Lirio felt alone. Deeply. He was alone when he was at home with his brother and his parents. He was alone when he was at his grandparents’ place and he was alone in class surrounded by other 23 kids. It hadn’t always been like this. He didn’t even realise when this radical change had happened.

  But he was alone. He would try to do what the others were doing, hoping to feel less lonely. But by trying to be someone else, he only ended up feeling more isolated and different. It doesn’t take much for middle schoolers to label you as different, weird, or abnormal. A name is enough for them to become merciless.

  Lirio was ‘guilty.’ He had that bizarre name that clashed with the others: Luca, Matteo and Leonardo. And as if that wasn’t enough, he had shown to be quite sensitive. And it’s not ‘normal’ for a 12-year-old boy to be sensitive. Twelve-year-olds are supposed to be reckless, smelly, cheeky, and tough. They’re supposed to chase girls, smoke, and drink. They only hang out with the gang. Boys versus girls. They’re supposed to play football and skip school. He didn’t get it. He didn’t even understand his female peers, for that matter—thinking about makeup, about how to get the boys’ attention, yet pretending not to care.

  It wasn’t like that before. It wasn’t so lonely. He had a friend: Viola. They would meet during the school break and often even after school. They would study together. They would get a gelato. They would watch movies.

  But then…

  Something had happened. She had changed or maybe he had. Maybe both of them. She had started to do what the other kids were doing. She had started smoking and going out on Saturday nights. He had started perceiving her as distant. He felt she was elsewhere when they were together. She began lying to him. And he knew. He had noticed that each time she would look down before doing it, as if she was trying to concentrate. But it was still ok for him. He would have accepted her with her virtues and her flaws. Friends help stand by each other even during hard times… or so he thought.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  But one day…

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” she had asked him.

  “Like what?” he had asked back, confused.

  “Do you think you’re better than me? Because you don’t smoke?”

  “Viola, what are you talking about?”

  “I’ve seen how you look at me when I smoke. With contempt/disdain.”

  “That's absolutely untrue, how did that cross your mind—”

  “I put up with everything until today. In the name of all the time spent together. In the name of our friendship. But I can’t take it anymore. You’re not better than me and I think that not seeing or hearing you, for a while, will make me feel better.”

  He wanted to respond. To say that, even if he was worried about her new habits because he cared about her, he didn’t feel superior or better in any way. He didn’t mean to give off a judging look. He wanted to ask her many things. He wanted to say something, justify himself for things he hadn’t done, but— the moment he was supposed to speak… he fell silent. And she walked away.

  Days, weeks went by. She never got in touch. He wouldn’t text her, he wouldn’t contact her because he didn’t want to bother her. He hoped she would be the one to come back to him. She saw his behavior as a proof he didn’t care about their friendship. Sometimes they would bump into each other on the stairs, at school. He would look at her and wait for her to greet him like she would do once. Instead, she would walk past him—refusing to even glance at him—looking fed up. He would see her chatting with people, laughing with them. Sometimes he almost had the impression they were talking about him, laughing about him.

  At home, his brother and his parents wouldn’t understand. His brother was one of those people everyone knows of. He had many friends. He wouldn’t even notice If one of his friends had disappeared overnight since he had another 100 and he remembered the name of 1/10 of them. His father didn’t care about him. And his mother would say: “It doesn’t matter. You will make new friends.” Maybe that thought could have helped him, if his mother had shown that she truly believed it.

  Songs, movies, series, books. Nothing seemed to understand. Everyone talked about broken hearts and relationships ended badly. Nobody talked about how hard it is to lose a friend. Nobody talked about the pain and the rage that were destroying Lirio.