Torn Pages

Ephemeral

Keith pov

We spent that entire day unpacking. We arrived at the new house around 9 am and I'm surprised I was up and functioning that early. I like my sleep. I get very grumpy

In the evening the house was a mess of boxes and items scattered around. The living room furniture was all pushed to one side of the living room and all the boxes were being unloaded into the other half for collection.
When you walked in, the living room was to the left and was in a circular kind of shape. The kitchen was further up ahead across from the living room. The large staircase was set in between the two rooms but the rooms were maybe 20 feet away from each other. With a large walkway in between which lead to the stairs. I hope that makes sense?? Then there was another living room across from the kitchen. I don't know why a house needs two living rooms on the same floor.

We had almost all the windows in the house open up and 5 fans set in different areas.
"When will my car be here?" I asked Christine while helping her unload the oh so sacred dishes into the white cabinets.
"It should be here tomorrow along with the van" She said.
I do have a car. It's a 2005 Chevrolet Cobalt to be exact, royal blue. It isn't the best but it was the average kind of car high school kids have. Small, used with a few chips in the windshield, a few spots of rust and mine unfortunately has a faded "Don't mess with Texas" bumper sticker from the previous owner. It's so cheesy but I've grown to like it ironically but hey it's a car and better than nothing.
I found out me and Christine's vehicles were brought up in a trailer (bringing two vehicles from two states over is very expensive and almost as bad as the moving trucks)

It was the evening and the table, living room furniture and everything for the bedrooms and we had decided to call it quits.

I wasn't done yet.
I have minor ocd and I had to unpack my boxes. The Internet rotor (wifi rotor, just rotor???) wasn't hooked up yet so I had nothing to do other than this. I was neatly folding my clothes and putting some in my dresser and some in the closet when Christine knocked on my door. I could tell it was her because of the special knock she does whenever she's asking to come in. 4 quick taps. I chuckled and smiled. "Come in" I laughed.
"How's it going?" She asked opening the door and leaning against the frame. "Good, I can't leave my boxes just lying around because it's pissing me off" I said. "He said a bad word!" Cole yelled with a mouthful of toothpaste running down the long hallway until he reached my room. He was wearing his Pokemon pyjamas and had a toothbrush sticking out from the corner of his mouth. He then ran back.
"He's got ears like a hawk" I said.
Christine laughed and came over and sat on the edge of my bed looking at me from across the room.
"You're worried about me aren't you?" I mumbled hanging up one of my many t-shirts up in the closet. I could tell she had something to say.
"Yes I am worried. I don't want the kids at school to tease you, I know that's something you'd say to a kid Meenah's age but I am legitimately worried because of what happened last semester..."
"If I don't tell anyone nobody will find out" I said.
"That is true but I'm just afraid" She said.

Last semester I told a girl who I considered a friend about my sexuality and she told everyone she knew and soon enough it spread like wildfire and I was harassed constantly for months on end.
This was Texas and many people are horribly homophobic and religious.
I like boys and that's okay. But then a few weeks of the harassing, Christine got a call from the principal. Some asshole had taped a pamphlet about "The danger of AIDS" On my locker.
I was a pussy and told the principal.
The guy was never caught.
The news died down and I had lost all of the friends remotely close to me. Thankfully I didn't have too many. They were mostly acquaintances I met in my classes. I never opened up to them much about anything really. Sure I had a few common interests with them but I never told them anything.
They didn't even know I was foster kid. Most people would be depressed but I kept my head up and pulled through another semester. It was pretty hard I'll say that.
Anyone would feel depressed if people would whisper about you and give you dirty looks in the halls, refusing to sit next to you or even work with you in projects. I became the virus of the school that nobody wanted to go near. It was like I had some really contagious disease like aura around me constantly, and people would keep away in fear of whatever the oh so terrible consequences that could occur if you were to even make eye contact with the little gay boy.
I'd taught myself to be my own best friend and that I didn't need friends to be happy. I have never taken anything for granted and I've appreciated every little thing someone would do for me. That's why I'm so happy to be with my family.
Things could be so much worse and I'm the luckiest guy in the world to have my family treat me like an actual person and not a virus.
I learned lots about myself that semester from all the time I spent alone.
I discovered parts about myself and my past I never knew. My third or fourth set of foster parents told me bits of my past.
I learned much more from Dane. Christine couldn't bring herself to talk to me about anything remotely related to my past and that's why she got Dane to do it. She was crying and holding my hand as he told me every little detail.
My history.
Oh man now this is a wild ride.
I'm not going to get into everything because it's not something I enjoy talking or even thinking about.
So this is going to be an attempt at making a very, very long story short.