Vivisection - 7

  I yawned from a night of stressful sleep, closing the front door behind me. It was half past eight in the morning, and I was dreading school, due to my inability to sleep properly the previous night. My thoughts had been plagued with various scenarios that might unfold between me and Greg, where he would realise he'd been an idiot for befriending me. Ugh, why couldn't I believe it when something good happened to me?
  I'd felt disheartened yesterday after Greg left, leaving me completely isolated in a room full of people. Again. But he had had to leave to go to his new home, even if it didn't look like he'd wanted to. He probably had though, thankful to get away from me. I bet he only stayed to talk to me out of guilt or something like that, enjoying leading me on through the delusion of friendship.
  But then I thought about the way he'd greeted me. After pulling away, his eyes seemed to hold genuine excitement, and then he kissed me... My God, I never thought I'd be kissed by anyone, especially not someone as wonderful as Greg. I felt temporarily dizzy as I remembered that I asked him to kiss me again, and he did! Yeah, it'd only been my cheek, but it had sent joy surging through me, making me feel so different from how I usually did. Nobody had ever made me feel this way before, and this person was someone I'd only met two days ago. In fact, it had been less than forty-eight hours since I'd seen him for the first time. He was driving me crazy already. This can't have been a good sign.
  When I'd got home after collecting Mum yesterday, I'd instantly retreated to my bedroom, wanting to be alone, daydreaming about the times I'd spent with Greg. The glint of the razorblade left on my dressing table caught my eye, and I couldn't resist temptation. It worried me that I still wanted to use it even though I was far from depressed, but I figured that it could hardly make me feel worse. I rolled up my sleeve, casting my gaze over scratches on my lower arm. Some of them, the fresher ones, were red, scabs not having healed yet. A lot of them were simply white scars, shadows on my skin that would never fade. I traced patterns with my fingers, forging pictures in my mind. I smiled to myself, wondering just how genuine it was.
  With Greg in mind, I gripped the blade and drew a line with this twisted paintbrush. I was a painter working at a masterpiece, drawing a brush across my canvas and watching the colour get filled in. I felt an unexplainable rush of pleasure through this pain: doing this while thinking of Greg seemed to bring me to life, contradicting what my T-shirt said. Victor, you sick boy, I thought to myself. Only perverts get off to this sort of thing. It was true, but this was the closest thing to masturbation I could accomplish. This wasn't a sexual thing - if it was I'm sure I'd have felt it - but it felt good while I was doing it.
  Of course, afterwards, I felt guilty, quite disgusted at myself for doing something like that. I'd been generally uncomfortable for the rest of the day, and was too preoccupied to care that my parents were off again tomorrow afternoon (that's this afternoon now). I'd gone to bed feeling slightly uneasy, and that had affected my sleep.
  So now I was feeling more panicked than ever, conscious that my appearance was abysmal as I stepped onto the school bus with my head down, trying not to pay attention to anybody. They weren't paying too much attention to me this morning, and I was left alone for the majority of the journey to school.
  Narrowly avoiding being tripped up by a chav, I stumbled off the bus and entered the hell-hole referred to as school. It was early, and I decided to take residence in the library for a while. I liked the library: rowdy thugs hardly stepped foot in it, and the other people in the room were of the quiet nerdy type, not a nuisance to me in the slightest. Well, not to my face, but I'm sure they like to think that there's someone worse off than themselves. Maybe that was the one way I could make people feel good.
  I quietly retreated to a corner of the room, somewhere that I wouldn't disturb anybody, intending to sit there in silence until the first bell sounded. Why did I even bother coming to school? Okay, I was intelligent and destined to do well in life, but I lacked the motivation. I often questioned the point of my own existence, wondering if I had a purpose in life, and had never found a conclusive answer.
  Tears sprung to my eyes at my own pointlessness, and I bowed my head to hide them from anyone who might have been watching. How embarrassing, crying in school like this. Of course, it was a regular occurence, but I still felt completely stupid doing it.
  "There you are!" a voice called, not loud enough to be too loud in a library, but loud enough to startle me, especially when I found that the voice was directed at me.
  Hastily, I wiped my eyes and glanced upwards, almost obtaining a heart attack as I did so. Greg was standing before me, joy in his eyes and a smile on his face. Even in full school uniform, he looked so different from everyone else in this shithole. His clothing was perfectly neat and up to the required standard, but his hair still had three different colours in it and he hadn't taken out any of his piercings. I wondered vaguely how he got away with it, but was more concerned by the fact that he was here, looking slightly breathless, talking to me, when I had been sure he wouldn't.
  "I've been looking everywhere for you. Seriously. I know my way around here pretty well, and I've only been here for about twenty minutes. I've even been asking people if they'd seen you, description and everything."
  "What description did you use?" I uttered, having to force the words out because I could hardly believe he was here. He'd been looking for me.
  He smirked. "A hot dude who's combing the corridors for someone called Greg."
  Oh my God, more flirting.
  "No wonder you didn't find me. I'm not 'hot' and I've just been sitting here for ages."
  "Don't delude yourself, you're bloody gorgeous," he mumbled, sounding slightly serious this time. He sat down next to me. "But you weren't searching for your night in shining armour?"
  "More like shining piercings."
  "I'm so disappointed," he said lightly, joking once again.
  An awkward silence stretched across the next few seconds. I was waiting for him to laugh and leave, amazed at what a loser I was. Yet, he didn't go.
  "Y-you're still here?" I asked, feeling the familiar sting of tears at my eyes.
  He raised his eyebrow. "Does it look like I've gone anywhere? Yes, I'm still here. And I'm not intending to leave any time soon."
  I didn't try to hold back the tears this time, trying not to care that Greg could see me like this.
  "Hey," he soothed, leaning closer but not touching me. Perhaps he was afraid of what my reaction would be.
  "A-and you were looking for me? All morning?"
  "As soon as I set foot in this place, why?"
  I think I sunk to a new level of patheticness.
  "No one would- I've never- I never thought someone would want to find me."
  "Victor, you dummy. I wanted to find you. For all my life," I thought I heard him mumble. I probably imagined it. "I think you need a hug, but I don't think you'll want one right now. I'll let you keep some of your dignity," he added with a smirk.
  I snorted slightly with what may have been laughter, as I'm sure we both knew that I didn't have any dignity left to lose. But a hug would have been nice, even though I'm not sure how I'd have reacted to it. Maybe I just wanted him to touch me.
  "Hey, have you ever heard of waterproof eyeliner?" he asked with slight sarcasm. "You look like a weeping widow at a funeral."
  "You can talk," I came back, taking a tissue he handed me. I think I'd cheered up slightly since his last comment. "How the hell did you get away with all those piercings?"
  He shrugged. "No idea. But nobody's questioned me or asked me to remove them."
  "Maybe we're just lax on Health and Safety."
  "Yeah. Wanna borrow my eyeliner? It's waterproof."
  I nodded. "Yes, please."
  In a surprisingly casual way, he withdrew a mirror and a liquid eyeliner from his blazer pocket. This time it was me raising the eyebrow.
  "You carry eyeliner and a mirror around with you?"
  "Meh. Never know when you might need it."
  I took the mirror and redid my eyeliner, hating how red my eyes looked. I tried not to think about this, realising that I was just doing my makeup in the school library as if it was a completely normal activity. I handed Greg back his belongings.
  "Thanks," I thanked him.
  "No problem."
  "So, whose form are you in?"
  "Mrs Vandertramp's. She sounds like fun."
  "Me too."
  Greg faked a gasp. "It's fate!" he proclaimed.
  "She's not too bad. She teaches French as well, which the whole school finds amusing."
  "Hehe, yeah."
  "D'ya wanna go there now?" I offered. "Bell's gonna go in a minute."
  "Okay then."
  We stood up and left the library, Greg seemingly unfazed when a chav called out 'fags'. But if he didn't let it bother him, then neither would I. I'd been called that before, for reasons I couldn't explain, but I'd been so lifeless at that time that I'd barely registered what they were saying. It hadn't been true at the time (I wasn't attracted to anybody) but now I supposed it was, for I could hardly feel this way about Greg and be straight. From what I knew about him and how he acted around me, I didn't think he was either. But, I reminded myself, he could have been leading me on. I still wasn't entirely sure that Greg wanted to hang out with me: I kept expecting him to shout 'ha!' and run away. Though, wouldn't he have left by now?
  "What are you thinking about?" he asked me unexpectedly.
  "Huh?"
  "You were just gazing straight ahead of you without really seeing anything. I think you must have been thinking about something pretty big."
  "No, not really," I replied, hoping he wouldn't pursue the matter.
  "M'kay."
  "Uh, this is the room," I announced, standing outside of the first French room. "I think we're probably allowed in."
  Greg opened the door, inviting me inside first. Unused to this polite behaviour, I stepped awkwardly in front of him and into my form room.
  "Hey, Miss," I mumbled, feeling slightly sociable.
  "Good morning, Victor! You're unusually talkative today."
  I blushed and looked away from my teacher. The fact that she had called me talkative when I'd only spoken two words said a lot about me.
  "You must be Greg, right?"
  "Yeah, that's me."
  "Wow, nice piercings- I mean, tut tut, not good for school. But don't worry, I won't tell on you."
  Mrs Vandertramp was a pretty cool teacher, I suppose. I never really paid attention, too absorbed in my own demoralising thoughts. It was hard to believe that she was a married teacher at this age, early twenties, but there was no questioning her teaching ability. Everybody in her classes got good grades, even if they spent half of the time drooling over her. She was pretty and liked to flirt with the boys (and sometimes the girls), so she had no enemies. Once on non-uniform day, she wore a HIM tank top as well. Just one of my observations.
  "So Victor, are you and Greg friends?"
  Glancing at him nervously, as if for confirmation, I nodded, watching his eyes light up as I did.
  "We met on Saturday at a wedding, and we've been together ever since," he sighed happily, snaking a playful arm around me.
  I shook violently, waiting for Greg to move his arm. It felt uncomfortable since we were in front of someone, especially when this person's eyes had widened in joy.
  "Do you know what shonen-ai is?" the teacher questioned innocently.
  I had absolutely no idea, but was saved having to answer by the sudden ringing of the bell.
  "Never mind. You two can sit together," she added.
  Grateful for the opportunity to move, I stepped over to my usual seat and sat down, watching Greg seat himself next to me.
  "Y'know what?" he whispered.
  "What?"
  "I think I'm gonna like it here."
  "Then I think you're deluded."
  He shook his head, muttering something inaudible to himself. I figured it wasn't any of my business, and turned my attention to the desk in front of me, letting my mind wander. I vaguely pondered what shonen-ai might be, before turning my thoughts to Greg. He was actually here, sitting right beside me, being my friend. He surely was my friend, as he had smiled when I had confirmed our friendship to Mrs Vandertramp. No one could be that desperate to pull off a prank, surely. Maybe I just thought too negatively all the time: in fact, I did, there was no point in denying it. I didn't know if I was capable of thinking positively, as, for me, there was nothing to be positive about.
  Greg seemed pretty positive about things: he even thought he'd like this shit-hole. Why? Where was the hidden appeal that I'd missed? He can't have meant that he'd like it because I was there, because that would just be stupid. When had my presence ever excited anybody? Thinking back, Greg had been positively overjoyed to see me yesterday. This had shown through in his greeting, a greeting that two acquaintances surely wouldn't use to say hello to each other.
  Screw this thinking: I didn't understand it. I convinced myself to focus on the fact that Greg was here now, acting friendly towards me. That was all that mattered for the moment. It looked like I had a friend, and maybe school was going to become more enjoyable.