Sidemen Shots

Mock Me Once, Shame on Me; Mock Me Twice, Shame on You

They are laughing at him again. (Harry hasn't actually said anything this time.)

Uncomfortable, Harry huffs a mimicking, humourless laugh, the sound painful even to his own ears. He doesn't understand why they're laughing at him this time, but there's no way he would be able to visibly show his bafflement. They would just take it as an excuse to mock his gormless expression, like hyenas on the carcass of his social battery.

Ethan repeats something Harry had said earlier, for the second time in the last five minutes, and Harry feels his face physically twitch in response. His nose scrunches, his eyes blink together intensely, and his lips curl. Part of him feels angry, but he mentally talks himself through not reacting. He wants a reaction. People always want a reaction from you. DON'T give them one.

Agitated, Harry let's his eyes fall closed as he breathes in an ample inhale, exhaling slowly. He swallows, makes his eyes reopen again, then swallows a second time. His hand suddenly itches for his hair. Not now. Not here.

"You alright, Bog?" Tobi asks, but the lingering mirth in his voice fires up something deep in Harry's brain, irritates something in the darkest pits of his stomach. His jaw clenches, at the same time that his hands tighten in to fists.

"I'm fine," Harry grits out, thankfully adding enough normal people flair to it to get Tobi off his case. (His mom told him a long time ago to stop calling it that, but what does she know?) Tobi doesn't do more than nod, lips pursed, and move to clear off his board.

"Fucking look at him," Ethan cackles, pointing, and Harry... Well, he knows it's not meant with any malicious intent, but it's definitely not meant with any kind intent either. "He's just fucking standing there."

What else is he supposed to do? They didn't give him a chair. (Is it the way he's standing? Harry can't help that, no matter how many appointments he attended for it as a child.)

At least this time Simon bats at him lightly with his hand, smiling as he tells him, "Shut up, man. You've made that joke twice already."

Josh makes a deflecting joke at Ethan, and Vik stays silent without anything mean to say to him, but Harry doesn't feel as supported as he should in that moment.

"Right, next one," Harry continues diligently - stubbornly, one could argue. He refuses to give in to what feels to him like bait. They've thrown the line overboard, mealworm hooked on, now they're just waiting for Harry to stupidly chomp onto it. Hook, line, and sinker, his mind imitates Ethan and his irritating little drawl.

The rest of the recording passes much the same and the whole time Harry's walking the tightest of ropes above his rage. He can feel it bubbling, hurt and ugly and misjudged, and it's eating him up from the inside. All it will take - actually, Harry doesn't quite know what it will take; all he knows is that one wrong move could make him slip, sending him falling face first into the pit. That's what they're waiting for. Don't bite.

It's not what the boys are specifically looking for, exactly, hopefully never would be, they're supposed to be his friends, but it's not like they'd be disappointed if Harry made a fool of himself.

There he goes, the spast- ('Harry!', he can hear in his mom's appalled voice, interrupting him). Having his little tantrum, as expected.

Instead, Harry smiles at his friends, as well as at the camera. It's wide and forced, unnatural, and he feels irritated at having to accommodate these people, even when he's struggling to keep a handle on himself. (It's not fair.) It makes him feel better sometimes, in a weird sort of way, to pretend that his autism is a separate part of himself. An animal in need of reining in, of breaking down to fit the norms of human society. His brain is foreign to his own body, is all. He has to make do with what he has, has to do his best to mind the language barrier.