Twenty Øne Piløts||Imagines

Afraid to be Touched//Josh

Word Count:1912
[!!Trigger warning!!] This imagine deals with panic attacks and haphephobia.
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Everyone has their fears, their phobias, and their pet peeves, the things that drove them crazy. For some people, it was spiders, bugs, snakes, or any of the like. For others, it was the dark, the ocean, or flying.

But for some reason, when the girl at Josh's school couldn't stand to be touched, everyone thought she was a freak.

Josh didn't think so. He felt bad for her. Secretly, he had admired the girl for years from far away. She usually sat silently in the corner of whatever class she happened to be in.

He thought she was beautiful.

No one knew why she hated being touched so much(though Josh had a few theories that had begun with the unexplained bruises he noticed from time to time), but it was more than just a dislike of it-- it was a petrifying fear. It had started one day when someone had been passing her in the hallway, accidentally running into her shoulder, and they had grabbed her shoulders to steady themselves. This had flung her into a full-fledged panic. She collapsed on the ground, shaking, sobbing, hoarse screams spilling from her lips. Teachers had rushed to her aid, attempting to calm her as they rubbed her back soothingly. It had only made it worse. She screamed, scrambling to push their hands off of her with desperate screams of, "Don't touch me! Please, don't touch me!" Josh had witnessed the whole thing himself. She was sent home early, and for the rest of the day, whispers could be heard regarding the girl.

She always looked uncomfortable. Josh made it his aim to make her feel more comfortable in whatever subtle ways he could, even when all he could give was a gentle smile from across the room, which she was never able to return.

She no doubt heard the whispers about herself in the halls-- the insulting nicknames, the stories people made up to explain why she was the way she was. Josh wished he could make all the pain go away with a gentle hug-- but that wasn't an option.

When the spring semester rolled around and the seating arrangments in class were changed, teachers were sure to keep her at the back, for fear of setting off one of her episodes during a lesson. Josh found himself seated next to her in the back of his math class-- something that both excited and terrified him.

He was excited, hoping that this might be his chance to try to get to know the quiet girl that everyone else avoided. But at the same time, he was afraid he would slip up, saying something he shouldn't, or accidentally brushing her arm as he passed, or that he would just forget and reach out to touch her without thinking.

So he decided he'd take it slow, only smiling at her when he sat down the first day back from winter break.

The second and third classes passed without any excitement.

During the fourth class, he noticed her frantically searching through her backpack, coming up empty-handed. She finally gave up, setting the bag on the floor as she stared blankly at her open notebook.

"Do you need a pencil?" Josh asked her quietly while the teacher's back was to them. She shook her head, eyes slightly wide. He knew it wasn't true though-- she was probably just terrified of the idea that he might touch her hand when he passed the pencil to her.

Ignoring her answer, he reached in his bag, pulling out a freshly sharpened pencil. He inched the very end of it between his fingertips, leaving as much of the pencil untouched for her to grab, and held it out to her.

For a moment, she just stared at it, as if unaware of what she was meant to do next. Then she looked back and forth between the pencil and his face. Cautiously, she reached a hand out to take it, and Josh was sure to be as still as possible so he didn't frighten her. She grabbed the eraser of the pencil, pulling it out of his fingers, thanking him with a small smile-- a smile that made his heart soar.