do about them. And yet hadn't I just spent the last hour realising how pathetic they were? How absolutely insignificant and pitiful? The conflict raged somewhere in the space between my stomach and my lungs.

So I did what I always did. I gave up, and I threw back my head and wept.

*

I had no idea how much time had passed when the tears finally ceased to flow and my throat was left choked and aching but dry. My pillow was damp from the salty tears, and my skin was cold and prickly where the thick droplets had run down my cheeks.

I had been crying about everything and nothing at all. I cried for Knuckles, for his pain and his loss, for the life he had to live every day that I couldn't even imagine and for the loathing I'd felt towards him for so long. I cried for Ellie and the misery still left to come in her life. I cried for Jake and Gabes at last. I cried for never seeing Jake's delighted grin when he won at fifa again, or the simple contented happiness across Gabes' face as he stroked his fingers across his guitar strings. I cried for Ellie's mother. I cried for the characters in Knuckles' stories that I'd never even met. I cried for Dani. I cried for Jakob. I cried for PJ and Chris.

But most of all, I cried for Phil.

I cried because of the image PJ had planted in my mind with a few small words: the image of Phil on a bridge, leaning over and ready to jump. What if he did it again? What if, this time, PJ didn't get there in time? What if this time it was my fault? Because I told him I'd never loved him, and he had given me his everything.

I cried because I knew it would take a miracle to hold him in my arms again.

And I cried because I was crying and I didn't deserve the tears or the self-pity. The conflict hurt, but it was trying to imagine the future that retied the knot of anxiety in my stomach. What was I going to do? Could I put things right? Or would it be better to disappear now, before I did anymore damage?

I tried to consider life without them. I would walk the walls; maybe meet the guy with the glasses again. Start a wall walking club. Get bullied. Live out my college life then start afresh at Uni.

It was a bleak prospect.

Maybe, if I explained everything, I might be able to get them back. If I told Phil I only said that to save him, would he believe me? And then, would he take me back? No. Because he'd already broken up with me, regardless of what I'd said on the phone. Because I'd already fucked up for real, no pretence there. I couldn't see a way no matter how I racked my brains. There was nothing I could say or do that would redeem myself. Not now.

I lay and I stretched my brain and twisted it in knots. I bunched my fists against my eyes until I saw stars and constellations. I rolled over and over. I lay completely rigid. I hugged my knees to my chest then thrust them away again with a muffled yell. Finally, I lay limp and panting. My eyes were dry and stinging, my muscles finally feeling the ache of the day. I'd forgotten I'd been dancing. I had forgotten the hour's walk either way to the estate. But now my body remembered with a cry of protest and I was suddenly exhausted. I closed my eyes and curled into a ball on top of my sheets. I wanted to cry but there were no tears left, and even if there had been I didn't have the energy to force them out. So I stopped thinking and listened to the clock tick, letting a wave of empty bliss wash over me. Release lead to momentary freedom.

*

Just as I was slipping into the first drowsy stages of slumber, my phone vibrated. I reached out blindly and knocked it to the floor with a clatter. Cursing under my breath I rolled over and scooped up the battery and backing that had sprung off. I fumbled to put it back together, berating myself in whispers. Finally I managed to click the back into place and sat back to wait while it lethargically murmured into life with familiar chords. It was human by the killers, of course, because I had all the originality of a particularly dull goldfish.

The lyrics meant nothing now. I couldn't find anything deep in the syllables, nothing beautiful in the melodies. It just sounded cheap and clichéd and crappy and nothing special, nothing at all. I wasn't human and there was nothing beautiful in the dancers. Yeah, there was a puppet show, and I was the one who just clattered through the middle knocking everyone over and tangling the strings. Because some of the strings had been cut, and it had been my job to tie them back together but I'd fucked it up as usual.

The Phil puppet lay on the floor, his strings a tangled mess around his shoulders. The strings of his past that I'd been re-tying with big, loopy bows lay charred and burnt on the floor. I had been wrong all along, and Phil had been right. The song wasn't praising the beauty of dancers at all, rather pointing out their flaws. Their constraints. Their lack of free thought. Originality. Humanity. Phil was human. He was shining and bright and beautiful and he belonged to no one else. Knuckles was human, he wasn't content with sitting back and allowing the choreographers to weave their paths – he stepped in, he tried to set the dancers free and save them from their fate, and it had nearly worked. Only dancers always dance the steps they've been taught. Dancers dance their dance within a square, never seeing anything other than their own reflection in the mirrored studio and the reflections of the other dancers.

At the back of the stage there was a mirror, and finally I could see myself. The shiny new white strings I'd been weaving were tangled around my own neck and my face was pale and weak.

My name's Dan. I'm a dancer, but it's my best kept secret.

*

As the music faded slowly into silence so did my mini fantasy, and I was left in the black silence of my bedroom. The four walls close around my head were a cruel reminder of how trapped and helpless I was. I tapped the screen impatiently, waiting for the message to load.

I wondered who it could be at this time of night; my parents were sleeping and I didn't have any friends. It was probably the phone company. Or maybe my gran, she often went on midnight walks in her pink nightie through the centre of town when she'd overdosed on meds.

One new message: Knuckles – DO NOT ANSWER!!!

My heart pounded automatically and my eyebrows shot up into my forehead. I opened the message.

I rang Phil. I explained everything and told him he should forgive you because you're a good boyfriend. I lied, but I hope that you might be able to live up to that one day. He's on his way to your house now so you should probably open a window or something. Bye Dancer Dan, have a good life because I sure as hell won't. And if you ever hurt Phil again I will fucking kill you.

A single hot tear slid slowly down my cheek.