Goth Boy

Goth Boy



Starting Date: September 15, 2010 (9/15/10)



Chapter One

Scene 1



My name’s Alisha Collins and I’m fourteen years old. I live in a small town in the outskirts of Port

Angeles, Washington with my parents, and am an only child. Because I'm allergic to the dander and

saliva of most animals, we have no pets. It gets lonely at times; my parents both work full-time and I

have no siblings to hang out with. I have no friends, either, because I’m a loner at school. Instead of

hanging out with friends or playing sports or something else that most kids my age do, I stay indoors and

watch horror movies. All day long.



Most people think I'm strange. I get picked on a lot at school. I absolutely hate school. I'm failing in most

of my classes because I'm too afraid to ask my teachers for help. My parents are angry with my grades

and have paid numerous tutors to tutor me in the subjects I have the most difficulty in. But it really

hasn't worked, to be honest. I hate the tutoring. It hasn't improved my grades. If anything, it's just a way

for me to socialize with someone outside of my own house. The latest tutor, though, is the apple of my

eye.



His name was Rob, and he told me he was seventeen years old. He had the most beautiful eyes I've ever

seen; they’re big and the color of baby blue, with hints of darker blue lightly coating the outside of his

pupils. Every Monday when he would come into the library to meet me at our table for tutoring, I would

immediately start looking him over from head to toe. His black hair was backcombed and going every

which way, kind of like Edward Scissorhands’ – except it was a couple inches shorter. As we would talk,

only occasionally making eye contact with one another, I'd always notice the charcoal black eyeliner he

had thickly drawn around his eyes, the thick dusting of velvet black eye shadow on his eyelids, and the

crimson red lipstick applied to his slender lips.



As soon as he was seated at our table, he would place his slender arms on the dark walnut wooden table

and cup his hands together. Occasionally, especially during the summer months, he would slightly pull

up the sleeves of his coat, exposing his ghastly white wrists to the world. There was always a stark

contrast between the color of his clothing and skin: black and white. Color variety was non-existent; all

he wore was black. Save for the crimson red he wore on his lips, even his makeup was bland of all other

colors in the spectrum. Except, of course, he wore white foundation; the whitest of all white foundation

possible. When his face would near the window, and the sun shone through, I would notice the white

powder he had dusted all over his face.



Today was the day he and I would meet up again for our weekly tutoring. At precisely 4 P.M., the main

door to the library opened and there he was. Each step he took was followed by a rattling from the

chains on the tight, black bondage pants he wore, and the loud thumping of his ebony black leather

combat boots against the beige vinyl composition tile flooring. For a guy of the height six-foot-four,

you'd expect a long, smooth gait. Not with Rob. His was one for the books: shoulders curled forward;

head pointing down toward the ground; arms swinging up and down, like a bird's wings flapping before

takeoff; feet pointed slightly outwards; and legs a little bowed out as he toddled around the exact way a

toddler does.

I know it sounded terrible, but every time I would see him walk, I couldn’t help but start laughing in my

head. I've never seen a walk as bizarre as his, but strangely enough, I think it's kind of a turn on. Now,

mind you, he doesn't do the arm flapping all the time; he only does it when he has the room to do so.

It'd be a huge nuisance to others if he did that all the time; after all, having someone flapping their arms

up and down is not only strange, but it'd hurt if you were near enough to experience the slap from it.



As usual, people stared his way as he walked through the doors. A few middle and high school aged girls

started to laugh as they watched him walk. Once he finally got to the table, he slammed down his black

and red skull patterned messenger bag on the table and let out a loud sigh. Why Can’t I Be You? – a song

by The Cure – was blaring from the earphones of his iPod. He wildly grabbed at the earphones, viciously

pulling them out from his ears, and slammed his left thumb down on the pause button. After switching

off the iPod, he shoved it into a side zip pocket on his bag and looked up at me with a big, friendly grin.



"Hey," he said breathlessly as the potent smell of fresh cigarette smoke permeated from his mouth.



I coughed, as usual, and he said sorry as many times possible in a ten-second span. He always came to

our appointments smelling like this: the cigarette smoke freshly penetrated in his clothes, hair and

mouth. And as usual, he would pop a mint or two into his mouth and bring out a bottle of Curve and

spray it on himself. I loved the smell of the Curve cologne, but it just didn’t mesh well with the smoke

smell. Rob pulled out some books and a pencil from his bag, and sat patiently as I began to work on my

math homework. Right in the midst of a hard math problem, I quickly glanced up at Rob and saw that his

right index finger had worked its way into his mouth and was rubbing at his platinum skull tongue

piercing. His left index finger, including the thumb and middle finger, was wrapped around a pencil and

scribbling down incoherent notes on a coffee stained sheet of college ruled paper.



I looked back at the math problem and started to sigh in exasperation. I didn’t know the answer. I tried

hard to try and solve it, to no avail. Finally I decided that I needed Rob to help me, but before I asked, I

looked over at him again and saw that his right hand was snaking its way over to his bag and reaching

inside the main pocket. He pulled out a bag of trail mix, and carefully tore open the upper right hand

portion of the little bag. Shaking some of the mixture of raisins, sunflower seeds, peanuts and M&Ms

into his left hand, he brought the mixture up to his mouth and poured it in, and began to chew slowly.



“Mmm.” He closed his eyes, smiled, and rubbed at his stomach. “Mmm.”



I couldn’t help but began bursting into laughter. It was hilarious to hear him moaning “Mmm” as he ate

something as simple as trail mix. I looked around the room and saw others staring right at us. I was so

embarrassed that I turned fire engine red. It didn’t take long before Rob’s eyes opened and he looked

right at me, his face showing his displeasure with my interrupting his food engulfing session.



“Do you need help with your homework yet?” he asked as he put away the bag of trail mix and picked

up his pencil.



“Yeah,” I replied, shoving my homework paper toward him and pointing to the problem I had the most

difficulty with. “It’s that one. I just can’t do it.”



He squinted at the paper, and then started to smile. “Oh, that’s easy.”

“Easy?” I looked at the sheet and cringed as I looked back over the problem.



“You’re trying to find the slope of the line.”



What slope are you talking about? I barely paid enough attention in class to know what the slope of a

line was.



“You need to rewrite the equation in slope intercept form; which is y = mx + b.”



Um, what? I had no idea what this guy was talking about.



“You need to identify the value of m. Do you understand me, Alisha?”



No, Rob, I don’t understand what you’re saying. It’s all gibberish to me.



“Alisha?” He nudged me with his right hand. “Are you listening to me?”



“I don’t understand,” I said, sighing as I placed my left hand under my chin, and tapped the pencil in my

right hand against the table.



Rob looked up at me. “Would it help you if I did the problem so you could see how it’s done?”



“Yes,” I said, letting out a sigh of relief. Please, Rob, do all of it! I’d love it if you did every single problem

for me.



Thirty seconds later and he was done solving it. He scribbled down some numbers below the problem

and circled it. “That’s the answer,” he pointed out as he talked me through all of the steps needed to try

and make sure I understood how he got it. I had no idea how he did it. I didn’t pay attention to that; I

paid attention to his awkward smile and the way he swung his arms as he explained the steps to me.



I had Rob help me with the rest of my math and also with my history homework. It was a quarter past

five o’clock before we finished my homework. As we packed up our bags, I glanced out a nearby window

and noticed that the rain downpour was heavier than it was when I had first gotten to the library. I was

supposed to walk home, and although I loved walking in the rain, I just wasn’t in the mood to walk in it

today. I pulled out my cell phone and just as I was about to dial home to my mom, Rob touched my arm.



“I can drive you home,” he said as he took my cell phone into his hands and clasped it shut.



“Oh, really?” I was shocked. I hadn’t expected him to just take my phone away like that – and then close

it. I grabbed it back from him and slipped it into my right jeans pocket.



“Come on,” he said, tugging at my arm. We started for the library door.



As his arms began to fling up and down, I decided to take some action. Grasping his left arm and yanking

it down, I told him as bluntly as possible, “You walk weird.”



“I know,” he mumbled as he freed his arm from mine and purposely flung it up and down. “Everyone

says so…”

He ran a hand down his mid-thigh length black trench coat, straightening out any folds in the leather

exterior. I sped up, surpassing him, and pushed open the door. As I stood outside, holding it open for

him, I watched him pull out the car keys from his coat pocket and walk out the door in his usual strange

way. We continued to walk in silence until we came up to a black Toyota Corolla 1998. He quickly

toddled to the driver’s door and placed his keys in the lock and opened up his door. Once he was sitting

inside, he reached over to the passenger seat door and unlocked the door.



“Get in,” he said, as he continuously readjusted himself into a comfortable sitting position; and then he

buckled his seat belt and rammed the keys into the car ignition and started up the engine.



I rushed to the passenger seat door and quickly got inside. I sat down and buckled my seat belt as

quickly as possible. As I was reaching to shut the door, that’s when I noticed that god awful odor in his

car. It smelled like an old Casino hotel room: musty and musky with the smell of stale cigarette smoke

and cologne and perfume to top it all off. The exterior was fairly decent, but my god! The interior, it was

a disaster! I looked beneath my feet and saw a bunch of trash.



“Ew,” I said, not able to take the horrid smell and how horribly trashed the interior was. “What

happened?”



“Sorry,” he said, looking down at my feet. “My friends borrowed my car for the weekend.”



The car’s ashtray was open and full of cigarette butts, ashes, and beer bottle caps. A couple of empty

beer bottles were lying on the floor near my feet, along with a pipe, fast food wrappers, and an

assortment of other trash. I turned and looked to the back of the car and it was even more of a mess:

candy wrappers, more beer bottles, fast food wrappers and assorted trash, empty cigarette packs, and

lots of food crumbs.



Rob continued to keep his right foot on the brake pedal as he shifted the hand brake into reverse. He

turned his body and looked over his right shoulder and out of the back window as he began to slowly

take his foot off of the brake pedal. Once he was far enough out of his parking spot, he shifted into

drive, placed his foot on the accelerator, and began to drive out of the library parking lot.



Once he was on the main road, he started talking to me again. “Sorry my car’s gross,” he mumbled, not

even taking one glance at me as he spoke. “I didn’t think I’d have a pretty girl in it.”



“A pretty girl?”



I saw a hint of a smile on his face. “Yeah.”



Looking over at him, I saw his left hand reaching in one of his pockets and pull out a lighter. “You mind if

I –“



“Yes,” I answered, now watching him put away the lighter.



“Sorry.” Rob swallowed hard as he stole a glance at me. “I’ll just wait.”

“Thanks.” I stared out the window and began to notice that he was going to the wrong way. He didn’t

even know how to get to my house, anyway; I never told him where I lived!



“Hey, Rob,” I said as I looked over at him. “Where are you going?”



“To my house,” he responded as he flipped on the left turn signal and began to make a left turn at Fog

Forest road.



I heard a lot about Fog Forest road from school. Supposedly, it was this old neighborhood with all sorts

of creepy trails on the vast span of acreage surrounding the houses. I would hear people say that there

were old abandoned houses there and how some were even haunted. Aside from the actual houses,

they would say the area was gorgeous and a favorite amongst ghost hunters, Goths, and creepy teens

due to its “paranormal activity”.



“I thought you were taking me home?” This just wasn’t fair: here he told me he was going to drive me

home, but yet he was now taking me to his house. I was seriously getting a tad bit worried.



“I just have to pick up something at my house real quick, and then we’ll go to yours,” he said uneasily.



Gee, Rob, it would have been really nice if you could have at least told me that beforehand. Not only am

I pissed about you volunteering to drive me home in a car whose interior you knew was trashed by your

friends, but now going to your house when you told me you were driving me to mine? Enough’s enough

already, Rob! I would have been a much happier camper if you had just left my cell phone the hell alone

and let me call my mom to come and pick me up. At least that way, I would have already been at home,

snuggled in a fleece blanket on the family room couch, watching the newest horror movie on Comcast’s

On Demand.



But I couldn’t tell Rob that. After all, I did happen to have a major crush on the guy, and it would be kind

of neat to actually see what Fog Forest road was really like. “That’s fine,” I said, smiling, as I turned to

look out the window.



Once he finished making his left turn, he slowly drove down the old dirt road of Fog Forest. I looked out

at the houses: most were old run down places that looked centuries old, while just a few were livable

and slightly newer in appearance. Only three of the many houses I saw looked even remotely livable.

Everything else; I couldn't imagine anyone wanting to live in one of them. There was a lot of beautiful

acreage, though, and I saw many trail paths that looked wonderful for taking walks or riding bikes on.



Rob drove further down until he reached the last house on the street. It was the most decent looking of

all the houses on the street I had seen. He parked on the street in front of the house's lawn and

unbuckled his seat belt. "We're here," he said, smiling, as he turned my way and began staring at me.



"It looks old," I said as I took off my seat belt and opened up the car door. "Old and creepy."



"It's a little over a hundred years old," he responded as he opened up the driver’s seat door. He stepped

outside and toddled over to my side. "But I love it. It holds a lot of history."

He offered me his hand, but I felt insulted by his gesture. I was able to get out of the car by myself; why

did he feel the need to help me get out? Did he really feel I was too much of a baby to get out all by

myself?



"No, thanks," I said, pushing his hand away. "I can get out by myself. I'm not a baby, you know?"



“I insist,” he said as he grabbed my hand.



“I said no,” I hissed as I yanked away my hand and sprung to my feet, closing the door behind my ass.



“Sorry,” he said, biting his lip hard. “I was just trying to show some chivalry.”



Chivalry was dead, Rob. Don’t you understand that we girls want to be treated as equals? We aren’t

little delicate flowers that need a guy to do the most basic of things for us. I didn’t need your help to get

out of a car. I’ve done it hundreds of times.



As we walked up to the door, he opened it up and as he smiled and signaled for me to come inside, he

said, “Ladies first.”



I rolled my eyes and walked in. “Thanks,” I muttered. I wasn’t impressed by the way he was acting. I

wanted him to treat me like an equal, not like some delicate young girl.



The interior was no better looking than the exterior of the house. There was a lot of dust on the shelves,

cobwebs along the ceilings, and the strong smell of stale cigarette smoke and mildew. The furniture was

antique and had an old smell to its fabric. The paintings on the walls and the statues near the walls

looked centuries old. The paint on the walls was chipping off. The lights in the front entrance hallway

were so dim that it would be a surprise if anyone was able to read even a sentence from a book without

their vision going haywire.



“Wow, it’s a total dump in here,” I said, not realizing until after saying that, that I should have just kept

my trap shut! That was as rude as can be. I usually never was that rude.



“What did you expect the house of an addict family to look like?” Rob sighed as he shut the front door

and set his bag underneath a wooden table top that was to the right side of the door.



“Sorry, Rob. I didn’t mean to say that,” I apologized.



“No need to lie,” he said as he looked at me and half-smiled. “I know you meant to say it. Who

wouldn’t? This place’s a dump.”



It really was a dump. Old and musty smelling. Bad lighting. Absolutely atrocious to look at. I doubt it had

heating or air conditioning. To be honest, I was surprised it even had running water and electricity.



“I didn’t expect your place to be this bad,” I said, laughing, as I looked over at a pile of rotted food in a

nearby corner.



Sighing, Rob looked down at the ground. “Be lucky your parents care about you. You’ve got nice clothes,

you smell nice, you look nice – but me, I –“

I laughed hysterically. “I smell nice?”



Grabbing at the ends of his coat and pulling on them, he blushed and looked at me for a half a second

before looking down at the ground again. “Yeah.”



“Thanks. My dad buys me body spray and lotion at Victoria’s Secret.”



“What’s Victoria’s Secret?”



Are you kidding me? He had never heard of Victoria’s Secret? Geez! “Seriously?”



Rob continued to look embarrassed and humiliated. “A perfume store?”



“No, silly,” I said, giggling, as I playfully bumped him with my shoulder. “It’s a lingerie store – well, it has

perfume and lotion and clothes for women, too, but it’s mainly lingerie.”



“Lingerie, what’s that?”



“You really don’t know what lingerie is?”



“I don’t…”



“Underwear and bras – stuff like that.”



“Oh.” Rob looked down at my chest and swallowed hard. “So, you – you wear that stuff – that stuff from

that store?”



“Sometimes,” I replied, feeling awkward with where his glance was at. “My mom loves the store, so we

go there a lot.”



“Oh.”



“Yeah. What stores do you like to shop at?”



“I don’t know,” he said, sighing. “Can’t afford to shop at nice stores. I have to shop at thrift stores.”



“Really?”



Rob nodded. “You’re lucky your parents get you stuff. I’ve only gotten two gifts from anyone in my

family: a car and an iPod – for my sixteenth birthday.”



“Oh.” I was starting to actually feel sorry for the poor guy. It sounded like his life sucked.



“And I have almost nothing going for me,” he said depressingly.



“You have things going for you,” I said as I smiled. “You’re really smart.”

“Being smart doesn’t matter anyway,” he said, frowning. “I applied to Harvard and surprisingly was

accepted, but –“



“That’s awesome! See, you’re super smart!”



“But once I told my mom and her boyfriend, they ripped up the acceptance letter and told me there’s no

way I’d go to college.”



“They can’t tell you what to do. Once you’re eighteen, you can do whatever you want.”



“I couldn’t afford college, anyway.”



“There’s always scholarships, you know?”



“I’ve been offered some math scholarships, but I had to decline.”



“Why would you decline them?!”



“I’m not worthy of them. Someone else who has hope deserves them. I’m not worthy of college, so why

should I take away the chance for someone who’s actually worthy?”



“Don’t say that, Rob. I think you’re worthy. You should have jumped at the chance.”



Okay, so now I officially felt sorry for Rob. And now I felt horrible for laughing at the way he walks. It was

now obvious why he curled his shoulders forward and looked down at the ground while he walked. He

had ridiculously low self esteem and confidence.



“I don’t even have a computer or TV or cell phone.” He continued to tell me the reality of his life. “The

only reason I was able to get songs on my iPod was from a friend’s house. Otherwise, if I need to use a

computer, I have to go to the library and that ends up being a pain.”



“Why’s it such a pain to use the library computer?”



“People always stare at me. I hate when people stare at me as I walk. It makes me even more self

conscious.”



“It’s because of your walk,” I said with honesty.



“I have leg muscle issues. I can’t help the way I walk.”



Aw, poor guy. I never realized that that was the reason he toddled like the bowlegged way a toddler

does. “Can’t you have it checked out by your doctor or something?”



“My mom doesn’t have medical insurance and I can’t afford to see a doctor.”



Even worse. I really was feeling so sorry for Rob. The more he told me, the more I realized how much his

life really did suck.

“You could try to work on stopping the whole hand flapping thing.”



Rob laughed nervously. “It’s a bad habit,” he said as he shyly smiled.



“I think just working on that alone would really help. That and the whole curled forward shoulders and

head looking down at the ground.”



“I know.”



“And the whole moaning ‘Mmm’ while eating food in the library is really strange, too.”



He bit his lip and looked at me with friendly eyes. “I don’t usually do that in public. It’s just that I haven’t

eaten for a few days and it tasted sooo good.”



Okay, why on earth would you go a few days without eating? Are you crazy or what?! Rob was weird

and there was no getting around that. “Why would you do that?” I questioned.



“I couldn’t afford to buy any food. I was all out of money from having to take my sister to the doctor’s,

and having to buy the medicine for her.”



“Isn’t there food in your house?”



“My mom and her boyfriend’s burnout friends ate all the food I got from grocery shopping last week,

and the only food left was all old and moldy.”



“You have to do the grocery shopping?”



“And the cooking, cleaning, taking care of kids, and everything else that they don’t do. My mom’s high

almost all the time, or out getting money for her drug habit. And her boyfriend, well, he’s just as

worthless as her.”



“What kind of work does she do?”



“Opening her thighs,” whispered Rob, looking down at the ground. “For money.”



“She’s a prostitute?”



“Unfortunately.”



“Wow. Poor you.”



“Na. It’s the poor kids that have it worse. I have a one-year-old sister and a two-year-old brother who

mean the world to me. But since I’m so busy with school and tutoring, I don’t get to be with them that

much during the week. I always worry about them while I’m gone during the day. At least I have a half

hour between getting out of school and tutoring sessions to make sure their diapers are changed and

they have food in their stomachs. I know it sounds awful that they have to go six or seven hours

between their next diaper change and feeding, but it’s the best I can do on schooldays.”

“That’s awful that you’re expected to take care of them. You shouldn’t let yourself go hungry like this,

though, Rob!”



“I didn’t have to. I could have got food for me and let them starve, but I’d never do something like that. I

put my brother and sister before me.”



“That’s horrible! What an awful life you have to live,” I said as I touched my hand to Rob’s shoulder.



“And that’s why I smoke cigarettes,” he said, laughing. “It’s the only thing that keeps me from going

insane. Well, that, and cutting.”



“But smoking’s so bad for your health, Rob.”



“It’s better than being wasted on alcohol all the time, or shooting up heroin, or snorting up coke, or

smoking meth; all that stuff is what my family does.”



“I guess,” I replied. There was no use going on about the health consequences; I’m sure he already knew

how bad it was for his health and had been told it one too many times.



“Come on up stairs,” he said as he took my hand into his and led me up the old oak staircase. Each step

we took resulted in a loud creaking of the stairs floorboards. We walked down the hall and to an old

cherry oak door with a rusty doorknob. His large, slender hands opened the door and we both walked

into a room.



On the wooden floor was a queen sized mattress covered with black sheets and a comforter. There was

a mirror hanging on the wall to the far left of the room. Next to the bed were an empty ashtray and an

alarm clock. There was also a dresser to the right of the bed, and an opened door leading into a walk-in

closet. The walls were painted a dark blood red. A dimly-lit light hung from the ceiling in the center of

the room. It must have been Rob’s room. It was rather bland. I was suspecting all sorts of morbid things

to be in his room.



He signaled for me to sit down on his bed, and I did so. He sat next to me and looked at me with a hint

of a smile on his face. “I know it’s boring and I don’t have much, but at least my room’s clean. I like it

clean.”



We sat silently on his bed and let a few minutes pass us by. He was staring at me the whole entire time. I

finally couldn’t take it any longer. “I thought you were just going to get something and then you’d drop

me off?” I asked.



“Okay, so I lied,” he said as he bit down hard on his bottom lip. “It’s just that, well, I wanted company.”



So he lied to me. Interestingly enough, though, I wasn’t angry. I guess it was because I was hoping for

this day to come. Six months of having him as my tutor resulted in dreaming about him almost every

night and imagining what it would be like to finally get to hang out with him from outside of our tutoring

sessions. I never imagined his life would suck this much, or that his house would be this terrible, but at

least I got to be with him.



“I understand,” I said, smiling as I focused my eyes on his.

“Do you, uh, mind if I take off my coat?”



I shook my head.



Rob took off his coat; now exposed was a Mindless Self Indulgence t-shirt and his long, skinny, pasty

white arms. “It’s kinda hot in here,” he commented, laughing at the end. His face turned red when he

saw me looking over, right near his arms. He tried to hide his arms from my wandering eyes, but it was

too late; I caught a glimpse of them before he was able to tuck them behind his back. Dozens upon

dozens of scars covered the length and width of both his arms; some of the cuts were minor, whereas

the majority were deep and extremely noticeable.



Lowering his head as he sighed, he murmured, “I know, they’re hideous…”



Hideous wasn’t the word I would have used; distressing was. It was distressing to see such a wonderful

guy’s arms in such horrible condition from his own self-destructive ways. I wanted to tell him that it

didn’t bug me, or that it wasn’t bad, or that they weren’t hideous; but if I had, I would have been lying,

and that would be just as bad as telling the truth. Instead, I kept my mouth shut and smiled – smiled

pleasantly. Grabbing his hand into mine, I brought it close to my body and cradled it. “So, Rob,” I began,

looking up at him, “what piercings do you have?



“I – I – I have my, uh, nipples, um, pierced…with, uh, black spike straight barbells…”



Along with that he also had a silver captive bead lip ring with a black and white checkered ball on the

left side of his lower lip, piercings in both his ears, a white-gold bent barbell eyebrow piercing, and of

course, the platinum skull tongue piercing. The only reason I knew what they were called, was because

he told me.



I smiled. “That’s cool.”



He finally looked up and over at me. “You’re so cute,” he said, grinning, as his cheeks turned rosy red.



I, too, blushed. “Really, you think?”



Rob nodded. “Looking at you makes me…”



Raising my brows, I grinned and said, “Makes you what?”



“Happy.”



Honestly, I didn’t know whether to feel flattered or disappointed; because I was kind of hoping for

something more like, ‘Makes me want to rip off your shirt and screw you,’ or something. What was the

point of a guy making me feel cute, when what I really wanted was to feel sexy – sexy enough to make

out with and stuff? There was none; it was just a piffling boost, nothing more.



“Have you ever kissed a girl?”

The split second shake of his head was all I needed to see before my brain registered and I realized that

this guy was not experienced – sexually – in the least. But you know what? I felt flattered. It made me

feel special that I could be the first girl he ever did anything with. The guy I slowly began to develop hot

and ready feelings for was a total virgin to the ninth degree, and I could totally be the first girl he ever

locked lips with.



“I haven’t kissed a guy.” My cheeks began to burn. I could have sworn that I was blushing the same

shade of red as his crimson red lipstick.



That little –err, I meant tall – weirdo’s lips curled into a big ol’ smile as he stole a glance at me. “I wish

we were each other’s first to kiss.”



I hinted wanting to kiss by smiling and grinning, and then puckering my lips a little.



Rob put his right hand on my shoulder blade and pulled me up against his body. With his left hand, he

stroked at my cheek. Without any sort of warning, he dove his face in for mine and instead of his lips

against mine, our noses collided. And it hurt.



“Wow, that was…awkward,” I whispered, looking into his eyes, kind of not knowing what to think or do.



He pulled away from me and kept still as he stared off into space. “Sorry.”



This time, I decided to initiate it, in hopes it would go more smoothly, for lack of better word. Placing a

hand on his cheek, I lightly caressed at it, and with my other hand, I placed it down on his thigh. Thinking

that it would help get things, uh, going, I slid my hand to the crotch of his pants. My heart started to

flutter a little when, instead of expecting nothing there, I felt his hard-on. I wanted to rub at it to, but

before I was able to get a better feel, Rob grabbed my wrists and threw them off. His eyes grew wide –

wide with horror and surprise – as he stared at me for several seconds.



“No,” he whispered, trying to say it as kindly as possible. “No touching…down there.”



“Sorry. I didn’t realize that you didn’t want me to –“



Before I was able to continue, Rob dove his face for mine and before our noses were about to collide

again, he tilted his head slight to the right and nudged his lips against mine; his lip ring lightly pushing

into my bottom lip. We locked eyes with one another and grinned as our teeth just barely touched. I was

lip-to-lip with my tutor – the guy I had been crushing on. His crimson red slender lips were touching

mine. His big blue eyes were staring directly into my awestruck eyes. His stubble felt like sandpaper as it

brushed up against my face. But holy crap! We were kissing! Kissing!



Just as abrupt as he started, he ended. “I love you,” he whispered, his face real giddy as he snuck peeks

at mine – time and time again.



My heart was pounding against my chest. My skin felt warm all over. Everything else that had happened

today became all a big blur; the only thing on my mind was Rob. It felt like he was all mine; that he had

belonged to me and only me. His lips were mine; and my lips were his. Six months ago, I first met him;

and every day since then I dreamed of being close to him. My heart yearned for this strange, bizarre

Goth boy the first day we met in the library, and it has ached for him ever since.

“Love you, too,” I whispered back. Trying to control my excitement, I bit my lip and blinked my eyes a

couple of times.



“From the first day we met, I’ve wanted you,” he told me as he stroked his left hand up and down my

cheek.



My heart was pounding a mile a minute. My skin was burning. My hormones were screaming for more.

My mind was focusing on him and only him. I was so happy that I could have just fainted! He and I were

on the same page: the first day we met, we wanted each other. It was so… oh god, what’s that word?

Oh, yeah! Romantic! Yes, romantic. As romantic as can be. I may have been young, but you don’t get a

chance like this very often. I wanted Rob. Oh, God, did I ever want him! I would be the happiest girl on

earth if he was mine, and I was his.



“I never felt this way about a girl before,” he admitted to me. “I’ve never even had a girlfriend.”



I have never felt this away about a boy before, either, Rob. And I have never had a boyfriend. We can do

this together. We can learn together. Just the two of us and no one else. Just… just… let’s do it, Rob. Ask

me to be your girlfriend. Imagine how incredible our relationship would be.



“I’ll be eighteen in a month,” Rob said as he sighed. “And you’re only fourteen. A relationship between

us just couldn’t work, Alisha.”



We’ll keep it a secret then, Rob. I’m good at keeping secrets. I swear on my grave that I am. I just want

you. I want you all day, every day, until the day I die. I’ll do whatever it takes just to be with you. I’m

tired of being lonely all of the while; I just want you. I want you sooo badly!



“I want you, Rob,” I said as loudly as possible. “You’re the most amazing person I’ve ever met!”



He retracted his hand from my cheek. “You do?”



“Yes,” I said, grinning, as I pushed Rob’s body down on the bed and got on top of him.



Before he was able to say anything, I began to lift my shirt and show him my bra-clad chest. “We

should…you know…do it!”



Looking at my chest, his eyes fixated on my pink push up bra, he then looked up at me and pouted his

lips. “You really think having sex is a way to show your feelings for me?”



I nodded. “Well, that and – I don’t know! It just seems hecka fun!”



He shook his head. “You’re only fourteen. Fourteen’s way too young for sex.”



“No it’s not! So many of the freshmen girls are doing it!”



Just as I reached back to try and unclasped my bra, Rob reached back and stopped me. “And they’re way

too young. They should be trying to earn good grades, not fooling around with boys.”

“But – but – I want to! I thought you had feelings for me?”



“If you think that having sex is the only way for me to prove that I love you, then you have a lot to learn,

little one,” he said as he lightly touched his fingers to my cheek.



He was right. I did have a lot to learn. I just was surprised that he wasn’t jumping for my open invitation

to have sex. I thought almost any guy would take the offer in a heartbeat. I guess that meant that Rob

was a good guy. “You’re right,” I said as I sighed.



“I’m glad you realize it,” he said, smiling as he pulled me close to his body and wrapped an arm around

me. We ended up falling asleep…

Scene 2



I woke up to the sound of loud, obnoxious yelling.



“Who the hell is she?” screamed a woman’s voice from nearby the bed.



“Mom, calm down,” Rob spoke back softly. “You’ll wake her!”



It was his mom who was screaming like a mad woman. She sounded so young, like she was in her early-

20s; but that just couldn’t be. She had a seventeen-year-old son.



“That’s one of the girls you tutor, isn’t it?!”



“I was helping her with homework. That’s all, Mom.”



“Oh, you retarded boy!” she yelled. “You think I’m stupid?”



“Mom, nothing happened!”



“Nothing happened, my ass!” She said, hissing. “Take that brat home and get dinner ready. I’m

starving!”



“There’s no food left!”



“Well then, go to the fucking grocery store and get some!”



“I have no money left. I had to pay for the appointment and medicine for Lizzie because you wouldn’t.”



“I’m fucking hungry!”



“Then you get some fucking food yourself!” Rob yelled at her.



I opened up my eyes and looked over at Rob and his mother. She slapped him across the face. “You son

of a bitch,” she screamed as she slammed him against a wall. “You know to never talk back to me, you

fucking piece of shit!”



“I’m so sick and tired of this! I hate when you treat me like this!” Rob rubbed at the cheek she had

slapped.



“Then why don’t you just move in with that wealthy little bitch you’ve been fucking?”



“God, Mom! Stop it. I’m still a virgin – and so is she.”



“Bullshit!”



“I’m waiting for the right girl.”

She started to laugh. “What a joke! You’ll never find ‘the one.’ What girl would find your hideous self

attractive?”



“You know, you’re just jealous that I have morals and do well in school.”



“I want that girl out of my house. I can’t stand looking at that little slut.”



“I’m taking her home, so stop freaking out!”



“You better come back with dinner or else you’ll be payin’ for it, boy!”



“If you want dinner, then you’ll have to give me the money to buy it.”



She pulled out a twenty-dollar bill. “I want McDonalds. Buy a happy meal for Annie and two hamburgers

and fries for me and Justin.”



“What about Lizzie and Jason?”



“You know what to get them.” She groaned, and then shoved him forward.



Rob grabbed his car keys from off the dresser. “Thanks,” he mumbled as he grabbed the bill.



I examined his mother’s appearance. I was shocked by how she looked. She was pretty, unlike what I

had expected. She had a curvy, slender body with long, thin legs and arms. Her eyes were big and baby

blue just like Rob’s; her skin was smooth and milky white; and her shiny raven black hair was straight,

thick and silky and a few inches past her shoulders. The woman was very tall; I’d hazard a guess that she

was six-foot. She also looked as young as she had sounded, but I knew she had to at least be in her

thirties. She and Rob looked like brother and sister.



I sat up and looked over at Rob. “What time is it?” I asked him.



He and his mother both looked over at me. “Hey, Alisha,” he said, grinning, as he came over and sat by

my side. “It’s 7:37.”



I was able to get a better look at his mother’s face. The makeup around her eyes was applied in such a

way as to give her a beautiful smoky eyes look. Her full lips, which looked like they had been injected

with collagen, were colored with a burgundy shade of lipstick.



She stared at me so bitterly. She knew nothing about me, yet she looked at me like I was the scum of

the earth. “You better not get that child pregnant,” she said, hissing at Rob as she continued to stare me

down. “The last thing we need is a retarded baby running around.”



“You don’t need to worry about that.” Rob looked down at the wooden floor. “I won’t be passing on my

corrupted genes.”



“My life sucks all because of you!” His mother growled at him as she stared at me one last time before

angrily walking out of his room and slamming the door shut.

What were they even talking about? Why would Rob and I have a “retarded” baby? And why was Rob

saying he wouldn’t pass on his “corrupted genes”? His genes weren’t corrupt. I mean, the guy seemed

fairly healthy, except for the whole leg muscle issue.



“Sorry about my mom,” Rob said as he continued to stare at the ground. I was pretty sure he was crying,

because why else would he not be looking at me?



“She’s a bitch.” Yes, I know it sounded bad to insult someone’s mother like that, but the woman really

was a bitch.



He looked up me and was indeed silently crying. Tears were running down his cheeks. “She resents me,”

he said mournfully.



“How could she resent you? You’re such a wonderful son!” I reached my right hand out to Rob’s

shoulders, pulling his body to mine, and stroked at the back of his head.



“She was only thirteen when I was born.” Rob seemed hesitant to go on further.



“So young!” I could never in a million years imagine myself being a mother at the tender age of thirteen!



“I’m surprised I was born alive. But, I’m even more surprised that I didn’t suffer any major mental or

physical disabilities. With all her attempts to try and kill me while she was pregnant with me, it’s a shock

I came out relatively normal.”



“How could she ever do that?!” I gasped.



“You see, Alish, I’m the result of –“and then Rob completely stopped.



“The result of what?” I demanded.



“Nothing,” he said as he got up from the bed.



“I swear to God that I won’t tell anyone. Just tell me. Please, Rob. Please?”



He sat back down and stared at the floor. “My father is also my –“



“Your what?”



“My father is also my…my…grandfather,” he mumbled lowly.



I had nothing to say. I couldn’t even begin to comprehend what he was talking about. Why would his

father also be his grandfather?



“Huh?” I asked.



“My mom’s dad raped her. I’m the result.” The tears continued to stream down his cheeks. Black

droplets of eyeliner slowly dribbled down his face.

Rob was the result of incestuous rape. I couldn’t even begin to believe it, but it had to be true; Rob

wasn’t one to lie. And of all things, why would someone lie about this? The tears streaming from his

eyes were real. His mournful tone was real. It was real. The guy of my dreams was the result of

incestuous rape.



But before I could really process it through my head, I said the worst thing I could have possibly said,

“I’m surprised she didn’t abort you.”



He looked at me and began to bawl as loud as a starving baby. “I’m surprise she didn’t either,” he cried

so loudly that I swore his mom was going to bust through the door at any second and smack him across

the back of the head.



And then I realized what I had said. I grabbed Rob and hugged him tightly. “No, no, I didn’t mean to say

that,” I whispered to him. “I never in a million years meant to say that.”



“You spoke the truth. Not many people would have.” He was being too humble about it. What I said was

completely rude and uncalled for. I deserved to be whacked across the face! If I had been told that by

someone, I would have strangled the person.



“You know, Rob, it doesn’t matter how you were conceived,” I said as I brought my fingers to his cheeks

and began to wipe off the running eyeliner and tears. “What matters is that you’re an amazing guy who

deserves to be loved so passionately and treated with the upmost respect.”



He continued to bawl. “My mom tells me that I’m an inbred freak. She says I’ll never be able to have kids

‘cause they’ll all be deformed and have mental issues.”



“Don’t you ever listen to what she says to you; it’s all a bunch of nonsense. You’ll have normal children

like everyone else.” I was so furious that his mother could be so heartless toward him! It wasn’t his fault

that he was conceived that way. He did nothing wrong. It was her father who was the sick one and who

deserved the hatred; not Rob.



“I want my own family one day.” Rob’s bawling was calming down a bit. “I want my own babies to love

and cherish. I want my own wife to spoil with love and happiness.”



“You’ll easily have your own family, Rob. You’re such a sweet, loving person whose hard work will pay

off one day. You’ll have a wife to spoil with love and happiness, and babies to love and cherish. I promise

you will.”



“Yeah right,” he said as his bawling continued. “What girl wants a freak whose family is all a bunch of

pathetic drug addicts?”



Okay, so he was right. No girl would dream of a guy like that. Every girl wants her prince charming,

dressed in shining armor, arriving to her bedroom on his noble steed. At least that’s how I always

pictured it to be. I always pictured my first boyfriend as the boy next door type; the kind you’d want to

bring home to your parents and brag about for hours. Rob wasn’t that type at all. He was the kind I’d be

ashamed to show my parents to, because he was… well…super strange! I guess you could say that Rob

was a Goth charming, dressed in chains and bondage gear, who would arrive at your bedroom on his

vampire bat. He’d be the one to suggest going to a cemetery at night for the first date.

“I do.” Wait – what did I just say?! Did I just say I did? No. No, I couldn’t have. I would never say that.



His bawling silenced. I felt his arms grip around my body. “Would you like to take a walk around the

cemetery?” he asked me.



Point proven. He suggested the cemetery. Little did he know, though, I had always dreamed of

something like this happening. I was a horror movie fanatic; I dreamed of my life being like that of a

horror movie. Walking through the cemetery with a weird Goth boy was something I always secretly

wanted.



“Yeah, sure,” I responded.



Rob was only wearing his Mindless Self Indulgence t-shirt and a pair of tight black jeans. He released

himself from my grip and got up and grabbed a black hoodie from his closet and quickly put it on. “Come

on!” He grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet. We jogged down the stairs and out the door.



“Do you like cemeteries?” Rob asked me as he delicately grabbed my hand and interlocked his fingers

with mine.



“I like them,” I said aloofly as I looked around at the old abandoned houses that lay in sight.



“If I’m not at school or tutoring kids or taking care of my brother and sister, I’m at the cemetery or

walking around on the trails here,” he said as he swung our interlocked hands up and down. “I love the

amity and serenity of the cemetery. I can be one with my thoughts there.”



Truthfully, I had never even been to a cemetery before. My thought about cemeteries had always been

that they were creepy and spooky. Rob, on the other hand, talked about the cemetery nearby like it was

quiet and peaceful.



“Amity and serenity? You really don’t think cemeteries are creepy and spooky?”



“Why would they be creepy and spooky?”



“You know,” I said, looking up at him and smiling. “Ghosts, zombies, ghouls… those kinda spooky

things.”



“Those don’t scare me,” Rob said, smiling. “The real monsters are humans.”



“Not all people are monsters, Rob.”



Rob’s silence continued until we arrived at the cemetery. As he opened up the rusty, broken wrought

iron gate to the cemetery, we both walked inside and took a seat on an old wooden bench whose

boards were cracked severely and looked about ready to give. Surprisingly, as soon as I delicately sat

upon its wooden seat, it didn’t fall. I was imagining that my fat ass would make it break and have both

Rob and I come crashing down onto the ground. Thankfully that didn’t happen.

“My mom threw me down the stairs when I was only sixteen-months-old,” Rob said, wiping at his eyes.

“I never got proper medical care. I’ve had this weird walk ever since the incident.”



“Why the –why the hell would she do that?”



“She hated me. She still hates me. I’m the thing in her life that makes her so miserable.”



“She should’ve just put you up for adoption. At least you wouldn’t have been through hell and back.”



“No.” Rob looked up at me with teary eyes which were red and puffy; and red around his nose and

under his eyes. “She should have just aborted me.”



I threw my arms around Rob’s slender body and rested my left cheek against his chest. “If she did that,

who would I be cuddling right now?”



His arms made their way around my body and he began to shakily move his hands up and down my

back. I could feel his warm breath on the top of my head. Unexpectantly, he pressed his lips against my

head, lightly kissing it. “Another guy.”



I laughed. Rob was ignorant about me; about my loner reputation at school. No guys liked me. No guys

ever even talked to me. “No,” I said as I finally settled my laughing. “I’d be all alone at home, doing

nothing exciting.”



“You know, you and me go to the same school,” Rob whispered.



“We do?” I never would have known that. I had never seen Rob walking around the campus at school. I

never even saw him at lunch. Or is that maybe because I was such a loner and kept to my own little

spot?



“I’m a loner, too.” Rob’s fingernails began to scratch my back, up and down in short strokes.



“But, it’s just that, well; I’ve never seen you there.”



“Promise not to hurt me?”



“Huh?”



“Promise not to get angry at me?”



“I won’t get angry at you… I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”



“I watch you from my car every day at lunch,” he whispered with a hint of a smile in his voice. “But I’ve

never had the courage to come up and talk to you.”



So this whole time – nearly half of the school year, Rob had been watching me during lunch? Creepy! I

never realized anyone was watching me as I ate and moped around at lunch. “You see me every Monday

in the library to tutor me, yet you didn’t have the courage to come up and talk to me at lunch?”

“I was too nervous to. I always thought I bothered you during our tutoring sessions. I never would have

thought you had a crush on me. No girl’s ever had a crush on me. I’m considered the most repulsive and

creepiest guy at school.”



“So, you just sit in your car at lunch and watch me?”



“Well, I don’t always just watch…”



“What do you mean by that?”



“Sometimes… sometimes I-I…I-I… oh, nothing! Nevermind. Pretend I didn’t say anything at all.”



“No, tell me. Sometimes you what?”



“I can’t tell you. You’d never talk to me again if I told you.”



It must have been something perverted. I would still talk to him even if it was something sick. I really

liked Rob. He liked me. I have never experienced a guy liking me before. All I knew was that I really liked

it: knowing that there was someone who actually liked me, and in more than a “let’s just be friends”

way.



“Tell me, Rob. I really wanna know!”



He brought one of his hands down to his lap and placed it on the crotch of his pants. “You know…” He

hinted by raising his eyebrows and rubbing his hand up and down. “I bet you already know what I’m

talking about…”



Yeah, I pretty much did. Jerking off, jacking off, spanking the monkey… whatever the hell you wanted to

call it; that was what he was talking about. It had to be. I mean, what else would he be saying – that he

would just watch and eat? The guy barely ate. I doubt he even had food for lunch.



“So, you jerk off sometimes when you’re watching me?” I asked him as I crept my right hand to the hand

on his crotch and interlocked my fingers with his.



Rob’s cheeks turned bright pink as he blushed in embarrassment. “Who knows,” he said, grinning, as he

continued to avoid eye contact.



I smiled. “You know.”



“Sorry, it’s just that I’m really shy… and…um,” he said, gulping, “nervous.”



Rob was shy, I had to admit that. He had a lot of trouble making eye contact; but oddly enough, not too

much with me. He gave me a lot of eye contact when we talked: his gazing was long, almost to the point

of giving me the creeps. And every time he did look at me, I would notice how much his pupils dilated;

the once bright baby blues turning into spheres of darkness. The more I started to think about the topic,

the more I started to realize how much Rob really had been flirty with me these past few months: from

the lifting of his eyebrows to the parting of his lips to the slightly flared nostrils to the touching and

fidgeting around with his hair, face and clothes – all happening the most prominent in the first few

minutes of us chit chatting before beginning our tutoring session; right at the time when I was looking at

him the most.



“It’s so cute how shy you are,” I said, giggling.



“What’s your favorite animal?” Rob randomly asked. I guess what we were talking about was making

him too nervous to elaborate further on about?



I had a lot of favorite animals. The thing was that I just couldn’t ever be hands on with any of them

without breaking into hives and suffering from an asthma attack. Dogs, cats, horses – I absolutely

adored them, but I couldn’t ever touch them without suffering the brutal consequences. “Horses,” I

replied. “What about yours?”



“Tarantulas,” he said proudly as let go of me and stood up. I looked up at Rob and saw that he was

smiling the sweetest, most heartwarming smile I had ever seen. His teeth were far from perfect, but for

a guy who smoked and who probably hadn’t ever seen the inside of a dentist’s office, they were in

decent condition. Some of them were crooked, especially the front bottoms ones, and his teeth were a

bit – err, more than a bit – yellow, especially near the gums, but otherwise, I was able to tolerate looking

at them without cringing.



“So you’re a spider lover?” I grinned as I, too, stood up, and brushed my right hand against Rob’s left.



“What can I say? I love my eight legged friends like most people love their families.”



So that meant that Rob didn’t fall into the ten-percent of men who have arachnophobia, and I didn’t fall

into the fifty-percent of women who have it. Spiders never scared me; in fact, I would always check to

make sure no spiders were crawling around in the bathtub or the sink before turning on the water.



Rob reached his left hand into the left pocket of his black hoodie. After several seconds of fumbling

around, he pulled out a red disposable Bic lighter and a pack of Marlboro Reds. He was an addict, and

his addiction was nicotine. And like any addict, he had to have his next fix; his next hit of dopamine

raising nicotine. Sex, food, drugs – the three main pleasures, or rewards as you could call them. Rob

needed one of them; but unlike in that order, the drugs would come before the sex and food.



He stared at his pack of cigarettes like a coke addict stares possessively and delightfully at his supply of

cocaine. His eyes flickered with excitement as he pulled open the lid and ran his fingers along the tops of

the cigarettes, trying to ever so quickly pull out the perfect cancer stick to deliver his next hit of nicotine.

He licked his lips with satisfaction as he pulled out “the one” and ever so gently pinched his fingers

around the light brown-yellow speckled filter before placing it between his slender lips, which were

painted with lipstick akin to the droplets of fresh blood oozing out from a wound.



He made sure to firmly seal his lips around the filter of the cigarette before taking the Bic lighter into his

left hand and lighting the tip of his cancer stick. He quickly shoved the lighter into his left hoodie pocket.

Eyes closed and brain ready for some nicotine action, Rob took a long drag on his cigarette. As he

exhaled a large amount of thick blue-grey smoke whose smell was musty, potent and very repugnant, he

took his right hand and lightly stroked at the inner portion of my left wrist with his index and middle

fingers. “I love the first drag,” he said, smiling at me as he began to open up his eyes. “It’s like a

braingasm.”

Interesting choice of words there, Rob. A braingasm? Well, at least you were able to describe how it

made you feel in one interesting – but totally made up – word. I watched him take another drag, but this

time it was shorter and his eyes were open. For some reason, Rob looked so hot right now. It couldn’t be

from the smoking; I absolutely detested smoking and its putrid smell. Or could it? I was picturing him

nearly naked; wearing only a pair of black briefs. His skinny blanched body amidst the plentiful of

century-old gravestones and sky reaching Redwoods. Running his hands down the middle of his body,

from his chest and down to his abdomen and then to the hems of his briefs; the left hand slowly

disappearing into the briefs. And no focus would be on his cut scars; all the focus would be on his

gorgeous vampire-pale skin. He was the first true black haired, blue eyed guy I had ever seen whose skin

was this pale. I loved a pale guy; an almost deathly pale one with just a hint of pink as a reminder of him

being a living, breathing person. The contrast he possessed, it was hot: baby blue eyes, raven black hair,

and pale, pale skin.



Before I became too lost within my fantasy of Rob in only briefs in this cemetery, he nearly brought me

back to reality with his fingertips tip-toeing up my forearms like a tarantula walking across bare flesh.

“Earth to Alisha,” he said, giggling to me as he waved his cigarette in front of me. “Are you okay?”



The smell of the cigarette smoke right in front of my face didn’t even bring me back to reality. Instead of

waking up and getting with the picture, I looked up at Rob, blankly, and said the stupidest thing I could

have possibly said, “I was picturing you naked.”



Rob stared at me for several seconds before his face showed any emotion, and that was when I saw a

mischievous smile form. His cheeks were extremely rosy in color now; from embarrassment, I suppose?

“And here I thought I was weird. Heh,” he said, laughing, as he bent down and elbowed my shoulder

playfully.



“How was that weird?” I asked Rob, totally and completely confused.



“With all my bruises and scars, how could you ever want to picture me naked?” The smile on his face

faded away to a look of inferiority.



I didn’t even notice the bruises. And why would I care if he had scars or not? I loved his body for what it

was: naturally attractive. “You’re a natural beauty,” I told him, touching my fingers to his cheeks in short

caresses.



Of course, when he first took off his coat I did happen to notice the numerous cut marks and scars he

had all over his forearms. That didn't deter me from finding him attractive, though. He was the most

attractive guy I had ever been around – personality-wise.



"A natural beauty?" Rob sighed as he took another drag from his cigarette.



"You know, Rob, you don’t have to be shy about your body. I haven’t seen it, but I doubt it’s as bad as

you make it out to be.”



"It's hideous. Scarred up. Bruised up. Too skinny. Too pale. I'm so ugly!"

"Skinniness, bruises, scars and all, I find you attractive because you’re sweet, loving, smart and have

morals." I flung my left arm around his body.



“I want you.” Rob’s voice oozed with excitement as he dropped his cigarette on the ground and

extinguished it with his shoes.



“Rob, you don’t just litter like that,” I scolded as I pointed to the cigarette butt.



He totally ignored what I was saying. Instead, he grabbed at my shoulders and began to try and wrestle

me to the ground. I didn’t put up much of a fight, because I thought it was just some harmless playing.

That is until he got me down on the ground and pinned down my arms and legs. “I want you so badly,”

he said, heaving, as he placed his lips on my forehead.



“Get off me,” I yelled at him as I tried to free myself from his strong grip. “This isn’t cute, Rob!”



“Do you wanna be my wife?” His smile was so sweet, so sincere. His twinkling baby blues wouldn’t stop

gazing into my eyes. A few tears were sliding down his cheeks. I think they were tears of happiness.



The smell of cigarette smoke on his breath and on his clothes was overpowering. I was coughing and

trying to free my arms. But it was a useless effort. As skinny as he was, he was still much stronger than I

was. “Do you want to be my wife?” he repeated as he tightened his grip around my arms.



“This game isn’t funny,” I yelled at him as I thrashed my body around. “Just let me go!”



“It’d be amazing, I promise you. You’d love being my wife. And you know what? We’d have the cutest

babies ever!”



Well, he did have a point about the whole having cute babies thing. But would I really love being with

Rob… for life? He was already proving how low his self esteem and confidence was, how very insecure

he was, and how he would be a total clinger in a relationship. I didn’t know if I could handle a guy like

that. With so many issues, Rob was bound to be pretty fucked up. I think he already was.



“What do you say, Alisha? Do you wanna be my wife?”



I was only fourteen years old. I wasn’t even completely done growing yet. He, on the other hand, was

only a month away from being able to buy his cigarettes without breaking the law. Sure, I would be

fifteen in a couple of months, but even fifteen’s much too young to be trying to plan who I want to

spend the rest of my life with! I really didn’t know what to say. I mean, why the hell did he have to say

wife?! Why couldn’t he have just said girlfriend? I would have said yes –although with some hesitation –

if he asked me that!



“I’m sorry, Rob, but –” Before I could finish my sentence, Rob narrowed his eyebrows and dug his

fingernails into my skin.



“But what?” he hissed.



“I’m way too young to get married,” I whispered to him.

His fingernails dug deeper. “I won’t let go till you say yes.”



“I’m not saying yes to something I don’t wanna do,” I stubbornly told Rob.



And his nails dug deep enough to make me shout out in pain. “Rob!” I screamed as I thrust so violently

that I knocked his hands off my arms.



I may have knocked his arms off, but I wasn’t able to escape his quick arms. They grabbed me back so

fast that I didn’t even have time to move from the spot I was in. He had me pinned down yet again and

this time he slammed my back against the ground. “I need you, Alisha,” Rob said in a shaky crazy tone

that sent chills down my back. “You can’t leave me.”



“I just want love.” He cried as he let go of me, and brought his hands up to his face. “I just want to know

what it feels like to feel loved...and to love another person.”



“Pinning me down and trying to get me to say something I don’t mean is no way of getting it,” I said

angrily as I scooted away from him.



“I’m sorry I hurt you,” he said as he bawled. “I really didn’t mean to dig my nails into your skin… or slam

you down onto the ground… it’s just that… it’s just that…”



“It’s just what?” I yelled.



“I’m afraid of you just leaving me here all by myself.”



“Why would I? I told you I loved you!”



It finally registered to Rob. His face finally had the expression I was looking for: excitement, optimism,

hopefulness. “I want to be your girlfriend, Rob, but not your wife,” I said as I got to my feet and walked a

few steps away from him.



He got to his feet and clasped his hands around my body. “Well then,” he said excitedly. “Would you like

to be my girlfriend?”



I wasn’t so sure at this point. After what he did, I was really turned off. I mean, holding me down,

digging your nails into my skin, and trying to force me to say yes to something I didn’t want to? That was

too much. I didn’t think any girl would have given him any chance had he done that to her. But me? I

was a low self esteemed, insecure loser. I wanted somebody to love me –badly! I was nearly as

desperate as he was.



Even though I was only fourteen, I wanted to know what it felt like to, you know, do it! Girls talked

about it all the time at school, and I was dying to know what all the fuss was about. On the flip side,

though, I was too afraid to do it. I wouldn’t even wear short sleeves or shorts in public, so to have to get

naked, that’d be a horrible nightmare come true! I did have to wear shorts in P.E., which totally sucked,

but it was only because I have to. I still had this strong desire to experience what it feels like to

have…you know…sex.

I wanted a boyfriend. I wanted one so bad. Would Rob be the one for me? Would he and I lose our

virginities to one another? Would we someday marry and have a family? If so, how many kids? At what

age? Where would we live? So many questions, yet so few answerable. All I knew at this point was that I

had a chance to have a boyfriend. Should I seize the chance or wait for a potentially better guy who

wasn’t so screwed up?



“Alisha,” he said, his left hand sliding down toward my butt. “We’d be perfect together.”



He did have a point: we were both so socially awkward, into the weirdest things, considered off-limits to

date by any normal person, and just really similar in all sorts of ways. I had the hots for him, and he had

the hots for me. He loved kids and so did I. A match made in heaven, right? Maybe…that is if he could

get over his insecurity issues.



“Rob,” I finally began to speak, my arms clutched around his rawboned body. “I like you…a lot.”



His face lit up like one of those fireworks at a professional firework show on Fourth of July; you know,

like those real razzle-dazzle ones that people are in awe over and can’t get enough of. That sweet,

warm, innocent smile of his had my heart pounding against my chest. “I want us to be each other’s

first,” he cooed.



“What do you think it’s like, Rob?”



His eyes gazed into mine. “Different,” he said, grinning.



I liked his response. It was short and sweet, straight to the point, and the kinda answer you would

expect from a guy who never put the snake in the cave. I was glad that he didn’t try to exaggerate and

say it was the most amazing, most magnificent thing in the world. I wouldn’t have believed him. I didn’t

get how sex could be described like that. I mean, how amazing and magnificent could it be to have a guy

sticking his thing in you? It must feel good, though, or else why would so many people be going at it and

bragging about how great it is?



Sex sells. Our society emphasizes sex all the god damn time! Sex this, sex that. I swear, it was like sex

made the world go ‘round. Turn on any movie rated R, and you can expect a sex scene. Oh, yeah, and

the sex scenes always seem to come on right as your mom or dad are passing by or coming into the

room. Sigh. Always at the worst times! Movies and books always make it seem like the best thing

possible. Was it really that wonderful? I mean, let me use me and Rob for example: we’d be all nervous

and shy; hesitant to strip down; hesitant to proceed with it. He’d be totally self conscious about his scars

and cut marks; and me self conscious about my fat. I’d be worried about getting pregnant; he’d be

worried about me ditching him afterwards. He’d probably have a hell of a time putting on the condom,

and would probably end up whiplashing his dick with it. He’d probably get so nervous he’d go soft or

cum before we could go at it. Neither of us would know what the hell to do; we’d probably call it a quits

at trying to get it, you know, in. Even if we did get to that point, I knew that we’d both be clueless. How

fast should he thrust? Should our eyes be opened or closed? Would I end up staring at his scarred arms

and get turned off? Would he get turned off seeing me naked? Would I get turned off seeing his skinny

body completely naked? Would we both lose the desire to do it upon realizing how involved and

intimate it was?

Just thinking up and pondering those questions had me totally turned off from the whole idea of getting

skin-to-skin with him. I didn’t think I could handle his boney body against mine; it just seemed too sick.

The poor guy needed to be fed. Now that I thought about it and used my brains instead of my

hormones, I realized that seeing him shirtless was almost sickening. He was cut up, bruised, scarred, and

too skinny for his own good. No girl would find his body, at least in its current condition, eye candy. His

body’s imperfections were all the evidence of what sick things his mother had done to him over the

years. His skinniness was due to his having to go without food. And you know why he’d deprive himself

of food for sometimes even days at a time? So that he could use that money – the only money he’d have

left from his part-time job of tutoring – in order to feed his brother and sister. Sweet, right? Of course!

Talk about the best brother someone could possibly have!



Maybe I was overanalyzing too much? My family would tell me that I thought and worried too much,

and I was starting to agree with them. It was pathetic that I could go from saying his body was attractive

to now unattractive and making me sick. How could I possibly think that? Rob was a great guy. He was

probably the perfect guy for me. A part of me wanted to say yes to being his girlfriend and spending my

life with him; but the other part of me was sickened by the idea of being intimate with Rob, and wanted

nothing more than a platonic friendship with him. Was Rob the one for me, or was there someone else

out there who would be a better match? Could I handle Rob’s insecurities and self-esteem and

confidence issues? Would his depression just lead me into a greater state of unhappiness myself? Would

his nasty habit of smoking get on my nerves too much? Would we last a couple of days or weeks or

months or years? Was there anything I found incredible about Rob? Was he good enough to be my

boyfriend? Was he too good for me? Would we ever truly fall in love and be happily ever after? What

would my life be like if I allowed him into it? What would my parents think of Rob? Yikes! That was a

stupid question! How could I even wonder that one? I already know the answer to it.



My father: millionaire as a result of his well-known and top-rated dieting products and exercise

equipment. My mother: plastic surgeon by trade; cosmetic surgery addict by stupidity. Two very good-

looking people, both of whom were in the modeling industry, and who were as vain as can be and very

focused on social status and all that other useless shit that only image worshipping people care about.

Due to fertility problems, they were only able to have one kid –me. I was their only one, and I

disappointed them. They wanted beautiful children: children they could brag about for hours; children

they could show off to everyone; children they could feel proud and ecstatic about.



My mother told me, and this was completely in her own words, that as unattractive as I am, I needed to

find a hot guy so I that I could give them beautiful grandchildren. I would never forget how many hours I

cried over her saying that. I never thought I was unattractive; all I thought was that I just had a bit too

much junk in the trunk…and hood… and that otherwise, I was still pretty. It was a real self-esteem

dropper, that was for sure. My confidence also dropped severely because of it. Me and my mom were

never close, and after saying that, we became even farther apart. My dad wasn’t any better; he always

made sure to remind me of how I turned out to be a genetic fluke, and how I was a total disappointment

to the family. I was the curse. I was the one beaten by the ugly stick. I guess it wasn’t fair that my

parents were so god damn good-looking, so Mother Nature thought they should have a pig of a child.



I had never fit in with them or anyone else I was related to. They were all so good-looking, and I was

so…not. My cousins were all beautiful and involved in modeling or pageants or something that was just

reserved for beautiful people who may – or may not –have talent. My parents made sure to point out

how beautiful and talented my cousins were – all the fucking time! It was a never-ending battle of

arguing with them. They told me to diet and exercise, to do my hair and makeup, to tan –and every

other possible transformation possible to make myself “beautiful.” I didn’t do any of it. It was partly out

of spite, but the other part was because, as you guessed, laziness.



But the one thing that both my parents were the worst on was dating. “If you ever end up dating,” I

remember my mom saying, uneasily and unsure of if it would ever happen, “he better be a stud to make

up for all that you lack in…in looks.”



And if that wasn’t already offensive enough, my parents would say in unison, “If you ever bring home a

guy for us to meet, he better be normal – and good-looking!” And then they would go on to tell me what

kind of guys I could and couldn’t date. The list of “dateables” was short, whereas the “undateables” was

long and treacherous.



Rob was the perfect example of the kind of guy my parents told me to never in a million years bring

home to them. They told me that they would never approve of such a guy; that such a guy would kill my

and my family’s image. Our reputation. Our everything. Just one whiff of him and they’d be screaming

bloody murder at me for being around such a “badass punk of a guy”. One look at how scarred up his

arms were and how skinny his body was, and my mom would have me by the throat, threatening to cut

my it with one of her scalpels. Upon knowing that me and him kissed, my dad would have me thrown

onto the ground, a whip in his right hand. Rob was the kind of guy my parents made fun of. The kind of

guy my parents despised. The kind of guy they thought was better off dead. His kind, as they’d say, was

trash and unworthy of ever meeting their kind. It was sad to hear how judgmental and ignorant my

parents were about the people who didn’t fit their bill. What made them think guys like Rob were so

bad? What does having drug addicts for parents even have to do with whether a person was good or

bad? Not all kids of drug addicts were addicts themselves. Rob’s gothic appearance was already enough

to give my parents a heart attack. Them finding out about his life and family and stuff? They would kill

me.



But I had feelings for this guy. For this weirdass Goth guy. I loved his sweet, innocent smile. I loved his

child-like giggle of a laugh. I loved his big hands palm-to-palm with mine, our fingers interlocked and our

arms swinging up and down. I loved his strange, dark style of clothing that no normal person would ever

dare try on. I just loved the weirdness he had burned deep within his core. He had a personality like no

other, and there was no way there would be another guy as unique as him. He truly was one of a kind.

Or…one in a million? No! He was one in a billion. I could spot him from a mile away by just his physical

appearance. I had never seen anyone else with that walk of his. It was the most, um, unique walk I had

ever seen.



I was physically attracted to Rob. I was emotionally attracted to Rob. I constantly thought about Rob. I

dreamed about Rob…and some of those dreams… um…some of them were pretty… steamy, to say the

least. That guy was, like, blueprinted into my life now. Six months of having him tutoring me and I

desired him like no other. I had kept this attraction a secret from all others, to save myself the pain and

rejection from others and their judgmental and close-minded ways. I couldn’t imagine the stigmatization

I would experience if a fellow student or peer my age found out that I had the hots for the school freak.



My parents would kill me for this, but you know what? Fuck them! Fuck everything they say. Fuck their

social status bullshit. Fuck their closed-minded, ignorant ways of thinking! I wanted love. I wanted

somebody to love. I wanted to be happy for once. I wanted Rob.

I grabbed Rob’s hand and looked him straight in the eye. “Yes,” I whispered, a smile quickly lighting up

my once emotionless face. “I’ll be your girlfriend.”



And the fireworks all lit up! I swear, he grinned so big that I thought he would hurt himself! He bent

down and grasped his skinny arms around my body and lifted me up. That skinny guy was able to pick up

my fatass! And he was holding me chest-to-chest with him. He was squeezing me so tight that I thought I

would suffocate.



“I’m so happy,” he said, sobbing. “This is the best day of my life.”



“Really?” I asked, my hands making their way around his body.



“Yes,” he said as he loosened his grip enough for me to be able to get down. I slid myself down to the

ground and stood there looking up at him.



Rob sat down, his body leaning against the back of a headstone. “I want you in my arms,” he said as he

made hand signals for me to come over.



“Aw,” I said, grinning, as I sat down next to him, leaning my head against his shoulder. “You’re so

sweet.”



“I’m a good guy, Alisha. Really, I am.” He hooked his left arm around me and used his other hand to pet

the top of my head.



“I know,” I assured him, my right hand lightly going up and down one of his slender thighs.



“You’re perfect.” Rob’s hand worked its way down to my shoulders.



“No one’s perfect, Rob.”



“Untrue. You are perfect,” he said, his left arm squeezing around my shoulder and pulling me closer and

closer down toward his lap.



He spread his legs and started hitting the earth between his legs. “Sit right here, hun.”



I stood up and got between his spread out legs and sat down. He lowered his chest against my back and

squeezed his arms around my body. “I like this better.” I could hear him grinning. “I can hold you

tighter.”



His chest was contour with my back. His chin was leaning on my shoulder, and I could feel his warm

breath against the back of my neck. “How many kids do you want?” he whispered.



“I don’t know,” I said as I touched my right hand to one of his arms. “I never really thought about it.”



“I want at least four,” he said, smiling.



“Wow,” I said as I grinned. “You sure want a big family, don’t you?”

“Yup,” he said as he released a hand from around my body and placed it on my upper thigh.



“And who would you ideally have kids with – me?”



“Of course,” he said, kissing my neck. “In an ideal world, we’d marry and have a house and babies, and

live happily ever as as a big, beautiful family.”



His full name was Robert Vincent Sutherland. He was born April 12th. His favorite color was black. His

favorite number was five. He had never been out of Washington. He has true black hair – not dark

brown, but actual black. He can’t get tan to save his life. He told me that he burns, but never ever gets

tan. He has been smoking since he was ten and has the worst smoker’s cough ever in the mornings. He

hated dogs because he was attacked by one when he was five. He had never tried alcohol or weed – or

any other drug for that matter. He wasn’t religion, but yet he read the bible and went to church a couple

times a month. He had no tattoos and no desire to ever get any. Oh, and he snored – super loud! He told

me that his mom would always bitch and complain about his snoring; that’s how loud and obnoxious it

was!



Rob was sooo smart. You know what classes the guy was taking? AP Chemistry, AP Statistics, AP U.S.

Government and Politics, and of course… English and P.E. Oh, and ceramics. I asked him why he didn’t

take AP English; he just smiled and said nothing. I pushed and prodded till he gave me an answer. And

you know what his answer was? “Presentations.”



Yeah, I know: he misses out on going into AP English just because the teacher at our school who teaches

12th grade AP English assigns a shitload of oral presentations. Rob totally and completely sucked at

presenting: he had social anxiety – badly. Yeah, okay, so he's a tutor. How can someone who tutors have

bad social anxiety? It's not one-on-one that gets him super duper anxious; it's groups of people. An

audience. It's the eyes following his every move... his every mistake. He gets panic attacks every time he

has to present. They get so bad, in fact, that he's passed out a few times. Scary, right? Totally!



During our last tutoring session, Rob told me about one of his worst school days ever. The reason the

subject came up was because I told him about a mortifying incident that had happened to me at school

that day. The mortifying incident that happened to me? I got my period that day and didn't know it. In

English, Mr. Andrews called me up to the board to punctuate a sentence. I start walking up there and

can hear whispering and laughing from my peers. Mr. Andrews looked to see what all the fuss was

about, and then he came up to me and whispered, "Alisha, you may want to use the restroom." I asked

him why and he told me, "You have a huge blood stain on the back of your pants." And to make matters

worse, they were my new pair of white jeans! Ugh!



The story Rob told me? You wanna know what happened?



It happened in P.E., which he has last period. Mr. Adams, his P.E. coach, is a total jackass. Well, to Rob's

dismay, Mr. Adams had assigned a group presentation on the muscle groups. Okay, yay for Rob, it's a

group presentation! Those are easy as pie, right? Wrong. Rob couldn't even handle group presentations!

That same exact day, he had a couple of bad self inflicted cuts on his inner thighs and right forearm.

We're talking total bleeders! He had them bandaged up, but then he took the bandages off as he got

dressed for P.E. as he figured: hell, they must have stopped bleeding by now! Some background on

Rob's P.E. attire: he always wears a long sleeved shirt under his P.E. shirt; usually it's black, but this time

around, it was white because the coach was getting aggravated with him always wearing black long

sleeved shirts. The P.E. shorts are white. White, of all damn colors!



The presentation groups consisted of six members, and all six of the members were required to have a

speaking part in the presentation. If one member did not speak or just totally bailed out of the

presentation, the whole group would fail. Yeah, Mr. Adams was a bastard for doing that. Poor Rob, he

was suffering anxiety and panic attacks for two weeks before the presentation – two weeks!



His group was first. The six of them got up there, posters and reading outlines in hand. The other five

members: totally calm and ready to deliver their lines; Rob? He was shaking like a leaf in 150 mph

winds. His face: fire engine red. His heart: racing a mile a minute. His throat: dry. His breathing: all

heaves and gasps. His white long sleeved shirt? The right sleeve was drenched in blood. His white

shorts? The crotch was saturated with fresh blood.



Everyone in the P.E. class stared at him in horror and disgust. Almost all of them ended up bursting into

laughter.



"Looks like someone got his period," said one of the popular boys in the class. He was laughing such a

cold, wicked laugh.



"I knew he was a pussy; I just didn't know he actually had one," shouted a friend of the popular boy.



"Plug it up with a tampon, you fucking freak," said a boy who was smirking – the closest one in the

audience.



Rob looked down, his mouth open, as he stared at his bloody shorts and blood drenched right sleeve. He

then looked up at the audience, his mouth still opened. He burst into tears as he ran full speed out of

the gym and into the locker rooms. Mr. Adams sent one of his group members into the locker rooms to

get him.



"Dude, you need to come back. Mr. Adams threatened to fail us if we didn't complete the group

presentation," barked the group member once he finally found Rob, who had locked himself in one of

the bathroom stalls and was bawling like a baby. "Don't you have another pair of shorts or something?"



Rob did have another pair of shorts. He liked having an extra pair "just in case." It sure did come in

handy for such a situation! He unlocked the door and slowly opened it, peering out and looking down at

the ground, his hair covering his eyes. "Yes," he heaved as he forced himself to his locker.



"Mr. Adams said to take off the long sleeved shirt," the group member, Alex, said as he watched Rob

open up his locker and pull out his extra pair of shorts and some bandages to bandage up the bleeding

wounds. "He says you're not allowed to wear it anyway. That it's against P.E. uniform regulations or

some shit like that."



Rob first bandaged his right wound, and then the wounds on his inner thighs. He turned around, pulling

down his blood saturated shorts, and put on the extra pair. He took his arms out of both his shirts and

took off the long sleeved shirt, all while still wearing the P.E. shirt to cover up his body. He shoved the

two articles of clothing into his locker and locked it. He and Alex walked out of the locker rooms and

back into the gym. The whole P.E. class stared at Rob as he walked in; all that did was make him more

nervous and embarrassed. His scarred arms were now uncovered and he felt completely exposed.



Once they got over to their group, Alex nudged Rob's shoulder. "You're first," he whispered as he

shoved a piece of paper into Rob's shaking hands. "First introduce yourself, then read what's off the

paper."



A couple of the P.E. students laughed as Rob's hands and the paper shook violently. He swallowed hard

and looked down at his shaking feet. "I--I--I--I'm—" he stuttered, tears falling down his cheeks. All he

could hear was his heart pounding like a hammer against metal. His vision was blurring, and he felt like

he was on the verge of death.



Alex elbowed Rob. "Dude," he whispered bitterly. "Fucking introduce yourself. Quit being a fucking

retard!"



Right in front of the audience, Rob burst into tears. "I think....I think...I'm...about....to die," he said,

gasping, as he bent down and clutched at his chest.



Right then and there he fainted. His anxiety was so bad that he passed out! He was having a panic attack

and no one even cared. Thankfully, he was only passed out for thirty seconds before he opened up his

eyes and looked up, only to see Mr. Adams standing above him. "Robert," he said in a worried sick tone,

"are you alright? Is everything okay?"



Rob got up from the ground and tried to make a run for it to the gym doors. "You're not getting out of

presenting," said Mr. Adams, sighing, as he grabbed Rob's upper arm and led him back to his group.



"God, what a fucking baby," laughingly said a girl to one of her friends as she watched Rob cry as he

looked out at the audience.



"I can't do this!" Rob bawled like a baby as he took off running out the doors and into the locker rooms.

He locked himself in the bathroom stall again and stayed there, bawling and bawling.



His group ended up failing because Rob wouldn't come out of the stall. They were furious; they yelled

and cussed at Rob, telling him he better watch his ass or else they'd fuck him up. And they told him

they'd make P.E. a living hell for him the rest of the year -- which they currently did. Ever since the

incident, a few weeks ago, Rob has been made fun of and treated like shit all during P.E. The sad part of

it all? Rob couldn’t help his panic attacks and anxiety. The teacher shouldn’t have acted the way he did.

His group shouldn’t have been as resentful as they were. Rob didn’t deserve any of it. He already had a

shitty live as is; but to have P.E. turned into a living hell? That was just fucked up. He was failing the

class; he currently had an F. An F, in P.E.!



Oh, and you know Rob’s walk? Yeah, well, he tried his hardest to walk as normally as he could at school.

It hurt him physically to do so, though. But, it was worse when he walked how he normally would: kids

would tease him relentlessly and many would trip him just because they were curious about if he’d fall

as weird as he walked. And they thought it’d be funny to see his, in their words, skinny ass fall. Cruel?

Hell yes! Poor Rob! He would tell me about how badly he’d get made fun of, walked all over, and treated

like a piece of shit. It was pathetic how mean and cruel kids were to him. And that’s exactly why he goes

to his car and hangs out by himself during lunch: to avoid the teasing, the physical harm they’d try to do

to him, and the way others would stare at him, snickering and whispering as he walked by.



Rob brought me back to reality by squeezing his arms tightly around my body. His bony arms hurt like

hell!



“Ow!” I squeaked as I squirmed around. “Your bony arms hurt!”



He laughed. “Sorry, sweetie.”



I sneered. “What would you do if I stripped for you – right now?”



“It’d make me nervous – real nervous.”



Silence. Only the crickets could be heard now. That response of his left me…wordless. Literally.



“Alisha,” Rob finally began to say after the awkward silence went on for a minute, “why are you always

trying to initiate something sexual?”



“Because, Rob, that’s kind of what relationships include.”



He went silent. Like, dead silent; to the point at which I was totally creeped out. I mean, ugh! Didn’t this

guy have any clue about relationships or girls? Did all he want was a friendship with just the ability to

cuddle and kiss? I thought we were now boyfriend and girlfriend? Why would I even want a boyfriend if

the only stuff we would do was what friends did?



“Rob?” I turned my head and looked up at him. “Rob? What’s up?”



It was too dark to tell what his facial expression was, but I knew he was thinking. Deep in thought. What

about, I just didn’t know.



“You okay, Rob?”



All that was followed by my question was deep breathing.



“Rob?”



“Alisha, don’t get mad at me, okay?” Rob sounded like he was on the verge of tears. “Promise me you

won’t?”



I rolled my eyes. “Just say it, Rob.”



“I don’t like when you initiate something sexual – because it makes me think of my hooker mom trying

to get one of those guys to sleep with her. You’re not a sleazy girl like my mom, Alisha, so it really kills

me when you try to act like one by trying to touch my privates or strip for me. I don’t like when you act

like that. I hate when girls act sleazy and like all they want is a guy’s thing in between their legs.”

Well, that kinda stung – to have him thinking of his hooker mom when I tried to… do stuff with him. That

completely turned off those hormones. Now I just wanted to smack him or something. He made me

sound like I was some sleazy, skanky hoe who wanted to rape away his morals. That prudent little skinny

freak! At that rate, he might as well be a virgin till he dies. Rob was kind of hopeless in that department.

But whatever. It would take a lot more than that for me to stop initiating.



“Thanks for comparing me to your mom,” I said bitterly.



And of course, that weak little pussy boy didn’t say shit, because he knew I was pissed, and that if he

had said more, he would probably offend me even more.



Now I was kind of being a little sarcastic bitch. “Every girl loves to hear how alike she is to a guy’s mom.”



“I didn’t say you were like my mom – at all, Alisha, so you don’t need to get hissy-pissy with me. I was

just saying that it makes me nervous and worried when you try to start sexual things. That’s what my

mom did, and guess where it got her?”



“Oh, so now you’re saying that I’m going to turn out to be some loser whore like your mom?”



I got up from his lap and up on my feet. Standing there, right above him, I looked down. “Maybe you’re

just a faggot, Rob.”



“No I didn’t, Alisha,” he replied calmly. “And if having enough integrity to stick to my morals, and

enough respect to view you as the beautiful, loving, worthy girl you are – and not someone to get it “on

with” – makes me a faggot…then I guess it’s better to be a faggot than a ‘real man.’”



“Well, do you like guys?”



Rob got to his feet and grabbed one of my hands. “What do you think, Alisha?”



I shrugged. “You could be gay or bi for all I know.”



“You want sex and I don’t. Ironic, isn’t it?”



“It’s not ironic. It’s weird.”



“I know that you’re nowhere near as physically attracted to me as I am to you. If only you knew, Alisha;

then you’d know the answer – and how obvious it was.”



“Whatever, Rob. It’s just – I don’t know. I just don’t get it – why you don’t have interest in doing it.”



“When you’re a seven-year-old kid who’s witnessing your mom passed out naked on the couch with

three guys all over her – with one on top of her – and you don’t know what’s going on or happening, but

all you know is that it’s bad, then you’ll understand. I have feelings for you, Alisha. I’m not some creepy,

horny guy who wants to take advantage of your youth and innocence.”



“Sorry to hear what you’ve had to go through in your life, Rob, but... it’s just… I don’t know… I just kinda

wish you weren’t so scared of doing stuff.”

“Why do you think I’m scared?”



“It’s obvious, Rob.”



He said nothing in reply. I kept quiet. It was for the better that we kept to ourselves for a couple of

minutes. He had said some stupid things to me; I had said some mean things to him. I think it was the

best option for us just to agree to disagree and move on. Now pondering upon how I acted and what I

said, I came to realize that I was being a jerk to him. The whole faggot comment was totally uncalled for.

Rob was a good person – just really awkward and shy and scared and fucked up – and that was what

counted the most. I should just be thankful that he was respectful and honorable enough to have

refrained from name-calling me or throwing a hissy fit for the crap I said. A lot of guys would have

interjected with name-calling or getting pissed or something, but Rob, he didn’t. He stood his ground

and realized I was just having a bitch-fit and that the best way to handle it was by being calm and

collective and most importantly, respectful. Rob did know a little something about girls after all, I

suppose.



“I’m sorry, Rob,” I said. “I’m sorry for calling you a faggot, and for getting all pissy and bitchy. You didn’t

deserve any of that. You were just trying to tell me the reasons why you were afraid of my advances

toward you. I shouldn’t have acted the stupid way I did. Sorry.”



Rob hugged me. “It’s okay, Alisha. I’m sorry, too.”



I hugged him back. “But, Rob?”



“Yeah?”



“If we ended up marrying, would we ever have sex?”



He laughed. “Well, Alisha, come on now; you know I want kids.”



“Yeah, but knowing you, you’d find a way to have the kids without us ever having sex.” I laughed and

playfully slapped him.



He playfully slapped me back. “Of course we would, sweetie,” he answered back. “Anyway, making kids

the natural way would be a whole lot better.”



“Mhm, sure, Rob! You’d find a way around it!” I laughed and then looked up at him. “Just kidding!”



As he looked down at me I could make out the grin on his face. “Maybe we’ll end up as the married

virgin couple who miraculously conceived their children.”

Chapter Two



Rob was kind enough to wait with me when my dad took for freaking ever to pick me up from the

library. Once he finally arrived, Rob walked out of the library with me and hugged me tight. "Bye,

Alisha,” said Rob as he smiled at me. "I love you!"



"Love you, too!" I rushed toward the car and got inside.



"Who was that weirdo hugging you?" my dad asked me as soon as I got in the car and closed the door.



I buckled my seat belt. "Rob. My tutor."



He started to drive off. "Why would your tutor hug you?"



I looked over at my dad and smiled. "He's nice."



"Okay," he replied apathetically. "You notice the car?"



"Yeah, Dad; couldn't miss it. It's bright red."



"It’s a 2011 Ferrari 458 Italia. Brand spanking new, baby! Nice, isn’t she?”



"Mom's going to be pissed."



"Oooh yeah. But get this? I got you something special."



Now I was kind of excited. "What?"



He handed me a large gift bag. "Find out, kiddo!"



I dug through the bag and pulled out a large box. I opened up the lid and looked inside: three lacy

thongs in the colors hot pink, baby blue and red. And a picture of a fat guy – insanely fat.”



Looking over at my dad, who was sneering, I said sarcastically, “Gee, thanks, Dad. Some thongs that are

Mom’s size and a picture of a really fat guy. You shouldn’t have.”



Now he started to crack up. “Now, Alisha, don’t think of it that way.” He grabbed one of the thongs and

held it up. “Think of it as a motivator: with the right diet and exercise, you’ll be able to wear them.”



“That doesn’t help any.”



“See, Alisha, you have a choice: you can be your mom’s size and be wearing the sexy outfits she wears.”

He put the thong back in the bag and pointed to the fat guy. “Or you can look like that fat guy and live a

miserable life.”



“Or I could just be me.” I rolled my eyes.



“No.”

“Why do I have to be either Mom or that fat guy?”



“Because, I’m trying to make a point here, sweetie,” he replied as he took my hand into his and

squeezed. “But, tell me, Alisha, that tutor of yours – what’s with him?”



“He helps me with math and homework, Dad. Isn’t that what you pay him for?”



“Don’t play stupid, Alisha.” My dad looked over at me and grinned. “You know what I meant.”



I shrugged. “I don’t get what you’re saying.”



“Why’s he so bizarre?”



I shrugged again. “Beats me.”



“Oh, yeah, don’t do anything to piss your mom off.”



“Why?”



“She got back home a few hours ago.”



“From where?”



“Dr Randolph’s.”



“That plastic surgeon in Seattle?”



He nodded. “Double Ds. I guess she wasn’t satisfied with those Cs she had put in a few years ago.”



“Gross.”



“Alisha!” My dad looked over at me and smiled. “Don’t. Be nice. You know how much your mom hates

when you bitch about her new surgeries.”



“But, Dad, it is gross! Her boobs were already too big with those Cs – and now double Ds? Ugh.”



Breast and butt implants. Facelift. Lip injections. Liposuction. Tummy tuck. Nose job. Botox. Laser hair

removal. What was even real about her anymore? Her body dysmorphic disorder.



He just sneered.



“Mom’s sick,” I mumbled. “She needs help.”



“Sick in the head,” he replied as he focused his attention back on the road. “There’s no psych doc who

can help her at this point.”

The therapy sessions never helped, the pills were useless, and the hypnosis was practically a joke.

Perfection was her greatest desire. Youth was what she wanted back, but yet was never able to achieve.



Ten years younger than my mom, my dad, Landon, was thirty four years old. My mom always told me

that the first two things she noticed about him were his blue as blue can be eyes – electric blue, as she

would call them; and his excellent smile. Working as a top model while also cultivating an exercise and

diet business with his father, it was weird to think that the then eighteen-year-old would fall for

someone like my mom – who was twenty-eight at the time. Then again, there was obviously the appeal:

she was a plastic surgeon, and a hot one at that.



“So, with that said,” began my dad, “she can’t bitch about my new car.”



“Because she got new boobs, right?”



“Exactly! If she’s able to get new boobs, I’m able to get a new car! Fair deal, wouldn’t you say?”



I nodded. “But…neither of you needed the, uh, new equipment, right?”



He narrowed his eyes and sneered. “Hey, one more word negative word about her boobs or my car, and

you’ll find that fat guy sleeping in your bed tonight!”



“Nah. I’d prefer my tutor.”



My dad looked at me like I was a crazed maniac. “Nuh uh! No weirdos sleeping anywhere in our house.”



“Then that means that fat guy can’t either. So there!”



“He’s just fat.”



“And Rob’s just…skinny.”



“Skinny and weird!”



“I suppose you have a point.”



“That guy worries me, Alisha. The way he hugged you, my god! You would have thought he was trying to

molest you.”



“Dad!”



“What? It did!”



“It was just a bear hug. No biggie.”



“You better not be trying to butter me up for a conversation about how you have a boyfriend and he’s

your freak of a tutor.”



“I’m not.”

“You sure? Because you know how angry your mom and I would be if we found out that you were dating

that freak.”



“Dad, chill. He’s just my tutor,” I lied.

Chapter ???



Rob’s mom’s real name was Bertha – Bertha Sutherland. Her ugly name suited her ugly personality well;

that woman was a monster! She wouldn’t go by it, though; instead, she went by Beth or Birdie or her

prostitute name: Raven. Usually Raven or Birdie. But being as I hated her, I referred to her as Raven –

almost always.



I was over at the shithole – err, I meant, Rob’s house – again. It had been a few weeks since I last saw his

mom Raven, and she looked quite a bit different. Her usual fairly flat stomach was now protruding.

Instead of having herself all dolled up with her makeup and hair all done, she looked terrible: her under

eyes were dark and sunken in, as were her cheeks; bright red alienated both her cheeks; and blemishes

and cuts dotted her face – though sparingly. And her hair, it was greasy, ratty and limp.



Walking over toward the living room – which was trashed with random shit, like food wrappers, moldy

food, tampon boxes, used condoms and used up lube, and other stuff that I wouldn’t dare touch –, Rob

and I noticed Raven sprawled out on the three-seater couch. She was wearing only a lacey black push-up

bra along with a black lace thong. Rob turned away when her eyes met his and stared coldly.



“I need my fucking crank, you fucking skinny ass freak!” she said to him, her voice high and whiny.



While turned around, Rob mumbled, “Why – why are you in just your…underwear?”



Raven looked over at me and frowned. “What you starin’ at, whore?”



I continued to look at her, which just pissed her off even more. She picked up an old bottle of lube and

thrust it at Rob’s back. It hit dead-center. Finally he turned around and faced the monster – err, I meant

her. Heh. As he circled his thumbs around one another and avoided making eye contact with her, she

started sneering. “I can smell your smelly ass from here. When’s the last time you washed that stanky

body of yours?”



Rob definitely didn’t smell like roses and fresh showery smells, but he didn’t smell raunchy. For a guy

who only washed his hair about twice a month – four times at the ultimate max – and who showered

just as equally –, he didn’t smell all that bad. I think the saving factors were the fact that he wore

deodorant and Curve cologne. Plus he always smelled like cigarettes – fresh or stale, it didn’t matter; he

always had that odor on him. So, I think that was what covered up the fact that he didn’t get wet and

lathered up with soap much at all. You really couldn’t even tell he rarely washed his hair because it was

ratted and styled like a complete mess, so it already looked homely. And yeah, as you guessed it, his

clothes didn’t get washed often either; once a month, max. My boyfriend was a bacteria fest, but I loved

him anyway. At least it was just dirt and sweat and grim, not diseases and infections and STDs.



“What smell?” I asked, narrowing my brows. “Rob doesn’t smell raunchy.”



Raven continued to sneer. “Cause girls like you like the smell of stank – it gets you all hot and bothered,

don’t it?”



“What?”



“A skinny ass like him smells like stanky ass. You like that smell, don’t you? Cause you whores who use

expensive perfumes and shit think y’all are better than others, huh? That’s why you like that stank smell

of his.”



“Mom! Stop it!” murmured Rob.



“Does her pussy smell like a fucking perfume fest, too? I bet that little bitch douches it every day with

some high end pussy douche. Rich little fucks like to do it ‘cause they naturally got ‘em stanky pussies. I

bet that’s why she likes your stanky ass smell – ‘cause she’s naturally got a stanky pussy.”



“You’re gross, Mom! Stop it!”



“Oh, and for the record,” I began, eyeing her coldly, “my pussy smells just fine, thank you very much.

You’re the one whose pussy probably smells like raunchiness – and rotting semen!”



She laughed – a cackle akin to a witch’s. “Is that what you say after you let him stick it in you – to

reassure yourself that your pussy still got ‘dat high end perfume smell?”



“What?”



“His dick, duh. You’re a whore – I just know it from the look of you. Got your titties almost poppin’ out

from that low cut skank shirt of yours. Bet you’re wearing some animal printed lacey thong under those

designer ass jeans of yours. And some expensive ass bra, ‘cause you rich bitches like it high end, huh?

My skinny ass bitch of a son probably all over you ‘cause you let him fuck your pussy. Is it still tight – or

loose from all the other skinny bitches you let fuck you?”



“I’m not a whore. I’ve never slept with a guy. The only one whose pussy is loose and fucked too many

times over, is the low end hooker lying on the sofa in her thong and bra, looking all fucked up on drugs

and too many dick poundings. Did you at least enjoy the fucking that got you knocked up?”



I talked back to an elder. Bite me. Pretty much all adults say that you (kids and teenagers) should never

talk back to adults or be rude to them, but is that always a rule to follow? No; at least not when you’re

dealing with scum like Raven.

She flipped me off and spread her legs. “Eat me, whore!” she screamed. “Use your tongue to make me

cum, you little skank!”



I sneered. “I’d rather eat that rotten shit in your living room than touch my tongue to your cum

dumpster.”



Before I could hear what the bitch had to say, Rob grabbed one of my arms and pulled me out of the

room and down the hall. As we arrived in the kitchen, he stood me still and looked down at me, grinning

from ear-to-ear. “Thanks.”



“No problem. Someone had to give her a piece of her own medicine. She’s a bitch.”



He nodded. “I’d be stabbed or burned or shot if I talked that way to her…”



Yes, I stood up for myself. Never did I think I would be that rude and sassy to an adult, but my God did it

feel great! Hearing her talk so negatively about Rob, then me, totally put me into combat mode; and

instead of fighting physically, I fought verbally. That was an awesome battle!



The kitchen – well, let’s just say that… it was nasty – nasty like one of those people’s kitchens on the

show Hoarders. Trash was all over the place. Mold was on most of the appliances. Nasty food and God-

knows-what stains were all over the counters and floor, and even the ceiling! And there were

cockroaches and moths and worms and other creepy crawlers all over the place. Oh, and most of the

food was expired, molded, stale – disgusting. Rob told me that he once had to eat five live cockroaches

for his mom and her boyfriend’s amusement. And then once, when he was a kid, he got so desperate for

food that he cooked up some bugs. At first I didn’t believe him and thought he was just BSing me, but

then I saw how serious he looked and then I started to put two and two together, and I realized that it

was true – that his mom would do shit like that, or that he’d get desperate enough to do something

nasty like that.



Rob opened the fridge and looked inside. I was able to take a long glance inside before I had to look

away – for fear I’d vomit. There was a gallon of new milk, packets of meat and cheese, and then the

nasty shit: a vial of blood, dozens of dead roaches, a dead tarantula, some drug needles and a bloody

rag.



“Ew!” I said as I watched Rob pull out the gallon of milk. “How can you drink from that jug knowing it

was in… there?”



He shoved off some garbage on the counter and put the milk down. “It’s either that or starve to death.”



“But, what’s with the blood?”



“My mom needed blood from me ‘cause she’s gotta turn in a blood sample tomorrow.”



I cringed. “But – but –“



Smiling as he looked over at me, he brought a hand to my shoulder and squeezed. “Don’t even ask me

about the bloody thing in there… that’s a, uh, long story.”

“Care to example the dead roaches and tarantula?”



He laughed at the disgusted face I made. “One of my tarantulas died and I still gotta bury him, so that’s

why he’s in there. As for those roaches: some idiot left the door open and before they reclosed it, the

roaches got in – and ultimately died from the cold.”



“And you just left them in there?!”



Rob shrugged his shoulders. “It happened yesterday. I’ve been busy with homework and school and

taking care of my brother and sister. I didn’t have any time to chuck ‘em out.”



Instead of being able to continue to question Rob, I saw something move from the corner of my eye.



“Wob,” said a toddler’s voice. “I hungry. I hungry!”



When I looked I saw a little boy who looked just a little above three feet, with dark brown hair and big

dark green eyes. He looked real thin and pasty white – and dirty, like he hadn’t taken a bath for awhile.



“Wobbbb!” whined the little boy as he clutched at his stomach. “I hungry! I eat! I eat!”



I tried to walk up to the little boy, but instead of allowing for me to approach him, he flashed me a dirty

look and backed away. “Who you? Who you? Who you?”



Rob approached the little boy and picked him up. “She’s my girlfriend, Alisha,” he cooed to the child.

“She’s nice. You’ll like her.”



“Alisha,” began Rob, looking over at me and grinning, “this is Jason. He’s two years old.” Rob then

looked at Jason and said, “Jason, this is Alisha.”



Jason looked over at me and began to smile. “She nice. She nice girl.”