He Could Have Been (What He Thought He Wanted) | ✔

no more wire hangers

c h a p t e r 4

"You're such a lame ass."

I close my eyes, and pretend like that isn't being directed towards me. Even though it absolutely is. Insults are absolutely being pinpointed my way.

I look at the clock on the wall, and curse it for only being 5 minutes into class. A guy named Wayne Yearling keeps whispering insults in my ear.

I look at the worksheet on my desk, and try to get lost in figuring out the chemical formulas. Maybe if I try to figure out why this particular metal has this much protons maybe...

"Faggot."

...But there's only three charges...

"Loser."

I erase the initial answer I put in, and after a couple beats I put in the possible correct answer.

"Retard."

I close my eyes again, and let out a small sigh. I turn around and look at Wayne. I don't intimidate him with my glare. He smirks. "What are you lookin' at suck-ass?"

I tell him slowly, "Please stop bothering me. I'm trying to do my work."

He mimics me, and another insult comes my way.

I get up from my desk, and walk out the room, despite the teacher's objections to such actions. Like I give a shit.

Just when I'm out the door, still walking, my focus on nothing but ditching school. I bump into someone.

"What the fuck?" The person says. It's a girl.

"Sorry!" I apologize immediately, and crouch down helping her get the things I caused her to drop. Just as I'm handing them to her, I look up and see that it's Abi Dearest.

Shit, I feel my face warm up, and I no longer can make any eye contact with her. "Uh, watch where you're going next time," I mumble.

She understands me, and replies with, "Watch where you're going! You should be in class anyway!" I shrug, walking away. Whatever.

—

I take my PSP out of my backpack, and turn it on. The only game I brought with me was Sims 2, which will do for now.

Even though I ditched school for awhile, I came back because I didn't want to go home. Instead, I hung out on the bleachers, as the football players practiced on the field. The coach hasn't said anything to me, so I'm safe here, playing my PSP.

That's until two assholes decide to approach me.

"Hey, dipshit," the more brawny one says to me, "You shouldn't be here, at our practice."

I begrudgingly take my eyes away from the screen of my PSP, and look up at both of the brainless jocks. I answer in a voice that masks the actual fear I'm feeling in this particular moment. "If the coach doesn't have a problem with me sitting over here, I think I'm okay where I'm sitting."

Then that's when the less brawny one of the duo, decides to take my PSP away from me. "Fred, I don't think this chump understands what we're really telling him." They both then look at me. "Fag, get the fuck outta here."

You know, I should have just listened to them. But no, I believe my pride got in the way, or perhaps I wanted to make my day even more shittier. Regardless, if I did what I was told my PSP would've never been broken, intentionally, that is.

I guess I must really lead a boring and non-social life if my heart sorta breaks when my PSP does. The jocks smirk in triumph.

I grab my backpack and walk down the steps of the bleachers. My face feels warm, and I swear if the setting I'm in wasn't public. Isn't public. I could've cried like a baby. But I blink back my tears, and proceed to trek home.

People, particularly adults, say high school is the best years of your life. It's a time in your life to really live, and be carefree. Your not yet an adult. And years later, those years become more nostalgic, and you get to reminisce in those years to your children.

But for me, it won't be that way. I'll look at these years so bitterly. Every time someone wants to mention high school to me, I'll shut them down immediately. Because high school is a living hell. Just like war, it is romanticized. Even John Hughes romanticized that shit.

It's not fair that Abi Dearest is interested in some guy like Danny Sanderson. Really, it isn't. The nerd never gets the girl. The bad boy gets the girl. The jock gets the girl. But never the loser, the nerd, the geek...

I step onto the crosswalk after looking both ways. I'm about five minutes from my house, almost there.

—

"I'm such a horrible Mom!"

I don't say anything in response to my mother's statement. If I lied, and said to her the opposite of statement I'd be cheating myself. Even though I'm basically cheating myself.

My mother takes the shirt I hold out to her, and puts it on. I don't look at her. I've been staring at the ground.

"Collin, you should call your dad," she suggests weakly. "I bet you'd like living with him. He has a much nicer house, and he isn't some wack job who has to take peels..."

She rambles on and on per usual. Glumly, I listen.

Apparently, Roger broke up with her. I don't know for what reasons, I can only assume, because my mother dates a lot. And usually, after she's been dumped or rejected my mother drinks a lot more.

It's a whiskey night for her. Last time, it was two whole bottles of wine.

I shake my head. "No, Mom. I'm not doing that. That asshole doesn't want me!" My response is that easy because I know my dad could care less about my whereabouts. He left my mother and I years ago because he didn't want to be a dad, or dealing with my mother got extremely hard. Either way, it's such lousy excuses.

I can only admit this to myself, because it's myself who truly knows how I feel, and that is without my dad there's something missing.

Imagine this: A heart made out of bricks and mortar.

In the middle of the heart, it's missing a brick; an empty rectangle.

But there's something lying on the ground. It's a brick. And on that brick, the word "Dad" is scrawled across it.

Is that what the heart is really missing?

—

Author's Note: Anyone having daddy issues at the moment? My dad doesn't even talk to me, even though we live in the same town.