August 19 • Monday
“Hello. My name is Finnley. I'm seventeen years old. I've just moved into a small town in Wyoming. This blog wasn't my idea; my therapist told me I should keep a journal before I moved. No one keeps a journal anymore, but since promised him- and I keep my promises- I decided that a different medium was in order. Mostly I'm doing it for her. She would want me to try.
“The other day I bought a book of poetry. I read it in the silence of my sunlight room with my rabbit, Rory. Poetry always speaks deeply to me in ways I don't care to define. Not like real people; not like speaking. No one reads poetry anymore- maybe that's why the world is as bad as it is.
“Well, I suppose that's it. G'bye.”
Finnley quickly scanned his writing quickly, then deleted it all. Too personal. And poetry? No one knew about that. What was he thinking? Saying "g'bye"? Mentioning his pet rabbit for goodness sakes. And he had mentioned her as well. He wasn't ready to talk about that yet. What rubbish. Breathing out slowly, he began to type again.
“Today, I go to a new school in a new town. They said a change of location would do me good- that change is good. I'm not so sure about that, but it's happening anyway, no matter how I feel. Whatever it is that I'm starting today, it will surely be interesting.”
Finnley groaned and once again deleted it. He had good thoughts, but suddenly the prospect of everyone reading them didn't make him feel so great. Maybe he should've gone with a journal. Deciding to keep his initial opener (having not thought of any better options), he typed, "Hello. My name is-" before his mother knocked on the door.
"Finnley? Finnley are you up yet?" she called through the wooden barrier. Finnley groaned and sank back in his chair, shoving his hair back and looking around the room that wasn't truly his. He had up since three am and was fully dressed, as he was most nights, but she didn't need to know that. The blog post, though... maybe he could write it after school. Maybe something interesting would have happened by then.
"Yeah Mom!" he called back. Shutting his laptop and leaving it on his desk to charge, he stood up and stretched.
"That's wonderful! The school is close enough to walk, but it'll probably take you twenty minutes or more, you really don't want to be late, especially on your first day..." Finnley chose to ignore most of what she said after that. He knew his mother very well by now, and after what had happened... well, she just got more overprotective. She was worried for him, she just didn't know the proper way to deal with it. "Make new friends!" Finnley didn't make new friends. He was shy before, and now? There was no way. "Remember to be yourself!" No one was allowed to see himself. No one would want to. "Just be happy!" It's pretty hard to be happy when you aren't. Finnley threw on a sweatshirt even as he pasted on a smile just for his mother. She didn't deserve to see the bad side of him; after all, she'd been through nearly as much as he had.
"Hi Mom," he said, pulling the door open.
"Finnley! Are you really wearing that on the first day of school? Don't you want to make a good first impression? And a sweatshirt and jeans! Finnley, it's eighty degrees out there today!" Finnley hadn't noticed the smile slide from his face, but she had, and she stopped abruptly. "Of course, I understand if you just want to lie low for a little while. Have you written your first blog post yet?" While it appeared that she was tactfully changing the subject, it was really just the same subject. Everything was the same subject these days.
Coaxing the smile back onto his face and urging it not to look too weary, he told her he hadn't. "I was going to write it this morning, but I guess I just slept in too late. I won't forget to do it tonight."
He could see his mother visibly relax when he said he slept in. It was one thing less for her to worry about. This pattern of sleep was normal to Finnley by now, but he knew that she wouldn't understand how he had it under control. It wasn't good for her to be so stressed out.
Having responded to all of her morning queries, Finnley proceeded down to the kitchen, grabbing a quick bowl of cereal before looking at the thermometer. Shoot, he thought, it really is eighty out there. Maybe I'd better change after all. Spening most of his time inside, where he was least likely to encounter other people, had lead him to have no idea what the weather was doing on any given day, let alone how to dress for it.
He had ten minutes before he had to leave. Plenty of time. He checked on Rory and gave him some food. "Wish I could stay too," Finnley whispered. His mother had retreated to her bedroom, he could hear the running water of the shower. Back in his own room, he dug through the closet. There- some shorts. He rifled through them and, pulling out a navy blue pair, changed and then shed his sweatshirt. He shivered. He felt exposed without its protection, but he had to settle for putting on his backpack rather than another layer.
When Finnley emerged, the house was quiet. His mother was nowhere in sight. Putting a quick sticky note on the door, he hurried out of the house. Being late would, after all, be a bad thing. It would make him stand out. As he opened the door, he was struck with a blazing heat, and the sun, though nearly up, was shining brightly. Despite his change of clothing, Finnley was quickly overwhelmed. He'd been out only a few times the whole summer, and everything had been cold before that, in his old town. It was a world away right now.
It was slow going to school, taking up almost all the time he had allowed himself for the walk. His route skirted around the edge of his neighborhood. On the other side was an imposing pine forest, looking dark in the bright day. He thought he saw things shifting in the woods, which further added to his discomfort. It seemed as if something was watching him, asking him what he was doing here, new in town. Finnley stopped suddenly, and turned right around to stare directly in the forest. Nothing moved. Nothing stared. Satisfied, he nodded. The heat- not to mention his anxiety- was getting to him more than it should've. It was going to be a perfectly normal day- he would slide into this town unnoticed and unbothered. It was what he was good at.
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