Whisper in the Dark

“You can just ask me, you know,” he laughed. It was a really nice laugh too. “You don’t have to go and confuse me just because you think I might not want to answer. Maybe I will and maybe I won’t. It depends on the question, no big deal.”

I sighed, wondering why I was so nervous about asking the question. Many people had no problems asking me the same question. But I guess it’s different when I’m not trying to ridicule him and actually want to know.

“So, I noticed that your wristband was on your wrist even before you had your shirt on. Most likely before you even came out of the bathroom. Honestly you don’t have to answer, but I can empathize because well, as you can see, I have a wristband on my arm too. Um…do you, what I mean is…”

It was his turn to sigh; he knew what the question was. The smile that had just graced his face was gone and I was sad that it was my fault. “Yeah, you know what the wristband is for and if it wasn’t for your understanding I would not be telling you this. So many people have asked me and I hate the ridicule in their faces, you know? Just because I’m not perfect doesn’t mean they can judge me. But why do you do it? You seem so put together and proud.”

I snorted very unbecomingly. “I am hardly proud of anything in my life. I always get into trouble; I have horrible grades; my whole family thinks I am the biggest joke and let down ever. The whole rich-and-snobby-society-is-the-true-way-to-be-happy thing is complete and utter bull because I hate the stupid well to do society that up until I came here I had to endure. It is all just too much.”

That was a lot to say and I had never told anyone else anything even remotely that true before. “My life has become one lie after another and I can’t stand it; that is not the way I want to live.”

“Wow, it’s amazing what a face can hide from the world. I never would have thought that you felt anything like that. You must have become a master at masking emotions. I on the other hand am no where near as good as you at hiding things. My life was completely crappy because no one ever accepted me-especially my parents. They truly believed that I would never amount to anything. They beat me and so I figured I deserved it and more so that’s what I did. I did what they did to myself. Kind of fucked up logic I’ll admit, but what can you do?”

“Hanley, we are going to overcome this together okay? I mean we already told each other that, and we haven’t even known each other for ten minutes. We are going to be strong together and we are going to be the perfect pair. This school and our families aren’t going to have shit on us. Let them talk, we’ll be stronger and we’ll make it through this without anyone.”

“Are you sure you aren’t proud of yourself?” he asked with skepticism. “You really seem to know exactly what you want and how to get it.” I only rolled my eyes at this and he knew that I would not give him an answer. “So, do you want a tour of this place? I know some pretty awesome secret rooms and hallways and all the shit that goes along with old castles.”

“Wait, you mean that this was actually a castle?” He nodded, knowing that it boggled my mind. “I thought it was just built to look like that. Jeeze, that is pretty cool, even to me.”

So we went all around the mass expanses of the castle-turned-boarding-school-for-unruly-rich-kids. Who would have thought? We spent the entire day searching around everything and I was very impressed by it all.

I had always wanted to visit a castle because I figured it would be so much better than living in a stupid stuck-up mansion and I was right. Castles are so cool, even castles that are turned into boarding schools. Hanley was so great, but there was always a stupid twisting feeling in my gut because I knew that he would only be my friend. He was the only person that ever understood me and why I did the things that I did. Mainly because he did most of the same things as me.

To be completely honest, I felt way more at home being in the dorm room with him than I ever did with anyone else I had ever known in my house. It was the little things that made all the difference, such as the fact that after only one day he was completely fine with sitting snuggled on the couch with me watching sci-fi movies together. Turns out he was as big a Star Wars geek as I was which was so cool. We stayed up all night watching all six of the movies, starting with number four.