FicWad

Once again I was awoken by the sound of shouting. It was a common occurrence that I was both beginning to get used to and simultaneously tire of. But I supposed that living in a home with several other foster children would do that to you, leave you with an odd hatred for noise and arguing and anything to do with people in general. Well maybe I didn't hatepeople as such, I just felt an intense dislike often in their company.

I mainly just stayed by myself, both at home and in school. I didn't have any friends but I didn't feel that I needed them. Why would I need friends when I lived in my own head, where everything that I needed was? I was a lone wolf, entirely figuratively of course, for the simple reason that I struggled to find similar people on my wavelength. Nobody thought the same as me, and it pained me to be in the company of them.

School was no problem whatsoever to me, honestly. I didn't like it, of course, because I was still forced into conformity with a load of people who were awfully tiresome and boring and mundane. Yet, the actual working, learning part of school was almost enjoyable for me. Learning was an excellent thing, because I never seemed to run out of space in my head. It was quite a wonder that my head hadn't exploded or suchlike, considering the amount of stuff that was concealed within it.

I didn't tend to share anything in my head with anyone else. Other people worried me. There were several things, actually, that worried me. Whilst I knew that my way of thinking was entirely rational and in the grand scheme of things, most of the things my classmates worried about weren't worth worrying about, there were a few things that worried me. One of those several things was definitely other people.

They worried me because they didn't seem to understand anything at all. Anything that they seemed occupied with bored me immensely, and vice versa. I knew simply that my wisdom was high above theirs, and whilst it was difficult for me to deal with their company as such, I managed.

"Gerard!" The shout came again, louder this time. I don't know why she bothered shouting me, because I wasn't going to be late. I was never late; not once. In fact, unbeknownst to her I'd been awake and dressed for the last half hour or so, looking out of the window and thinking about things that needed to be thought about.

That was another thing that worried me. Thinking. It worried me how I could go over and over the same thought in my mind, and miss the same thing each time. It worried me that I could have the thought that could unlock everything somewhere in my head, and if I didn't think it, nothing would change. It worried me how I had the potential to change the world if the need arose and yet I may never do it, because it all relied on what I thought about and interpretation.

I knew that if I told anyone else about what I worried about, they would think I was crazy. Well, they thought I was crazy anyway. My psychiatrist, Nancy, had several names for the way my mind worked, but in all honesty I didn't agree. I didn't have any disorders- quite the opposite. My way of thinking was the most rational of all, far more superior and sense-making than those who tried to name it and called me crazy. I wasn't crazy, they just didn't understand.

With the third shout, I cried out in annoyance and picked up my schoolbag, heading quickly down the stairs. The foster mother of the five boys in this house, Lily, had made us all breakfast, but I passed through the kitchen without picking anything up.

"Are you not eating again?" Lily asked, sounding concerned. I had worked out that Lily always sounded concerned where I was involved, and I think it was because of the kind of things Nancy told her about me. Nancy was a liar, I had also realised. She made things up to get money from Lily and from the school, when I didn't needa psychiatrist because there was nothing wrongwith me whatsoever. I was different, not crazy.

"I don't need to," I said simply, which was true. It's not even as if I do anything particularly athletic that would need energy, because all I did all day was sit around, in the library if I could manage, or outside if I couldn't.

Lily sighed, knowing me too well than to bother arguing. "But you've taken your pills, yes?"

I nodded, sighing dramatically through my lie. I had most definitely not taken my pills, and nor did I plan to take them. Not now and not ever. I was not going to take pills when I didn't need them. The way my mind worked was part of me, allowed me to be the person that I was, and I did not want to change that. Taking pills would change that, I had deduced after a period of time in which I'd tried to take them. I was me, without them.

"Alright, well, see you later."

That was another thing that worried me. How people said things that told you there would be later, there would be tomorrow, when they had no idea if the grand scheme of things were going to plan out like that at all.

And that was why I didn't ever tell anyone what I worried about. Because I knew they made me sound crazy. And I wasn't.

I am not crazy. I'm different. That's all.