The Rebel

Liam

Liam

“What do you need to buy?” Dylan snorts angrily into the phone, while I hear clanking noises and some cursing in the background. Of course, I’m calling him at a bad time again. At lunchtime the restaurant is always full.

“I’ve just said it. A bed.”

“What for? You have a bed. And it’s not small.”

“I need a new one.”

A little silence sets in the line, then Dylan begins to speak as if he had just got the idea.

“Okay, a new bed. I see.” I hear the distorted noise of him shouting with one of the waiters, then he speaks again. “So, you’re not coming to taste wine? The new supplier is really promising.”

“Is that today? f**k. I forgot.”

“Yeah, tonight.”

I breathe out with concern, because I really need to get over this damn bed-buying issue. I’ve been putting it off for weeks. Weeks? Years, actually.

“I try to close earlier today, but I still have a patient at 5, and after that I still need to do the bed thing. Are you coming?”

“To buy your bed?” he asks, and I can almost see his eyebrows run up his forehead. I’m just nuts.

“Ehmm…”

“It’s going to look damn good if we show up together at a furniture shop and begin to test the beds.” I laugh out, and he does the same at the other end of the line. “I’ll say you’re my chick.”

“What? Why would I be the woman?”

“Why do you think?” he asks with a tone as if I should know the answer. “No one would believe it about me, you handsome thing, but— “

“Shut up. Just forget about it!” I snort at him.

“It might actually be good fun. And if it’s a bed, you should buy one with iron bars. It’s good for a lot of things while having s*x,” he continues giving me a hard time, but I interrupt.

“I’ll be at Villains for eight.” And with that, I end the call.

I should go on holiday… but honestly… I don’t feel too motivated. Dylan can’t leave the restaurant now, and I don’t feel like travelling on my own. There’s my grandparents’ holiday home in Greenhaven, where Lily and I spent our childhood summers but I’m not even in the mood for that. My mother used to say everything is nicer if you have someone to share them with, and I have to give it to her. I don’t take loneliness very well, I miss Zoey, but quite possibly, I’m just missing someone I can come home to. For whom I can hardly wait for work to finish, whom I can tell about my day.

Sometimes the sight of the empty apartment makes me sick, as I close the door behind me in the evening. I don’t understand how Dylan is able to spend months on board the boat all by himself. I would go crazy. Of course, he functions very differently than me. With his past… no wonder he hates humans. We’ve been friends since forever, and I know what things he went through as a kid. At least, I know about most of it, and the rest he didn’t tell me, I can put together.

My parents have seen him as their son since I first took him home in dirty clothes, and hungry. We were ten, and Dylan was placed into our class. He was the problem child, with a troubled background. When he first entered the scene – mid-term – the cliques had formed themselves, everybody had a friend. He was just hanging loose, not belonging to anyone, but he didn’t even try to make friends. His hair had grown long, he was walking around with a grumpy face, and you had the feeling he was always on the edge. As if he was forever watching behind his back, expecting to be attacked. He was tense and rejecting the others, so even the boys more open to be friendly with him were put off. He was mostly alone and spent even the breaks on his own, kicking around pebbles. I also had my own circle of friends, but we, with our stupid acts of mischief were harmless compared to other gangs.

Boys from older classes regularly gave Dylan a hard time, but he always faced them with his chin high and teeth clenched. He was a daredevil, almost insane, like one who had nothing to lose. They either hated him or – just like me – secretly admired his toughness, and wanted to be his mate.

Once, when the older kids spotted me to be their target for bullying, Dylan was also nearby. It wasn’t the first time that they took away our food, threw our books around, and did crap like that. These were power games among boys, which happen in any school. I was tall even back then, but so skinny that I hardly had a shadow. In a sprint I would have left behind all the older kids, no question about that, but my pride kept me from running. Especially at school, with all my classmates watching. They were pushing me, teasing me and saying things like my sandwich was s**t, and I should tell my mother to prepare one with ham the next day. I had no chance alone against them, and I wasn’t going to get myself beat to pulp. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Dylan crouched near the fence, on the ground. He was chewing on a blade of grass, acting cool. I tried to make eye-contact with him, getting him to come over and stand by me, with my will. I don’t know why, as he himself wasn’t older than me, but I really hoped he would help. And the miracle happened.

Suddenly, from up close, I heard his voice from behind. He said, “Give him his sandwich back.” The boys were shifting their eyes between us, but I was as surprised as them. Out of the blue, I began to believe that I had hypnotic abilities. Then that older student reached my sandwich out to Dylan, and laughed out, “If you want it so badly, come, dwarf, and get it. You take it back to him.” I looked at his hand, and knew too well what was going to happen. Inside, I prayed that Dylan wouldn’t fall for the trick, but he did just that. As he reached out for the sandwich, the boy pulled his hand back and passed my snack on to his friend. They were loudly laughing at us, but didn’t have much time to be happy, because Dylan took the right moment to collide into the boy’s stomach with his head, who fell backwards. With that, the fight broke out, and I had no other choice but to throw myself in the middle of the pile beating whomever I could. The teacher on duty separated us, but by that time everybody’s nose was bleeding and our clothes were hanging off us in rags. We spent the rest of the day on the principal’s corridor, on one side Dylan and I, and the older students on the other. We didn’t talk, only looked at each other at times, with serenity. Then, as the principal called me into his office for the first time, I turned back at the door and looked at Dylan, who slowly pulled his face into a smile. That was the first time I saw him smiling since he set foot into our school. I was sore everywhere, my snack was lost, but on that afternoon, I found a friend for life.

From then on, we talked more often and spent more and more time in one another’s company. I, of course, felt much cooler now that a tough guy like Dylan Stark was my friend, and he, perhaps thanks to me, found his voice with the others and managed to conform somewhat.

It became evident that he never took any food with him, and always glued his eyes on mine as if he was going to jump on in and gulp it down in one. When I asked him if he wanted some of it, he always said no, and that he was never hungry. He lied, even my ten-year-old brain was able to decipher that, but he had too much dignity to admit that his stomach was empty. When I asked him about his family, he gave brief answers, and it was obvious he found the topic unpleasant. But from the fact he was the only one who didn’t have a neatly prepared lunch box, I could tell that their home couldn’t have been a happy place. I began to bring more and more food to school from home, and at lunch I made a show of how I wasn’t able to finish it all alone, because it’s too much, but my mother would make a fuss at home if I took the food back. Eventually he, slowly and mercifully, as if he wasn’t doing me a favour, agreed to eat half of my lunch. We never discussed this issue in more depth. I sensed I would hurt his dignity if I asked too much about his home issues.

I also became aware that he had some blue and purple bruises on his body. Whenever we had to get changed for sports, Dylan always put on his clothes privately, in the toilet, yet, I could still spot his injuries. I had come from a dream family; child abuse was unknown to me. I couldn’t even imagine what it is like when someone is beaten at home by their parents. I won’t say I was never slapped by my father every now and then when I did something utterly stupid, but it couldn’t be compared to what was going on at Dylan’s place.

After a while my mother became aware of my suddenly grown appetite, and she actually asked me what I was doing with that amount of food. I felt I would betray my new friend if I told her the truth, so I tried to convince her that I was eating that much on my own. She wasn’t really buying it, but left it at that. I think the mystery became evident to her, when, weeks after the fight, Dylan came home with me one time to work together on some school project. My parents made him feel welcome, and didn’t comment on his clothes that spoke of poverty, or on his sulky behaviour. They chose to ignore that he swallowed the lunch almost without chewing, and after this incident, my mother made the double snack with her own hands. Although delicately, they tried asking about his family, but at those times Dylan retired into his shell, or, if he was willing to share something, he made up all kinds of mystical stories about his mother, who had no time to make food for him and his six-year-old sister, because she’s a lawyer who is on the road a lot. As a kid, I didn’t care much what my friend’s parents were doing, but later my mother told me that they had their own suspicions even then. Somehow the picture wasn’t complete, especially because at times Dylan would say contradicting things about his mother. We had been friends for a year when he admitted that his mother was often in hospital, because something was wrong with her head. She had a brain tumour, but as a child you don’t really call it that yet.

One time, when Dylan didn’t show up at school for two days, instead of going home, I went to their place after classes were finished. I knew where he lived although he never invited me in. The house was really run-down, but I didn’t ascribe much significance to that. I knocked, I rang the bell, and although for a long time there was no answer, I didn’t give up, as I heard some noises from inside. The door only opened after several minutes, and a black-haired woman stood in front of me, with a broken expression on her face. If I remember correctly, I stared at her with an open mouth for a while, and that for various reasons. From the first moment I was sure that the woman was Dylan’s mother, since they looked so similar. The dark hair, the brown eyes, the line of their nose… their blood relation could not be denied. Mrs. Stark was still quite young, at least she looked that way compared to my mother. Although her hair was unkempt and her face and neck were covered with bruises, there was no doubt that she once was a very beautiful woman. Then, though, as she stood in front of me, holding onto the door handle, she somehow seemed tired, and… perhaps distant. It was as if she found it hard to focus on me, and the words were also coming haltingly out of her mouth. I, as my mother had raised me, introduced myself like a good boy and told her I was looking for Dylan. She just looked at me with puzzlement, didn’t invite me in, and I almost broke my waist leaning sideways, I was so desperate to take a peek inside. Dylan is ill. You can’t meet him now,” she finally said, while shaking her head with difficulty and resignation. “But I… have brought his homework,” I tried to press on, as I didn’t really buy her story about the illness. Dylan had a body of steel; I had never seen him ill before.

There were regularly marks on his body, but it was also evident to me that these had nothing to do with any illness. Yet, Mrs. Stark was adamant, she asked for my homework notes and promised to hand them over to Dylan. With disappointment I said goodbye to her, and with a long face, started down the stairs, when she shouted after me with a weak voice,” What did you say your name was?” I turned back, hoping she would still invite me inside. “Liam Parker. I’m Dylan’s best friend,” I pointed to my chest with pride as if this was some kind of a high rank. The woman looked at me languidly for a while, and then, as if a weak smile was crossing her tired face. Hope was waking in me once again that she would call me in, but all she said was, “You’re a good boy, Liam Parker.” And she was already closing the door on me.

Needless to say, I immediately felt desirous to prove the opposite. I walked around the house, then, holding onto the gutter, began to climb towards the flat roof on the first floor. It was quite a steep stunt as I kept myself balanced on the tiles on all fours, but I had a stubborn determination to not leave that place until I had talked to Dylan. I wanted to see him, to make sure he is okay, he didn’t have a more serious injury than we both were by that time used to. From the dislocated and cracked tiles, I quickly understood that I wasn’t the only one who used the gutter and the roof as an alternative escape route. I was certain that whenever necessary, my mate was also coming and going there.

Crawling, I approached the window, and as I peeked in, I spotted Dylan at once lying on the bed, with one hand under his head, and with the other, throwing a rubber ball against the wall. I immediately knew why he had skipped school. The injuries were this time under his eyes, and these, of course, could not be hidden under any clothes. My stomach went into a cramp with helpless rage about having to see him like that, and no matter how much I didn’t want to seem like a weakling, my eyes welled up. Unlike his, because when we looked into each other’s eyes, I couldn’t decide if it was shock or anger that dominated on his face. He jumped up as if bitten by a snake, ran to the window and yanked it open. I found it strange that he was moving his head from side to side with nervousness, even looking out into the street, like someone smelling danger. With restrained voice, he told me off, asking what the hell I was doing there, and if I was out of my mind.

Honestly, his reaction hurt my feelings, because to hell with it, we were mates and I hoped he would be happy to see me. Even if he wasn’t going to dance around with joy – that wasn’t his style – but at least, he wouldn’t yell my head off for having come to see him. I was naïve, didn’t sense any danger, unlike him, whose survival instinct had reached perfection by the age of ten, and was on the edge to jump, to escape at any moment. When he cursed at me, saying I was an arse for going there when his dad was likely to show up anytime, I didn’t know he was actually scared for me.

Once I saw his father from afar, a large, well-dressed, decent-looking chap. You couldn’t tell from his looks that he was a sadist beast who gets wasted at home every night and beats his family to pulp. To this day I don’t think Mr. Stark would have harmed me, the kid from next door if he found me in his house when he got home, but Dylan by all means didn’t want to risk it. Just like his mother, he didn’t invite me in, but joined me on the roof, followed me down the gutter, and said he would walk part of the way with me to my home. He pulled the hood over his head and we were walking silently side by side on the street. By that time, I didn’t find it necessary to ask where his injuries had come from. I knew his father had beaten him, and by the look of it, not only him but his mother too. His sister, Cat was only six at the time, and although it was at the tip of my tongue, I never actually felt it right to ask whether she was also getting some of the beatings. I asked if he wanted to have dinner with us, but he declined, and I didn’t want to pressure him. He made me promise that I would never go their house again, and we agreed to that. It was all too depressing, but I was clueless as to what I could do.

My mother saw that I was troubled about something, and she wouldn’t stop until she could get it out of me what the problem was. They both knew there was something going on at Dylan’s, but to interfere with a family’s private life is always a touchy issue. Naturally, mother couldn’t hold herself back, she wanted to help at all costs without taking the family away from the kids. I heard that in the evening she and my father were having an argument whether they should inform child and family services or the police. Back then this whole issue was too much for me, too painful and too shocking. I was ten, same as Dylan, yet, with his bitter experiences and survival instinct he was years ahead of me.

My mother eventually went to see Liz, Dylan’s mother, and offered help, but it wasn’t at all easy. Mrs. Stark, perhaps out of fear or lethargy, I have no idea why, but wasn’t willing to witness against her husband. We didn’t know it then, but it was already too late for her, anyway.

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