Fake

I swear to God, if one more person asks me one more thing, I’m going to rip out their esophagus and wring their neck with it. And then like clockwork, “Lucas,” someone called out to me.

Subconsciously, I kept my eye from twitching before I faced some girl that was sitting at the desk beside me. “Help me with question eight?”

I put on my fucking fake smile as I fantasized bitch-slapping her across the face. That’s just how it was though. No slip-ups, as promised.

*~*~*~*

“I fucking hate this!” I screamed, knocking off a vase I knew no one would miss off the table in the hallway.

Joni just looked at me with those eyes that always seemed to stare into my mind. I loved that Joni was mute. He’d endure my rants without saying a word. He wouldn’t reprimand me about any of it, he wouldn’t back talk me. And most of all, he wouldn’t tell me to do anything or how to be. It was like he simply accepted me as I was. That’s why Joni is my only real friend.

After I was done cursing my parents, my peers, my teachers, basically everyone in the entirely world and their existence I turned to Joni, his brown eyes looking questioningly up at me as if to ask me if I was done breaking things.

I sighed and my shoulders dropped. “Yeah, I’m done,” I told him before he gave a small smile.

My hair had been falling out for awhile now, all of the stress and tension built up from my expectations. I may be an amazing prodigy but I can’t be expected to fulfill all of their demands. So I brushed my hair, the falling strands thinning my hair. I’ll probably be bald in a few years if this shit keeps up.

“Wanna head out to the lake?” I asked him, shrugging the hair off my shoulders. I really needed to get out of this house. The housekeeper would take care of the mess I left and I threatened her long ago to keep her mouth shut to my parents when she’d caught me in the act.

He nodded fairly happily and followed me out the door and to our lake. Not one ever came here. It was a haven for me. I didn’t have to feel fake like I always did around everyone.

Joni immediately stripped to his boxer and jumped in the lukewarm water. I, however, sat of the end of the rickety dock that had to have been built during the civil war and dipped my feet in the water before lying back on the dock and sighing contentedly.

When I opened my eyes, I saw Joni stand over me, the water on his body dripping onto me. He looked worried. And then handed me my phone. When I saw the time I cursed. My parents would be home soon. I sighed, my day was ruined now.

I groaned as I stood up and walked home, Joni following behind me.

When I got home, my parents hugged me and told me how worried they were. I assured them that I was just fine.

“Honey, you’ve got to tell us when you’re going out!” Mom said.

“Or at least call,” Dad said, thoroughly disappointed. I mean, come on! I do much worse stuff than this so it’s ironic that this is all I’m getting in trouble for. And, well, as long as they don’t realize it, it’s not hurting them, right? Right.

When I got to my room, I pulled out a cigarette and sucked on it, inhaling all that I could. Joni didn’t stop me when I took the bottle of vodka from the safe in the cabinet under my bedside table. My parents wouldn’t come in, so I knew it was safe as I chugged a few mouthfuls.

Joni would be there to help me because he was the only one I could really count on at all. He was really the only thing keeping me here.

I don’t know what it is about him, but he’s just so damn… calming. Not to mention all of that innocent air about him. And the resilience of his being. It meant I couldn’t corrupt him whether it was my drinking, smoking, the drugs, swearing, or the breaking things.

That’s because his escape was his muteness, mine was everything I just mentioned. How we got along, I’ll never know. Maybe because he was the only one that didn’t demand anything of me.