In the morning I woke up and groggily walked downstairs to find mom already up and breakfast made. She told me Otto left for his meeting before she served me some French toast. Dad came downstairs holding his paper. Breakfast that morning was quite silent. I was quiet because I was worried shitless about Otto. He would have to face Alex, Brad, their parents, and his own father all by himself. I called his cell phone after breakfast and I got a voice mail. Mom said that he would be home within an hour, and to relax.
* * *
Sitting in the teacher conference room was painful. Brad and his parents sat near the end of the table while Alex and her parents were at the other end, with me and father stuck in the middle. The wall was stone with brown wooden double doors. The table was also made out of wood. Across from the doors were windows that revealed a field. The principal and two teachers came in and sat across from me and my father.
"So we have called this meeting due to intense bullying." The principal started.
"I will start by playing this recording that Otto so bravely gave us faculty." The principal said hitting the play button.
"Now that everything is out in the open we need to talk punishments." The principal said.
"Wait, are you telling me this boy hit my daughter?" Alex's father said pointing to Brad.
"Yes." The principal responded.
"Alex when did this happen? Why didn’t you tell us?" her mother asked with concern.
"You heard the recording; I didn’t want Otto to get hurt." Alex said not looking up.
"Brad, we raised you better than this! Apologize right now to both of them!" his mother scolded.
"I am sorry for threatening both of you and hitting you Alex." Brad said looking ashamed.
"Now, we do not tolerate violence, and it has been brought to my attention that Brad has beaten Otto up on a number of occasions. Brad will be suspended for two weeks and have to write a paper on teen violence. Also Alex told Brad to stay away from her and Otto in front of a guidance counselor, is this true Alex?"
"Yes, I don't want him near me or Otto." Alex said holding her head high.
"That settles it then, unless anyone has any other concerns." The principal said looking around the table.
"Alright, then you are all dismissed."
I got up and walked out of the room so fast you would have never known I was there. I didn’t want to see Alex, and I didn’t want to be around my father. I could hear my father walking not too far behind me, and I heard Alex call my name, but I didn’t slow down.
"Don't be rude Otto." My father hissed, making me slow down.
"Hey." Alex said with a half smile.
"Hi."
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah, fine. You?"
"I'm good. I'm glad that this whole Brad thing is behind us now."
"Yeah, same," I said finally looking at her, "Anyways I have to go to a friend's house; I will see you Monday though." I said walking a bit faster.
"Okay, see you Monday." She said waving.
"Where do you think you're going?" my father's voice echoed through the hall.
"To a friend's house." I said.
"What friend?"
"Doesn't matter, bye!" I said, and then raced down the hall and out the door.
"Otto! Otto! Get back here!" I heard my father yell, but I kept running.
I called Jeremy letting him know that I was running to his house and to drive to pick me up, because I couldn’t make it back to his house. I was probably running for about five minutes before I saw Jeremy's car. Rushing up to the car, he slowed down, and I hopped in and we sped back to his house. I lied back in the chair and closed my eyes, and the pain set in from running. Once at Jeremy's house his mom and dad were sitting on the couch waiting for us. I knew what they were going to ask, and I didn’t want to hear it, but Jeremy and I sat down.
"How was the meeting?" his mother asked.
"Fine." I replied.
"So are you ready to talk?" Jeremy's dad asked.
"I don't know, I will try." I said.
"Alright, that’s a start. So what exactly happened Otto?" Jeremy's mother asked.
"I was on my way home and when I was walking up to my house I noticed that the furniture was thrown around," I said taking a pause, not wanting to continue.
"And when you got in the house?" Jeremy's dad asked gently.
"I came in, and my father came down the stairs in a rage," I said shaking my head from the memories, "he was mad because I was called in for a meeting; he thought it was my fault. I explained to him it wasn’t but he was still mad, and pushed me up against a wall and started to hit me. He then left me once I was on the ground," I continued to say not wanting to go further; I could feel the water in my eyes and fought hard not to cry.
"How did you get the cuts?" Jeremy's mother asked with worried eyes.
"He went upstairs, and brought down his special cane with little spikes at the end that stuck out about a millimeter. I hadn’t been hit with that in such a long time, and I remembered it vividly. I bolted, or tried; I was knocked on the side and he dragged it to my back, then swung again and it caught my arm, so he dragged it all the way down. He gave me this disappointed look, and he turned to put the cane away and I decided it was now or never. So I ran, and I didn’t stop for a while. The pain eventually sunk in and I had to stop, stupidly it was at Alex's house and she saw me, so I ran again and made it to your house, or almost made it." I finished with tears falling from my eyes.
Jeremy's mother came over and gave me a hug which made me cry even harder. When did I become so weak? I used to be able to hold in the pain and tears… Jeremy's father looked disturbed by what I told him. Jeremy looked like he discovered something new. I didn’t care, all I knew was I was in a safe place for once in my life. I finally stopped crying after five minutes or so, and Jeremy's dad looked deep in thought.
"How long has this been going on?" Jeremy's father asked.
"Since I was a little kid." I replied. Jeremy's mother choked at that.
"You poor darling!" she said and pulled me into a hug.
"That isn’t the worst of it, and I guess I should tell you since I'm coming clean."
"What else could there be?" Jeremy's dad asked with shock.
"First off my mom left my dad and took my sister and left me. It was a deal, father said she could leave with my sister if I was left behind. Father has mentally abused me since I was a kid. He has told me that no one will ever like me, that I was a mistake and could never be loved…all of it falls along that line. I've never told anyone about that, not even Jeremy." I said looking at him with tears in my eyes.
"So that's why you are always shocked when someone speaks to you, or is kind to you, or cares for you? How could someone do that to you!?" Jeremy said outraged.
"Calm down, my father said I was a terrible kid at one point, he said I ruined my parent's relationship and I was some monster child. He told me I was hypnotized so I would forget all I did. So maybe there is a reason I am being punished, maybe I deserve all he has done to me."
"How can you say that?! You don't deserve it; maybe the monster child you were did, but not you. You aren’t the same person." Jeremy said.
"I am the same person though; just the monster part of me has been forgotten or locked away or something. I really don't know what happened but it must have been bad if father hit me and mentally abused me all this time."
"It isn’t right! You don't even know what you did! He can't blame you!"
"Yeah, I guess, and he doesn’t want me to remember for fear the bad side of me will awaken or something. He didn’t want to talk much about it. But anyways, now you know all I know." I said trying my best to keep composure.
I haven’t admitted it to myself until now, but I really wanted to know what I did. I was quite curious to know, but maybe father was protecting me from myself. I was lost in thought when Jeremy's father said, "Should we call the police? Or tell someone about this?"
"No! Please, don't say anything!" I almost begged.
"Why? Your dad has hurt you in so many ways, make him pay." Jeremy stated.
"Not until I know what I did to anger him so." I said standing up.
"You are not going to your house alone." Jeremy said grabbing my hand.
"Fine, then why don't we make it a party and you all come!" I said sarcastically.
"We have the concert to focus on, let this drama wait until tomorrow, please." Jeremy said with begging eyes.
"Fine." I said, sitting back down.
"You boys get ready, get pumped for the concert and enjoy yourselves tonight, and tomorrow we will deal with all of this." Jeremy's mother said, standing up with her husband to leave.
"So…" Jeremy said trying to make conversation.
"So…" I replied.
"Let's focus on the concert okay?"
"Yeah. I am totally excited to see them sing live! I mean, they must throw great concerts!"
"Yeah, from what I've seen on youtube it can get pretty rowdy sometimes, and especially if Andy like jumps off something or does some crazy shit like that. It should be epic." Jeremy said with a smile of excitement.
"Why can't it already be time to go to the concert, I mean really, I can hardly wait." I said laughing.
"Yeah, well, in the mean time we could kill a few hours with video games." Jeremy said with a huge grin.
"You would say that, but sure we can play, but I am not sure about the hour's thing, maybe for an hour but no more." I said.
"You are no fun you know that?" Jeremy said joking.
"Hey do you know who is opening for them?" I asked.
"This new band called Farewell, My Love. I've listened to some of their stuff, and I like it. Here I'll put a playlist of them and BVB on so we can get pumped for the concert." Jeremy said as he turned his computer on; music blasted out, and Jeremy started head banging. I laughed at him and then we started to play some video games.
The first game we played, I completely lost because it was one of Jeremy's new games that I hadn’t played before. I got the hang of it after the second try and still lost but was getting better. I saw Jeremy's mother go into the kitchen, probably to make a snack.
"Beat you again; it's no fun if there isn’t any competition." Jeremy joked.
"I know sorry maybe you have to go find a better player." I joked back.
Jeremy's mother came in and asked if we wanted a snack. She really was thoughtful; I wished my mother was like this. Jeremy said he was fine I said the same and thanked her. My cell phone started to ring; I looked at it and it was my father calling; hitting ignore I continued to play the video game with Jeremy. Jeremy looked at me to see if I was okay, when I nodded he continued to destroy me in the game. Hours passed by quickly, and dinner was soon on the table. Jeremy and I downed it and then went to his room to get ready.
He didn’t have many things that were my style. Jeremy threw me all of his stuff he didn’t wear much anymore and said I could do whatever I wanted to do with it. He had a plain black T-shirt which I cut slivers in so it looked like some animal clawed it up. I found some big safety pins and pinned the rips together. Another shirt in the pile he gave me had a cool logo which I cut out and sewed onto the black shirt. There were three pairs of pants in the pile, I took out the grey and black skinny jeans and created some rips in them. I wore my pair of black converse that had purple and red laces in them. I continued to search through the pile and found those hand gloves with the open fingers and slid that on. I asked if he had a chain anywhere, and luckily he did, so I broke the chain into different lengths and sewed three onto the glove. Jeremy laughed when he saw my final outfit.
"Gosh, I don't know how you do it! That is so cool! Time for make up right?"
"Duh!" I said going to his bathroom to see if he had any make up.
"As you know I don't really wear makeup but I do keep a supply of black liner and stuff in this cabinet." Jeremy said pulling a bag of black makeup out.
"Thanks!" I said reaching in and finding the liner immediately.
I didn’t do too much, just around the eyes to make them look black. Jeremy eventually caved and let me put some liner on him, but only a little. Jeremy was wearing a pair of black jeans and a BVB T-shirt with wrist bands.
"Ready to go?"
"Hell yeah!" I said.