Needle In the Hay

She reached out and caught his arm, the sun glinting off the gold around her neck.
'Don’t run away,' she says.
'Don’t be like your father.'
But the kid is quiet, acting silent and stupid like she knew he would.
---
He walks out the door to catch the bus, body stiff in clothes she picked out.
'It’s all about outer image,' she says.
'It’s all about how the world sees you.'
When she tries to talk to him, he keeps his eyes trained on the floor. Too tired and nervous to look her in the eye. The mother sighs, not understanding- why is he so difficult? Regardless, she'd show him how to be.
---
He moves farther into himself on the bus, shaking from the heat or lack of sleep or the panic crawling up his bones. He wipes a hand across his face, feeling too visible.
---
He gets off the bus before he should, heading for a house he knows. He walks, ignoring the rising sun. Once he makes it to the house, he lets himself in and slips down the stairs to the right bedroom.
He would hide in this house today, with this friend who took the pain away, the friend wouldn't ask, only getting ice for blooming bruises.
He knew where the bruises came from.
'I can't beat myself,' the son would say.
The son and the friend would stay all day, watching old movies and breathing in the smoke from burning papers. The things that helped the son stay quiet.
The son wonders briefly if going to school and getting the right grades would get her off his back, but he used to do that, and he still wasn't good enough. In her eyes he'd never fit in; he'd always be the needle in the hay, too bright and sharp to get by unnoticed.

© Copyright 2007 Abby Almon