[work in progress, and no. I am not describing myself or anyone i know , merely writing from an interesting perspective. Enjoy.]
I saw the heavy blue of my veins through the the translucent skin covering my wrist, slowly traced my middle finger over it. It singed like static that i could feel pumped through my heart, that clumsy old thing in my chest. It almost tickled, my wrist. Virgin territory. I smashed my thumb on to the passages of blood flowing to and from my hand, the airless pressure crushing my wrist, my hand feeling numb and heavy. I held myself like this, as if i was branding myself, and felt the pulse punch through my veins the same way you hear it in your ears when you hold your breath underwater for too long. I was suffocating my own hand, i could've mutilated it if i wanted to. I needed to make sure i was still real, still alive, a person with a light inside of them, whatever that means. As i sat choking my left hand i suddenly saw myself, knees tucked up to my chest, neck contorting itself as close to the kneecaps as it can get, angry at my damn hand on the bathroom floor. The back of my neck threatening to snap my spine if i bent any harder, any more beautifully on the bathroom floor of one of my school's piss stained bathrooms. Everywhere i put my hand was a wet puddle of piss, i didn't care, i rejoiced in it, savored the moisture until it was dry and sticky. Apparently i was a monster, a disgusting cave dweller who will never be handsome. This is how they treated me, the pigs at my school i mean. The things they had made me do, the lies my parents told me as a kid. You are just the cutest little thing aren't you? One day, Joseph, one day you will grow up and be the smartest, most handsome boy in the world! Maybe i should kill myself, if that's the only goal in life: being smart and handsome. I'm definitely not handsome, my fat nose like a witches' extended from the droopy eyelids and pudgy cheeks that i call home. My chin is small, futile, weak. It exaggerates the ever pleasant double chin by trying to sink into my face towards my nose, straight up like a damn elevator shaft or something. I can't even rock the emo look, my orange hair: "Ginger!" they shout. And they laugh. But it's not funny.
Apparently i'm not too smart either, but maybe if i could stop thinking about how unlawfully ugly i was when someone looks into my lazy eye i'd have some kind of intelligence, or personality for that matter. Just be yourself, they try to tell me, but when i look into the mirror i see a freak, and what's worse is that i don't even have some disability or hinderance to justify the way i look, just me. I'm an eye sore, that's pretty clear. I asked a girl out in seventh grade and she literally just stared at me and then started crying, like bawling her damn eyes out when she came back to her senses. A week later it got out that the only boy she could get to ask her out was the hunchback of notre dame, i didn't mean to offend her or anything. So if i am an eyesore, and i should just simply be myself, then just what exactly does anyone expect of me? The facts are these, people simply do not enjoy being around me, they are repulsed by me as if they might catch a little of my ugly by hanging around me, shit, i got plenty of it to share.
I wasn't so bad for a little while, or so i thought. I used to creatively disguise myself, i'd wear capes and Abraham Lincoln hats to school and act like a pirate or a prince or an artist, but they called that one "multiple personality disorder" Ms. johnson please, your son is too ugly to express himself, have you considered medication? Or perhaps plastic surgery? Or the electric chair? That ended when i was in seventh grade as well, apparently once the hormones kick in and the pimples invade the open real estate on your face you're not cute anymore. I was fortunate in that sense, i've never had to much of a pimple problem. Guess i dodged a real bullet there. It'd sure be inconvenient to be looked down on by society for a couple years because of how you look. Phew.
I am good at one thing, or at least i think i am. I dance, and i film myself and watch the video back on my computer. I use the internet to learn all the techniques and steps and exercises, and if you can get past the hula hoop tube of fat that runs all the way around my pelvis, you'd understand that i actually move quite gracefully, fluidly, it all just flows late at night with the lights off, i'm free by myself. In my cave. Away from petty judgments that "don't matter" or "shouldn't effect me". Alone. My parents don't know anything about my late night habits, i wouldn't tell them either, they already think i'm pretty messed up. I was committed to a psych ward for a little while, until the old doctor said that there was nothing quite wrong with me, my social tribulations will be smoothed out with age and maturity.
I have one friend. Her name is sam. She's chubby and bell bottomed, flat footed and clumsy. Blonde hair, blue eyes, nice red lips that compliment her full face. It has been said that fat girls always have pretty faces, and she was no exception. It was because of this that she tried to gain popularity. We have had a couple of fights throughout the years, but we've come to a mutual understanding that, despite its cruelty is actually quite comforting, She acknowledges that i'm ugly, and feels terribly sorry for me. We agreed that i would pretend i didn't know her in public, we'd meet secretly, chat now and then about our fears and shrinking list of hopes and dreams, and most importantly gossip, about everyone else. The thing about Sam wasn't her looks, she looked ok, but she was a talker. She knew how to flaunt what she had and had boys falling sideways and swallowing her chewing gum off the floor when she walked by. She knew everyone, she talked to and about everyone, and what she didn't tell to anyone else, she told to me. It was like magic trick, the whole school would be looking at her, and i'd be lurking behind the crowd, like a pickpocket who knows where everyone keeps their wallet. Once and i while i wouldn't be able to resist, someone would make a smart remark about my facial structure, and i'd walk by and get real close, whisper in their ear: you slut, i know you're cheating on Pedro, i know you slurped his big fat cock like lollipop, and i know you liked it. They'd be stunned, try to laugh, fumble in their pockets until they found their phones. The worst, the most phony moments were when they tried to treat me like a buddy, like a chip off the old block so i'd keep my mouth shut. "Oh! that's funny! What was your name again? Harold- right? you know you're not so bad you know, we'll talk some time ok?" The girls would sway their hips a little more and press their lips together a little harder, like i was some rapist asking them to strut down a hallway drowned in blood and broken glass. These were the few moments i lived for, i relished in the sweet revenge of these moments, confronting the disgusting monsters of the beautiful, the witty, the creative. The lucky.
This was my life, these were things that actually happened to me. Like i said, there i was on the disgusting, piss stained bathroom floor, making sure I was real. I can't go to class, not like this, not when i have to sit next to goddamn Harry Leafer. He was the damn center of attention and the teacher had sat him next to me in hopes that he might pipe down and do some classwork, but the kid has ADHD or something, every time the class mood shifts over into peace, sweet, serene, meditative peace, old Harry Leafer has some stupid question: "Hey uh, Ms. Paulson?" "Yes harry." "What period are we in?" The class might giggle, or they might break out into uncontrollable laughter, you never know with this lot. But anyway, me and Harry sit in the back, he sits in the corner and i sit right next to him, so every time he says something the whole class has to look past me in order to get at him. I would move and go sit somewhere else, but there are no other spots. I don't want to suddenly plop myself down in the spot between Gene Miller and Melissa Ashley, its already the dead center of the year and a move like that could potentially change the whole chemistry of the class. Oh my god, why is he sitting there. Should we move? I don't wanna look mean. He's a freak Gene! i'm not sitting here with him, it's gonna be SO awkward. Sometimes i consider the option though, i'd walk up to them very politely and say, "i don't know about you guys, but Harry's a real dick, Oh! i'm sorry Gene i didn't see you there, i forgot you two have a bit of a history." I could imagine them just staring at me, trying to un-see me. Maybe if we pretend we don't hear him, he'll go away. I'd grab Gene by her perfect slender elbow and rub my knuckle up against her pillowy breast, enough to make it look like an accident. I'd say "Listen bitch, you let me sit here with you two and you be grateful for it, or i'll tell the whole school about you and Danny Winkler".
But this was just fantasy. These were just the thoughts i'd have in my head when i was trying to fall asleep. I hoped one day i'd wake up in a different place. I hoped one day i'd find love in some underground home for a secret troll society, either stay there, with the trolls, or be killed. I'd be beautiful amongst the trolls, a man among boys, i'd have knowledge of the outside world. I could stage a damn uprising, a revolution if i wanted. I'd never have to see Gene Miller's tight skinny jeans, or her mid drift that teased so subtly at the smooth, youthful skin underneath. Her rounded breasts, they didn't need a push up bra, she never wore one but everyone thought she did, but Sam has seen her naked, so i know otherwise. The way her back curves into her her bottom, i just want put my hands on the indent of that curve, and just squeeze so gently, make her feel safe, it's ok Gene, the beast has you, nobody can hurt you now. Her light brown hair, her blue eyes like fluorescent baby blue lights, her red-pink lips hang perfectly, waiting for a kiss, and that smile. I've dreamed about that smile, so childish, so full of joy. But this was just fantasy. These were just the thoughts i'd have in my head when i was trying to fall asleep.
I had told Sam about this crush a couple of times, but it was quite clear she would never go for a guy like me. As a matter of fact, that girl i asked out in seventh grade, the one that started crying, was Gene's best friend. Who knows what kind of inside jokes they have running about me, if I have the audacity to think that anyone thinks about me. To think that anyone cares about me. "Just drop it, seriously it's a littler weird." Sam would say. I had nearly pried the bit about her seeing Gene naked from that locked safe of secrets she keeps on the school. The locked safe that i know the code to. Our arrangement was clear, she'd give me the scoop on the latest dirt on the school in return for a little space to vent about her problems. When she told me something, it was like writing it down on a piece of paper and then burning it, the only two who knew it existed were her, and the paper. After the beans were spilled, we'd go our separate ways.
So finally i got up off the bathroom floor, sobered up a bit. Came to my senses. I decided to skip the period because i didn't want to stare down at my desk all day while Harry cracks joke after joke, drawing look after look, glance after glance, suicide, suicide. After that period- fourth period i mean, we go to lunch, and i usually stay away from the cafeteria because i'm nearly bulimic. The last thing i need on top of the extra skin folding over itself where models carry their six packs, is more fat. I usually where a leather jacket to school, just so nobody messes with me. In all the movies i watch all the bad-asses always wear leather jackets. But mine's a little different, when i told my mom what i wanted, she grabbed the first coupon she could find and went to the nearby flea market. When she got back i threw the thing in the wash, it had a weird smell on it, and when it came back out, it was straight up beige with a blue zipper, all that fashionably bad-ass black had come clean off in the wash. What the fuck.
I was wondering around the halls, mindlessly, trying to see if i could get lost in the hallways that i've been walking for the past two years. I saw some seniors bouncing a basketball around in the hallway. One was wearing a real big shirt, that said "I'd fcuk me". I guess it was mis-spelled so the school couldn't say anything about it. Or maybe he just doesn't know how to read, it wouldn't surprise me. One time, in ninth grade i had a class with this kid, Clarence. Clarence was one of those black kids who took extra pride in being black, like everyone who's father's father wasn't part of the civil rights movement is completely invalid. If you insulted the kid, he thought you were saying it because he was black. If you picked him to be on your basketball team, he thought it was because he was black. If you were white, you were racist, because he was black. Anyway apparently Clarence is actually from the hood, he doesn't just pretend to be, and when he's not posted up at the neighborhood pharmacy, he's definitely not reading. So the teacher calls him to read a paragraph. "Hah, man this bitch ass paragraph, maine i got this. Aye where we again? Aye i lost my place." Someone had pointed him in the right direction. "Oh aight, thanks bruh, Ok." He cleared is throat, real loud, and put his head real close to the letters like he was inspecting them with a magnifying glass, his finger moved in awkward jerks along the page. "The- man, with- the g- oh! Gun! The man with the g-gun truh- tuh-" It's pronounced 'thrust', the whole class was thinking, but nobody said anything. They knew better with Clarence. He bumbled his way through the paragraph as i read and re-read the story about three times. Old Clarence, what a character.
I smelled weed throughout the hallways, weed and piss, can you guess where the pot heads like to smoke? Finally i just zoned out, lost myself in the man made concrete ripples throughout the wall, all that unnecessary chiseling. So i turn the corner and who do i see standing about a foot from my face? The gorgeous Gene Miller, black skinny jeans, yellow tank top, outside the rules of dress code. The trolls, think about the trolls. The whole half second that i had seen her had been occupied that same dreamy stare i had looking at the walls, aimed directly at her cleavage. She rolled her eyes, hard. "Ugh!" She stomped off the other direction. Away from the drooling troll. She had been agitated about something else before i strolled over, i could tell. Then she stopped,