1987
March 14th - I was shown a future of unrequited love and heartache. I knew then that I was doomed to a life of longing and regret. All men leave, even if they weren't fully there at all.
April 19th - On my 16th birthday, I spent all of my money trying to impress people I needed to be my friends, but wasn't very successful at hiding how much I amused them. I was the oddity, the freak that was entertaining. It was the beginning of the Jester.
Summer - My family turned against me. My mother had given me her old car, and someone kept calling it in as an abandoned vehicle. My aunt Diane wanted the car moved, and started her campaign to get me kicked out of my grandmother's house. I was going to a gay youthgroup at the Damien Center, and she had me followed one night to see where I was going. Stupidly, she told everyone I was going to a devil place because of the name Damien.
September - I came home to find my home, no...my room specificly was destroyed. While at the Damien center, someone came into a locked house, with a big guard dog, went to my room only and destroyed everything with a hammer. Only my aunt knew my grandmother would be out that night. Only my aunt had a key to the house. The guard dog was owned previously by my aunt. I still remember carrying everything to the dumpster, but only at 2am because my grandmother didn't want the neighbors to see it and question.
October - my best friend Charles spent the night. After laying around me in shorts and insisting on cuddling, he had the nerve to get disgusted with me when I tried to initiate sex. He went home the next day and never spoke to me again. Such is the folly of trusting friendship.
November - was told that my aunt threatened not to come around unless I was kicked out. My grandmother told me to stay in my room whenever she and her boyfriend came around to avoid 'trouble'. I learned how to hide in that cave of a room that year, to hide from my voice. I tried once to get help from my mother, as she is my aunt's sister, and she told me there was nothing she could do, that's why she moved all the way to Mooresville. I tried to call my father, who told me he wouldn't do anything for me either. I spent thanksgiving in my room. No one asked for me.
December - I decided to avoid christmas alltogether. I came home after the new year and my grandmother, acting all dire, handed me forty dollars and told me she sold my car for junk. My aunts boyfriend, drinking on Christmas day, took a sledge hammer to my car in front of everyone. They said nothing, just watched.
in 1987, I learned there is no love that can last, no friend that is ever true, nor any safety that can be trusted. Every year at this time, I go to my grandmothers and find a corner to sit still. I turn the Jester into subtle sarcastic jabs and watch them act as if nothing ever happened. My mother who's very words are "fuck family", will laugh with them and play the independent sister. My aunt diane, having a new and kinder boyfriend, will treat me with idle curiosity but never, never mention all she has done. My other aunt Theresa will dolt over her grandchild, never admitted how she always treated one of her sons better than the other.
in 2007, the family convinced my grandmother not to cook so much as she's 84. I thought I'd email everyone and make sure all the general foods were covered. Asking my mother, who's whoring herself out to a rich man whom she loathes in an attempt to get a house, for their email addreses, her response was "fuck family, fuck organization". She and I haven't spoken in two weeks, and thinking on it, we haven't really spoken about anything but her endeavor to became a rich whore. She asked me this year if I'd bring sandrah around and pretend she was my girlfriend so her rich guy would like me. Apparently he hates fags and fat people.
Today I took a cake to my grandmothers and had to re-explain why I wasn't coming. Ofcourse she turned the remorse into grief about herself. No one in my family says they're sorry, no one in my family admits to mistakes, no one in my family acknowledges the truth. While sitting there, my aunt diane, the same fucking bitch that helped shape me into this non trusting, afraid to love, fucking freak of a person has the nerve to call and ask that I look at her computer.
Many, many things have happened since them. Not all bad, but my life started when I got away from that place. I carry all of this with me, and I've tried so hard to escape it, but I can't.
in 2007, I sit here on Thanksgiving with my two most beloved friends, Ookas and Shadow. They are just now sitting down for dinner and what I call the great performance. I can just envision one of them asking about me, and my grandmother will say "he's not feeling well". Whoever will just nod and contine shoveling too salty food down the hatch. No one acknowledges.
I can't pretend anymore.
