Straighten Your Ties / Book 1

Is there any truth to the recipe? 

I've been mixing thrills in the right key

But I don't feel right in my skin

So I don't feel anything at all

I leave emotion at the door

Like a desperate boy on last call
-The Graduate – Anhedonia

Perhaps I was overreacting that day, because the next few hours weren’t so bad. That’s right, the next few hours were nothing compared to the next day. So, on the downside, even though I really needed that conversation that day, it really just made most things worse for me. I hardly slept that night, thinking about what the l had come over me, whether it was hormones or just teenage stupidity. I concluded that I wasn’t going to figure out a damn thing. That’s how teenage years are spent – just not figuring anything out at all. In the end of any pondering session, we’re – well, I’m – always saying “fuck it.” Then we move on to our homework. Which is what I didn’t get done that night.

After getting home to my house in the Mount, I decided to slump in my “office chair” which was simply my desk chair, but it used to be at my mother’s office, and sit there looking at my desktop monitor blankly, waiting for something to appear there that would re-assure me. That wasn’t going to happen. And screw mentioning this to my friends, as that wouldn’t go over well. My friends would only make fun of the whole situation, which wouldn’t help. Obviously.

The only thing I could do was sit there at my computer, thinking of something else to blog about other than the latest situation. Yes, I have (had) a blog. Big whoop. I like it. I created the custom image for it all by myself and I’ve been keeping track of my daily life on it for a while. But the thing is that every time I send an email on my Seguin email account, it’s in the signature, meaning the URL is in the bottom of the email. This link had spread to the seniors in the recent months, which I didn’t particularly want to happen. They had been trolling it for a while now. And it was difficult to write anything when you knew people you knew were watching you.

I know that’s what a blog is: a public journal or diary, but I kinda hated that. Even Mr. Caldwell followed it occasionally when he had spare time. I could tell because he had written comments that were the exact kind of tone he used. Nowadays as you can see, I’m typing my life down in a word document. Moving on. I wrote on it at least once weekly. I had written on it a lot when I had gotten the Nintendo Wii (which is gathering dust as I wait for a worthy game), basically writing down all the events that had happened trying to get it on launch day. It wasn’t worth it. But the story is quite something. And I receive comments on it. Sometimes none. Sometimes shit loads. I liked it when I got comments. It meant people were reading the thing I didn’t want them to read. My blog was linked in the signature of my Seguin email account, and that’s how most people got to reading it. I remember one specific entry that got a lot of comments:

I had written a fairly emo poem… let’s say it was morbid too, but I wrote it because I was really bored. Truthfully, there was no meaning behind it at all. But others took it the wrong way. I guess I should have pointed that out. But here’s the poem for you to decide:

I lay bleeding on the floor,
You can't hear me, It's too late,
You're already walking out the door,
Purely out of the emotion called hate,

There was me and you,
Night after night,
You felt I was a “who,”
It continued, fight after fight.

I lay here,
Blood dripping till I'm dead,
Choking on the verge of death,
I was shot with more than a bullet of lead.

My life was never a waste,
You made it to be,
Getting everything done with haste,
You referred to me as “he.”

Gun to my chest,
Your gun,
This is what's best,
This was my life, now there's none.

I lay here,
Blood dripping till I'm dead,
Choking on the verge of death,
I was shot with more than a bullet of lead.

That truly sounds like something a really emo chick on myspace would write. I’m ashamed of this piece of work just so you know. Don’t think I’ll ever be proud of it. EVER. Ms. Russell had read a poem rather similar to this that I had written in grade seven. This is the one that had won a third place prize in the poetry competition. I didn’t expect it to either. It was poorly written in my mind. But I criticize my work a lot. A bit too much sometimes. And Russell said only one thing to me “That’s really depressing.” It looked like she was on the verge of crying. Oh great. I’ll be considered the second to make her cry for an odd reason. She was very prone to it. A student oce called her a douchebag and she broke down.

But now, I sat there typing a short entry into my blog because I had nothing better to do:

Hey everyone,
I’m not exactly in a good mood today. Any day called Monday is a bad one for me. Like most of us. Today wasn’t the greatest, except for English which was quite amusing. Trying to make it to xmas break seems like it will take a lifetime at the moment. I’ll make it. I know I can.
-D

All I could write without giving anything away. My cell rang. I picked it up. Greg.
“Hey man,” I said half-heartedly.
“Eyyyyy!” he yelled back playfully. I held the phone away from my ear, squinting. Ow.
“Careful on the eardrums there buddy-boy…” I put the phone back to my ear. “Whatssup?”
“Homework of course.”
“Oh shit. What did we have?”
“Nothing in English - obviously.”
“Already knew that.”
We went on to discuss homework, among other things: bands, concerts, and such. But he got suspicious of my tone. “Are you alright man?”
“What?”
“I said – are – you – al – right?”
“Mmm? Yeah, me? Fine. Fine.”
“Doesn’t sound like it.” He paused, thinking I would speak. I wouldn’t dare do such a thing. “Is this by any chance about Becca?” Oh no… the B word.

I only wish. “No no no! I told you. We’re through. We do not talk about you know who anymore!” It angered me that everyone thought Becca was the cause of all my problems when she was the one who fixed a bunch of them.
“You still love her, eh?” I could tell he was being serious.
“Dude, no. And you’re using the word love too literally or something there.” I couldn’t even form proper sentences. I meant too loosely.

“You were a great couple.” I gotta admit, we were. But I’m not going to talk to Greg about it, and I’m not talking about it to you either. For now.

“I’m just tired man. It’s not about her. I just had a bad day. And I really just need a nap.” A nap away from April. A nap where I could think about something else. “So I’m hanging up now.”

“Fine, you little whoreeeeeee.”
“See you tomorrow.”
“Bye.” Click.
I truthfully needed that nap. Perhaps it wasn’t such a bad idea. But I knew I wouldn’t be getting much sleep tonight whether I had that nap or not. But then the door burst open.

“Derrick?” Mark, my autistic brother was standing there in shorts and a t-shirts. He never wore anything else when he was at home. And since his schedule at Marianopolis had several days with no classes, I would come home to him in shorts and him on his computer all the time. And even when he had school, he’d change into shorts. The shorts annoyed me. I wore pajama pants. Basically sweatpants. Day in. Day out. But I had a reason to look like a bum. I was in a suit all day. It was disgusting, sweaty, itchy and tight. He had free dress days every day. It was like my summer. He had probably worn a suit twice in his life. I could count how many times I’ve worn one, but it would cancel out my bum-look.

“Knock next time.” My parents never knocked. Neither did he. I didn’t bother turning my eyes in his direction. My cornea was about to glaze over in tiredness.
“Hi.” Mark said.
“Hi to you too…” I kept my gaze at the ceiling.
“Did you have a good day?”
“A shitty one.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Anything else? You never come in my room unless you need me for something.”
“Well… I… Uh…”
“Mhmm?”
“It’s just that…”
“Formulate the words in your mind, then project them!”
“My computer’s not working!”
“Were you looking at porn again?”
“ NO! I don’t look at porn! NO!”
“That’s what they all say.”
“I need help, Derrick!”
“What am I supposed to do? What isn’t working?”
“It’s all… ARGH!”
“WORDS!”
“SHIT. I don’t know, it’s just not starting up properly.”
“Again… what am I supposed to do?”
“Maybe you can fix the hard drive. Maybe it needs more RAM. Or a video card…”
“One – I can’t ‘fix’ hard drives. You need Viagra for that. Two – no effect on the startup if it was working before. Three – you’ve gone through three of them in the past few months. Four – I’M FUCKING TIRED! WHY DO YOU ALWAYS ASK ME FOR THIS SHIT!? YOU’RE TWENTY YEARS-OLD!”

He slammed the door and marched down the hallway, mumbling to himself like he always did.
Always did. Always would. He would likely remain in the four walls of this house for all of his life. I was the lucky one. My brain worked like it should have. Just sometimes was attracted to teachers.
I could leave the four walls behind. And I almost didn’t want to.