29. PAPER BONES.
PAPER BONES.
Remembering was a curse. My mind was a vault of unwanted echoes, and my body was a tomb of dead and dying things.
I wanted to forget it all. Every hand printed on my skin; every mouth pressed to it.
Elise was right. I should have gotten up and ran. Anywhere would’ve been better than this.
It only took one time for it to ruin someone.
But once wasn’t what I got.
It was worse than any pain I’d been dealt before. It killed me in ways that still allowed me to draw breath.
I was nothing but a boy with paper bones beneath his skin.
I was nothing.
I felt nothing.
The bedroom door would creak open, and another glass of water was pressed to my lips. I did not mind the distortion from the pain, but it went deeper than the physical. It ruined something inside of me to my very core.
I was lost, but lucid.
Julian, but not.
A person, but nothing .
On the verge of numbness, I found myself fighting to feel something—anything but that void and so I chose to build my temper with the hurt. The only way to fight back was to plant hate in every crevice of me until I was filled with it—fueled by it.
It was mid-afternoon when I was sitting on the steps of a house in another small town in Massachusetts.
I had a half-filled trash bag of everything I owned.
I tried to remember the names of my foster parents but never could.
They didn’t let me leave my room unless it was to go to school, which I could hardly remember being present for.
The teachers grew concerned and called in multiple welfare checks that only ever made matters worse.
Michelle stopped coming around. For a while, I thought it was the end for me—this was how my life would be until I turned eighteen and could choose a life for myself. The system only shoved me in where they could fit me.
That was until I was assigned a new caseworker named Talia, who figured out what was happening to me during her welfare check.
I didn’t ask what happened to Michelle—didn’t care.
It was a wordless exchange. She must have seen it on my face or maybe my foster parents, but within the next twenty minutes, I was getting in a car, and she was crying. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d spoken to anyone—wasn’t sure if my voice still worked or if I even wanted it to.
She promised she was taking me somewhere safe, but I had to keep quiet about what happened to me, or it could ruin the reputation of their organization or something. I wasn’t all that sure about it anyway, but I felt embarrassed for some reason, so I nodded absently.
The truth is, for the entirety of the car ride, I had one thought in mind—what it would be like to kill myself. I thought that if the world could keep dealing me such an ugly hand, what was the point?
Was it pain?
Or was it the hope it’d end someday?
I had thirteen pills in my pocket. One for each year of my life.
I’d stolen one from the cabinet in the bathroom each month, so no one noticed. I’d planned to take them that night, but then Talia showed up.
A part of me saw it as a sign to hang on. Even having experienced the things that I have, I still wanted to live. I wanted to live so desperately that it made my heart ache. I knew a less vile world existed, I only needed to find it.
Next, I was taken to a cross-gender group home in Boston. Talia thought it would be better for me to not be alone. It sounded appealing, and for the first time in a long time, a thrum of excitement shot through me —not alone .
Not alone .
Not alone .
Not alone .
The excitement didn’t last long because I was introduced to a new breed of survival. It was pure chaos, but at the end of it all, they were all as angry as me.
“SO, YOU'RE A SHRINK?” I asked, eyeing the middle-aged man across from me with distrust. He looked too polished, with a sweater vest and a calm smile. I didn't trust it—not him, not this place. I’d been here a month, keeping my head down, following the rules, and keeping quiet. I couldn’t see why I’d been called to this room now.
I didn’t need help. I could take care of myself.
“I’m a therapist. I’m here to help you,” he said in that smooth voice people use when they think they’re comforting you. But it only made me feel like I was under a microscope.
I chewed on my thumbnail, tasting a tinge of blood. “Nobody’s hurt me yet,” I told him, guessing that was what he wanted to know. All the adults kept looking at me with sadness in their eyes and it confused me. The therapist’s face was harder to read, though. “What was your name?”
“Dr. Garrison. Now, Julian, you said that nobody has hurt you yet . While that’s good to hear, can you tell me if that’s something that happened often in your previous placements?
” He asked and I shrugged at his question, only half-listening as my attention drifted to the candy dish on the table between us.
“You can have some,” he said, noticing my interest. Sensing my hesitation, he added, “Go on, it’s why it’s there. ”
I reached for the dish, taking a handful of jellybeans in case he changed his mind. I stuffed a few in my mouth before answering. “I’m not supposed to talk about it.”
He watched me chew in silence, then asked gently, “Talk about what?”
“Hurting,” I mumbled.
He nodded slowly. “Julian, when you say ‘hurting,’ is that something you feel physically? Or is it more on the inside?”
I shrugged.
He moved on quickly. “Where do you feel the hurt?”
“Everywhere.” I studied my fingers with a frown.
They were stained with candy color, and all my nail beds were bloodied from my insistent biting.
“Do you have any chocolate?” Without a word, he reached into his briefcase, pulled out a Hershey bar, and slid it across the table. I smiled. “Sweet, thanks.”
“Do you remember your last placement?”
My head bobbed back and forth as chocolate flooded my senses. “Not really.”
His eyes flick over the drawings spilling out of my bag. “I’ve heard that you spend a lot of time sketching. Is that something you enjoy?”
I nodded. It was what I’d been doing before I was dragged me into this room. “It makes my mind go. . .” I tapped my lips. “Quiet.”
“That’s wonderful, Julian. Art can be a powerful way to find peace.
Would you want to show me any of your sketches?
” I shook my head, appalled at the idea and he only laughed in response.
“Fair enough,” he said, adjusting the cuffs on his sweater.
I caught a glint from the gold band on his ring finger.
“Do you have a family?” I asked abruptly.
He looked down at the ring and nodded. “Yes, a wife and twins. A boy and a girl.”
I frowned, mulling it over. “Were they. . .made from love?”
My question threw him off. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason.” I clenched my jaw, irritated.
“There’s always a reason,” he said, too calmly.
It took everything in me not to snap. “Is that what you’re telling all your patients?
” I asked, fighting to keep my tone in check.
“That their mommy and daddy died for a reason? That they’re unwanted for a reason?
There’s a reason why they’re abandoned, bruised, tossed around like trash?
” I let out a weak laugh at his blank face.
“You’re wearing a fucking sweater vest. What the hell do you know about anything? ”
“I know a great deal about many things,” he answered. “But I also know nothing about a lot of them.”
I sighed, swiping a hand over my face, aggravated. “I don’t even know why you’re here.”
“I’m here to help you,” he told me again, the unshakable calm back in his voice.
“You’re here for a paycheck and you know it.”
“If that were true, I’d have told you our session ended fifteen minutes ago, but I’m still sitting here.”
My eyes darted to the clock. He was right, and it made me drop some of my defenses, but not all of them. “I know they told you I’m screwed up or fucked in the head, but I’m not.”
“That’s right. From what I can tell so far, you’ve got a good head on your shoulders and a sharp mind, albeit we could work on that colorful vocabulary of yours.”
I shrug. “So, what exactly am I supposed to talk to you about?”
He folded his hands thoughtfully. “You could tell me what happened in that house, Julian.”
I froze. The air felt heavy, pressing down on me. My walls shot back up, and I stood abruptly. “We’re done for the day.”
Rushing out of the room, I slammed the door shut behind me and stumbled out the front door. My knees hit the grass, and I clutched my chest as I cried.
If love could stay, it would have already.