4. “People who love themselves, don’t hurt other people. The more we hate ourselves, the more we want others to suffer.” ― Dan Pearce
Chapter 4
“People who love themselves, don’t hurt other people. The more we hate ourselves, the more we want others to suffer.” ― Dan Pearce
Dylan
T he next six weeks seemed to fly by in a sort of haze of my own making. Each day at school stayed the same. I went to class, I shot the shit with Hailey, she made me listen to whatever German Hard House rave track she’d pilfered from LimeWire the previous night and I pretended to take it seriously as music. I brushed my teeth and combed my hair. I dodged the football jocks where I could. It had been noticeable that they only rarely had me in their sights of late; I mean, did they shoulder past me in the hallway and call me a fag if I so much as breathed heavy around them? Sure. But had they stuffed me in a locker and shoved me in any more disgusting hampers? Not one. I had a sneaking suspicion that I owed that small mercy to my newbie study partner.
The part of my life that had changed, was that every other evening Austin Ridge knocked on my front door and spent the better part of the evening in my room studying. I would have liked to say as a good tutor that the whole time he was there was spent studying; I should in fact have said that as finals were coming up very soon and he needed to be ready. But it wasn’t not always the case, sometimes we studied but sometimes we just lay side by side on my bed and talked.
We talked about anything and everything. We talked about what movies we liked, his being mindless action flicks with explosions and guns that never seem to run out of bullets, mine being good scary horror movies. The big scary jock, it turned out, was afraid of horror movies. They scare the bejesus out of me , he had said in his most manly voice. I wanted to know what a bejesus looked like, so one of our study sessions had been taken up with Austin pressed against me on my bed While we watched Jason Vorhees hack up some unsuspecting but very horny counsellors.
Had I minded the big, scared jock’s body pressed against mine for the majority of the movie, or when he got too scared and pressed his face into the outside of my bicep? Hell no.
We’d talked about our friends, and I’d tried to listen and not scoff as he tried in vain to sell me on the upsides of being friends with Garrett and the rest of the football goons. I would just have to say that I was blind and would remain blind to their virtues and mourn later that I never got to know their mythical goodness.
We’d talked about what we thought college life might be like. I’d already applied for a place in the dorms, but Austin had not decided on his living situation yet, as his place was conditional dependent on his final grade. He had become such a fixture at my house that Dad had taken to setting him a place at the dinner table every other evening. Not like my dad would ever think to cook, but by god he could set a table. My dad would talk to him about football and whatever team was making the sport pages recently. It was almost a relief for my dad to talk to someone like Austin about football. The only time he had ever tried to have a serious conversation about football to me, I had ended up talking to him about English Soccer and how the football players would make excellent ballerinas due to their fancy foot work. He had shaken his head and moved on.
I stood in the lunch line of the school cafeteria clutching my charge card in my hand, the edges of the plastic card digging into my skin as I perused the trays of mediocre food laid out in the warm bain-maries in front of me. I winced at the largely untouched tray of ‘Chef’s special meatloaf’, which was school district code for unspeakable bland mystery meat, rancid breadcrumbs and the cheapest ketchup known to man. Quite rightly, the majority of students knew to ignore it and chose the god-awful burgers or mac and cheese instead. The only problem was that now it looked like by the time I got to the front of the queue; the only option left would be the unspeakable bland meat stuff.
I quietened my stomach for a moment and tried to decide whether I could survive the day on the half pack of mints in my bag and the questionable apple with ink stains all over it that currently lived at the back of my locker in the main hallway. My stomach growled at me like a yawning leopard, giving me an unequivocal answer. I resigned myself to the food of the damned and continued in the line.
“Oh I don’t think so!” an outraged voice whispered in my ear. I turned quickly to see Hailey looking at the meatloaf as if it was personally responsible for all the evils in the world. “You can’t eat that!” A sharp cough from Doris the lunch lady stilled Hailey’s passion as an apologetic smile formed on her face.
“I love you Doris, but that meatloaf should be used as a way to extract information rather than waterboarding.” Hailey shrugged with a cute smile. “I think they would get the answers quicker.”
The edges of Doris’s mouth quirked up on one side as she shook her head slightly and moved on to serving the next person in line.
“Oh look what we have here.” I shut my eyes tightly as Garrett’s voice suddenly sounded from directly behind me, “The Nerd and the Nerdette.”
“Wow, Garrett,” Hailey drawled, “you’re so original, I mean, you must have writers for this shit.”
I turned in time to watch a cruel sneer twist Garrett’s handsome face. “I don’t know why you hang out with this loser Hailey,” he said, his head nodding towards me. “I mean, you’re not bad to look at and you could do so much better in this school if you didn’t lower yourself to hanging around with this.” Garrett pointed down over my head as if he was pointing out moldy produce to a shop clerk.
“The choice between spending time with him and you, Garrett, was always going to be an easy one.” Hailey picked fluff from the front of her red sweater, examining it for a moment before discarding it from her fingers. “I mean, not only is there nothing interesting going on up here,” she leaned over and tapped the side of his head, “but also any residual attractiveness you might have had left over has all been sucked up with the memory of you pissing your pants on that trip to Six Flags.”
“I didn’t…” Garrett stammered.
“I vividly recall you weeping in the exit line for The Wild One, holding your jacket over your crotch, While Mrs. Jarvis told you that it happens to everyone.” Hailey wrinkled her nose. “Yeah you will always be the kid that pissed his pants on a roller coaster to me buddy. So I think I will just go back to talking to my friend if you don’t mind.”
“Hailey, you are a menace,” I whispered, a wide smile on my face.
“That might be the case,” she pulled on my arm, “but I also have a PB&J sandwich in my bag with your name on it.”
I prayed to whatever lunch time gods sent my blessing disguised as a seventeen-year-old pretty girl with a sandwich, and ducked out of the lunch line. Hailey led me across the room to a bunch of unused tables. We took one nearest the window, the view looking over the south quad and the football field in the distance.
“Thank you for that.” I nodded my head towards the lunch line. My eyes found Garrett, who narrowed his eyes as our gazes clashed.
“I hate that dude.” She shrugged. “It was very much my pleasure.”
“Thanks anyways.”
Hailey gave me a brief nod and smiled. “So prom is in a few weeks. Are we doing what we planned and staying home, watching horror movies and pretending that the idea of prom is social garbage and the people who got to it just sheeple, or are we going to be honest that we really want to go and just go stag together?” She drummed her fingers on the table in front of her.
“Hailey,” I stared at her pointedly, “I’m a complete Mary so I feel comfortable telling you that you are absolutely beautiful girl with a giant set of tits that any guy in this school would love to stick their dick in between. So tell me again why you would be going stag when you could get any guy you wanted?”
“That’s not true,” she laughed.
“You know it is true, but I don’t want you not to accept a date because you know that I won’t get asked or have no one to ask.”
She looked down nervously. “I’m not doing that.”
“Then you won’t mind saying yes to Todd Landry, because I know he asked you and I know that you think he is completely bang-able.” I said matter-of-factly.
“I mean…” Her drumming became more intense until I placed my hand over hers.
“Please don’t,” I pleaded sincerely. “I want you to go, and I want you to have a great memory of prom and I want to steal a dance with you, so can you tell him yes please?”
“I’ll think about it,” she grumbled. Hailey reached into her bag, passing me over a cellophane-wrapped sandwich and a bottle of blue Gatorade. We spent the next few minutes just chatting about anything and everything, including Austin’s last study session at my house and the happy discovery that when he fell asleep, he did this cute snore like a puppy and woke himself up, a line of drool on my pillow as he protested that he wasn’t asleep but merely resting his eyes. We got so lost in ourselves that we failed to notice Garrett and his goons take residence on the table behind me.
“So what do we think the Nerd and Nerdette talk about at lunch time then?” Garrett asked to his minions to which a chorus of chuckles and brief shrugs were his only response. “I imagine it’s something profound like Are we going to die virgins? or Shall we just bite the bullet and fuck each other because no one else is desperate enough to fuck us?”
I roll my eyes at Hailey hard. The unoriginal nature of his insults hadn’t achieved the aim of devastating us like he so wished it would, but instead subjecting us to his low-rent bullshit which at best was a minor irritation. The one thing I had not done was clock that Garrett was watching me do it.
“Dude, do you have a fucking problem?” Garrett moved quickly from his seat to stand next to mine, looming large over me.
“No, I don’t have a problem Garrett,” I managed to stutter out between clenched teeth, the fear creeping along my arms and legs, my toes and fingers going numb as my muscles contracted and froze.
“’Cause it looks like you’re disrespecting me in front of my boys.” His palms slammed down on the table in front of me. I looked around the lunchroom to see half the people avoiding the unfolding scene, pretending that it wasn’t happening While the other half watched on with rapturous fascination.
“Garrett, why don’t you just…” Hailey started before Garrett pinned her with a glare.
“If I wanted your opinion… Actually, I never want your opinion, so keep it to your fucking self,” he bit out.
“I didn’t mean…”
“You fucking losers never do mean anything,” he laughed cruelly, “you just sit here day after day, taking up space that belongs to people who matter, and news flash, you don’t fucking matter. You are nothing. You are dirt under my shoe. You are parasites that steal the oxygen from around us. Fags like you…”
“Hey!” My spine stiffened as a deep voice boomed from behind me. I glanced up at Garrett, whose face was etched with an equal mixture of confusion and irritation. “I think you owe Dylan an apology.”
I turned slowly in my seat. Austin looked pissed. His normally serene features were twisted into something not quite ugly, but an expression that I prayed would never be aimed at me.
“What the fuck?” Garrett laughed. “You’re kidding right?”
“Do I look like I’m kidding?” This could only end poorly for me. Sure, Austin might be able to calm the situation now, but he couldn’t be everywhere at once. Garrett would surely make me pay for whatever savior thing Austin was doing at the moment.
“Austin…”
“No Dylan,” Austin pinned me with his glare, “he doesn’t get to talk to you like that.”
“What are you, his fucking boyfriend?”
In a flash, Austin moved forward, gripping Garrett by the shirt and pushing him backwards until he hit the stone column behind. His arm was pressed across his chest, holding him in place. “What the fuck did you just say?” Anger radiated from Austin like water bursting from flooded riverbanks, flows and waves pouring off him, making those around him take a quick step back. “Say that again, I fucking dare you.”
My insides went cold. Garrett calling me the same old stupid insults that he always has didn’t and hadn’t bothered me for a while. They buzzed against the consciousness like a blue bottle trapped in a room. Austin reacting to being labelled along with me, like his whole world was about to end, felt like a thousand frozen blades piercing my heart. No, I was under no illusion that Austin was anything but straight. Did I think we were friends? Not exactly, but I thought we were at least at a place where neither of us would currently be choking the life out of another senior because he had the audacity to even contemplate that we might be more than friends.
I caught Hailey’s gaze, the look of pity on her face too much for me to deal with at that moment. I trained my stare to the floor.
“Man, I was just joking!” Garrett choked around Austin’s forearm.
“No, you fucking weren’t.” Austin scoffed. “Now I said apologize.” Not even bothering to spare me an over-the-shoulder glance, Austin gestured towards me with his free arm.
I stared around the room once more, the shocked faces staring between me and Austin. The rumor mill was powering its engines, stoking the fires that would surely be ablaze by the end of the day. I saw the incredulous looks on some that said, ‘ Of course Austin wouldn’t lower himself to the likes of him ’ without ever having to say a single word.
Garrett pulled free from Austin’s grip, piercing me with a withering gaze. “Okay, fuck I’m sorry okay,” he bit out, his stare flitting between me and Austin. He mumbled a few choice words under his breath before picking up his backpack from his table and left, his minions following closely behind.
Before I had a chance to do anything, Austin moved to stand in front of me. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah I’m fine.” Hailey placed a hand on my arm and squeezed gently. “Seriously, both of you, I’m good.”
“I told those guys to leave you alone, I honestly didn’t think…” He placed his hand on my shoulder. For a moment, the warmth was comforting, before I remembered his words. I shrugged my shoulder and pulled away from him.
The phrase ‘this will hurt me more than it hurts you’ could not be truer in this very moment. “Listen, friend, I think you are good to go when it comes to finals. I don’t think we need to have any more study sessions, okay?”
“Dylan.” His deep voice sounded scratchy as it forced its way from his throat. “I don’t know what just happened but…”
“No, it’s all good, Austin.” I plastered a big smile. “We wouldn’t want anyone thinking that we are any more than just friends. You have your reputation to think of. So let’s just call it a day on this.”
I started to move away but he reached out and snagged my arm. “What if I don’t want to? What if I enjoy spending time with you?”
My heart pounded in my chest and the thrum of energy underneath my skin demanded that I swooned and gave in to whatever he desired. The small buzz in the back of my head, however, became an all-consuming roar. He hadn’t thought of spending time with me when he’d flown off the handle when it came to someone misjudging our relationship. I had never and would never need that type of toxicity in my life, and I didn’t intend to start now. Once more I pulled my arm away from him.
“Maybe you should have thought of that before you went all Bruce Banner on Garrett when he said you were my boyfriend.” I narrowed my eyes, daring him to deny it.
“Dylan, it’s not what you think. I just didn’t…”
“I know what you just didn’t, Austin.” My lips curled into a tight smile. “It’s cool. You won’t have to worry about any misconceptions anymore. It’s been nice.”
His face fell. He looked like he wanted to say something, but the words got caught in his chest. I nodded mutely before turning around and left with Hailey in tow.