Crying Out Silent Read online

  “I’m not a girl.” A lie, but only a partial one.

  “Prove it.”

  I glanced at the door, praying someone would come in.

  He smiled knowingly. “It’s class time, which means no one’s gonna save your girly arse, so show me or I’ll make you.” He took a step closer.

  Scared he would actually do it, I quickly unzipped my shorts and pushed them down, along with my briefs, my dick too small to pull out. Not only that, it was trying to disappear inside my body, fear shrivelling it up, making it even smaller than it was. The doctor had said that the abnormality was due to me being intersex—or a partial hermaphrodite, since I didn’t have a vagina.

  “What the fuck!” Ant said, looking shocked. “What happened to your dick and balls?”

  “Nothing.” I quickly pulled my pants up and did the zipper, wishing I hadn’t relented.

  “Yeah, nuthin’ is defo the word, cos you’ve got nuthin’ down there. Even a baby has a bigger dick than you, and I don’t even know if you can call those balls. It looks like you’ve superglued your pussy together.”

  Tears started to well up in my eyes. I wanted to hit him for saying that, but knew I’d be the only one getting hurt. Then to my shock, he unzipped his pants and pulled out his own dick. My eyes went massive, but not because his dick was small—it was humungous!

  “The head of my cock is bigger than your whole cock,” he said. “Hell, I could hardly see your cock it’s so minute. Have you had a sex change? Cos that thing looks like an oversized clit.”

  “No!”

  “Well, if you’re lying, I’d ask for my money back, cos the cowboy doc did a shit job. Still, I’d hit that. You’re hot.” He reached for my shorts, unzipping them before I realised what he was doing.

  I smacked his hand away. “Don’t touch me!”

  His face turned vicious. “Don’t fuckin’ tell me what to do, you li’l bitch,” he spat.

  He pushed me against the wall, but instead of hitting me, he smashed his lips against mine. I was in too much shock to do anything, his kiss blindsiding me. He bit my lip, making me squeal. As soon as I opened my mouth, he slipped his tongue inside. I tried to shove him away, but couldn’t get him to budge, his chest as solid as a brick wall.

  He stopped kissing me and spun me around, pushing me into the toilet stall. I righted myself and went to leave, but he slammed me against the stall’s wall, knocking the wind out of me. Then he was yanking down my shorts, making me panic. I went to scream no, but instead jolted as a door banged. Ant instantly let go of me.

  “You in ’ere, Ant?” someone called out.

  Looking panicked, Ant quickly stuffed his hard cock into his pants, then threw a punch at me, hitting me in the eye. I cried out and slumped to the floor.

  “That’ll teach you for wanking next to me, you faggot!” he yelled.

  The dreadlocked kid from homeroom appeared in the stall’s doorway. I quickly covered my groin, unable to stop from sobbing uncontrollably, the pain in my eye, as well as the horror of what Ant had done to me, fuelling my tears.

  Joel’s expression turned from surprised to disgusted. “Fuckin’ pervo fag,” he spat, making me shrink in humiliation.

  Ant snapped, “Let’s go!”

  They moved away...

  ...and that was when I saw him.

  Ash.

  He was staring down at me with a sympathetic expression. For a second, I thought he was going to help me, but then he followed the others out, leaving me on the toilet floor, crying my heart out.

  I stayed there for what felt like forever, in too much shock to do anything else. I didn’t understand why this had happened to me, couldn’t even start to comprehend any of it.

  Someone entered the restroom, finally snapping me out of my stunned state. I quickly pulled my shorts up just as a kid stopped at the urinals across from the toilet stall. I pushed to my feet, capturing his attention. He looked over his shoulder, his eyebrows winging up as he caught sight of me.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  I shook my head and snatched up my bag, not sure I’d ever be right after what Ant had done. I was out the door before the kid could say another word, running home, only stopping briefly to use my inhaler. I let myself in, my mam and sister at work. And when my mother returned that night, asking what had happened to my eye, I lied, telling her a ball had hit me during P.E. She asked again, obviously not believing me due to my track record of being bullied. But I reassured her that it had been purely an accident, and that I’d tell her instantly if I was being bullied again. She relaxed a little after that, though still gave me worried glances over dinner. I knew what she was thinking—that someone had punched me. And I wanted to tell her she was right, but then I would have to tell her everything that came before it.

  Which I could never do.

  The next day I was too terrified to go to school, so I stayed home. It had been easy to do since my mam and sister left for work early. I sat down at my desk, detailing everything that had happened in my diary. I stopped at the part where Ant had pulled down my shorts. I closed my eyes, imagining what could’ve happened if his friends hadn’t walked in, but I couldn’t, or more like, I didn’t want to, because it was beyond terrifying.

  I pushed up from my chair and turned to the full-length mirror on the wardrobe, wondering why Ant had gotten hard over me. I was nothing to look at: too skinny, too pale, with freckles and orange hair that could blind you. I turned my face from side to side, not seeing anything that could be remotely hot. All I saw was me, a person who was both male and female, stuck in a world that only allowed me to be one or the other. Since I was born without a vagina, my parents had brought me up as a boy, something I knew didn’t feel right, but I didn’t think changing to a girl was right either. I was neither, yet both.

  The phone rang, jolting me out of my thoughts. I ran for it, picking it up before I realised my mistake.

  A woman’s voice came over the line. “May I speak to your mother?”

  “She’s at work,” I answered.

  “Is this Llewellyn?”

  “Yes,” I said softly.

  “Well, this is Mrs. Smithe, the school secretary, and, Llewellyn, you’re supposed to be at school. Are you ill?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then please tell your mother that I called, and if you take any sick days off she needs to phone in, and if you miss three days or more you have to bring in a doctor’s note.”

  I agreed, then hung up. My heart started racing at the thought of having to go back—of facing Ant, his friends, and the whole school. I imagined getting shouldered into lockers, taunts of being a fag thrown at me, sneers and jeers. Then what the woman had said about a doctor’s note gave me an idea. I headed into the kitchen and grabbed a chair, dragging it over to the cupboard. I climbed onto it and started searching through the med kit in the top cupboard, hoping to find something that would make me sick. I pulled out a box of pills, which only said to take two at a time. I wondered whether it would make me sick if I took five. I stuffed the box into my pocket, planning on taking the pills just before my mam got home.

  For the rest of the day, I watched TV or read more of Carrie, then, as planned, I took the pills just before six. A little while after taking them I started feeling light-headed, but not sick. Not what I wanted. I slumped onto the couch, realising I hadn’t put the pill packet away. I reached for it, but my hand flopped down.

  A noise came from the front door. I looked up, everything blurring, only the sound of my sister’s voice alerting me to who it was.

  “Are you okay, Louie?” she asked.

  “Tired,” I mumbled.

  “Louie, what’s wrong?”

  “Just tired.”

  She went quiet for a moment, then screamed, “Mam!”

  I closed my eyes, hearing our mother’s startled voice a few seconds later. A slap stung my face, followed by Mam shouting, “Open your eyes, baby. Open your eyes!”

  But I co
uldn’t. My head was all fogged up, taking me to another place. My sister started babbling, saying our address to someone before I lost consciousness.

  2

  LLEWELLYN

  When I woke up, I found out that my mam and sister thought I’d tried to commit suicide. I told them I hadn’t, that I’d been feeling unwell and had just taken too many pills for my pretend stomach ache. As a result, I was allowed to stay home for the rest of the week, my mam taking time off from work to be with me. But when Monday came around again, I knew I had no excuses left to get out of school.

  I got dressed, determined that I was going to get through the day, so I didn’t have to lie to my mother again. But as I neared Wera High, I started worrying that people would look at me like I was a pervert, calling me disgusting names due to the lies that Ant would’ve no doubt spread about me. Though, to my surprise, no one did, and the only time people bumped into me wasn’t on purpose, just a reflection of the crush of students walking through the gates and down the main corridor. It gave me hope, until I spotted Ant heading into my homeroom with his friends. I considered hiding out in the toilets again, but instead walked the rest of the way to class, knowing that:

  1) The last time I hid, I’d made things worse.

  2) I might as well have stayed at home if I did that, because the school secretary would ring there again, and I didn’t want my mam finding out that I’d skipped school.

  Still, I stopped in front of my homeroom door, wrestling with my fears. I peered through the little window in the door. The teacher wasn’t there, but Ant was, sitting in the same seat, talking to his friends.

  Chickening out, I turned to leave, almost face-planting into a monstrous girl’s breasts, the same one who’d blocked my way on the first day of school. She reached past me and shoved the door, along with me. I stumbled into the classroom, capturing everyone’s attention—including Ant’s. I quickly lowered my head and rushed to my seat at the back of the class.

  “The faggot’s back!” the dreadlocked kid hollered, causing me to freeze. Sniggers followed, making me wish I could disappear into nothing.

  Still keeping my gaze down, I took my seat. Footsteps approached my desk. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Ant, his big body towering over me.

  He placed his hands on my desk. “Look at me, fag.”

  “Please leave me alone,” I said, shrinking in upon myself.

  Ant slapped my cheek, making me yelp. “I said, look at me!”

  I raised my gaze, biting my lip to stop from crying. He was glaring at me as though he was going to beat me up. My eyes darted around the classroom, practically begging for someone to help me, but everyone remained in their seats, just watching us. The dreadlocked kid sniggered along with a few others, Ash not one of them. Instead, he was shaking his head and saying something to the tall boy in front of him, who also looked unimpressed.

  Ant grabbed my face, squeezing my cheeks hard. “You deaf?!”

  “No!” I squealed.

  He let go of my face. “Why weren’t you at school last week?”

  “I was sick,” I said, rubbing my aching cheeks.

  He laughed. “Or the li’l fag wuz gettin’ fucked by his daddy.”

  “Shut up, you lying creep!” I spat out, his words wiping away all sense of self-preservation. My dad had died from a heart attack two years ago, time by no means lessening the pain of losing him.

  Ant blinked, my outburst taking him by surprise, and not only him, but myself. The potential repercussions dawned on me. I quickly ducked underneath my desk. I knew it looked bad, that it was the wrong thing to do, but I was terrified.

  Ant erupted. “You li’l shit!” he yelled, jerking the desk away from me.

  It hit the back of the boy sitting in front of me. As the boy scrambled away, Ant grabbed me by the shirt and yanked me up. He lifted me off my feet, my feet dangling in thin air.

  “Oi, Ant!” the dreadlocked kid yelled. “If you touch him, you might catch AIDS.”

  Without letting me go, Ant looked over his shoulder. “You can’t catch AIDS from touching someone, moron.”

  “I ain’t a moron!” Joel yelled back. “You are!”

  Ant let go of me, causing me to fall to the floor. He stormed across the room to his outspoken mate, pushing past students, many swivelling their heads to continue watching. I climbed back into my chair, and looked over to see Joel standing up to Ant. The guy was considerably shorter than Ant, yet he showed absolutely no fear, something I had in abundance.

  Ant went to shove Joel, but Ash shot out of his chair, yelling at Ant to back off. When Ant went to go for Ash instead, another of his friends stood up, this one the size of Ant, if not bigger. He grabbed Ant and shoved him into the seat next to him, yelling, “Stay!” Then he did the same to the dreadlocked kid, who kept mumbling he wasn’t a moron. Ash held his hands up and climbed back into his seat.

  The door banged open. The teacher strolled into the classroom casually, not even having an inkling of what had happened only seconds before his arrival. Still, his presence was a massive relief, I just wished he’d arrived earlier.

  After the end of homeroom, I took off, but instead of veering into the toilets I went to my next class, praying that Ant didn’t cause me any more trouble. I tensed when he walked in with his mates, but he barely cast a glance my way. Though, it was probably because the teacher was there, writing on the whiteboard. Still, I wondered whether I could possibly make it through the day without getting hit.

  Luckily, the rest of the morning passed by without any problems. At lunch, I found a place behind the gym to hide. It was a thin strip between the wall and the hedge. I ate my lunch, then read until it was time for my next class, which thankfully didn’t have Ant in it.

  After school had finished, I ran home, feeling a little happier, like I could actually get through school this term. So, when my mam asked how my day had gone, I actually smiled and said, “Good,” regardless of the homeroom incident.

  And to my immense relief, Ant ignored me for the rest of the week. But I wasn’t as lucky with the following Monday. I looked up during English class and found him staring across the room at me, making my fear return. He smiled, the expression appearing friendly, although I knew it couldn’t be. I put my head back down, keeping it there for the remainder of the lesson.

  When the bell rang, I bolted to my next class, hoping he didn’t come up to me again. My worries turned out to be unfounded. He didn’t go near me that whole day, or the rest of the month, although I did notice he looked at me quite a lot. I didn’t like it, nor did I like him. I only liked Ash, who never looked at me, only at the blonde with the pink streaks in her hair.

  3

  JENNA HAMILTON

  March

  That longhaired, redheaded twerp was staring at Ash again. Not like it bothered me—unlike when Tiana looked at Ash. I grimaced as Ash’s gaze moved to Tiana as she entered the classroom. The Tongan girl was way too tall for a female in my opinion, not to mention way too pretty. Her wavy brown hair, which was a couple of shades darker than her caramel complexion, was hanging loose today, tumbling around her shoulders and down her back. It made me want to undo my ponytail and shake my hair out, because mine was nice too, if not cooler. I’d highlighted my hair with pink streaks, something that Ash had said he liked.

  Though, it wasn’t my hair he was eyeing up. His full attention was on Tiana as she flipped her hair, probably doing it for his benefit. She smiled across the room at him, her blatant interest in Ash making me want to punch her face in. I stretched my arms out, placing one behind him, resting it on the back of his chair. I smiled at her, pretty much letting her know whose boyfriend he was. She frowned and walked the rest of the way to her desk, apologising to the teacher for being late. I watched her as she sat down and said something to her best friend, another Tongan girl, although this one looked a bit Japanese. Lavinia glanced over her shoulder at me, Tiana obviously having said something about yours truly. I glared at La
vinia, but she just rolled her eyes at me, then turned back, saying something into Tiana’s ear. I didn’t like it, not one bit, because I knew Tiana was planning on stealing my man.

  I removed my arm from behind Ash and placed a hand on his lap under the desk, my fingers doing a little dance across his crotch to get his attention—and it sure did. He jumped in his seat, his dark brown eyes almost bugging out. I winked at him and pursed my lips, making a smooching sound. He relaxed, giving me a soft chuckle in return, the sound as beautiful as he was. If I’d asked God for the most gorgeous-looking guy there was, wham bam, he would have opened the pearly gates and tossed Ash down to me. It didn’t even matter that it looked like he’d fallen through a forest full of trees along the way—his clothes always messy, his hair even messier—he still looked hot as fuck. And that hair of his... It made my fingers itch, and not from lice, because I just wanted to run my fingers through those gorgeous black waves of his. When I’d first started going out with him a couple of months back, one of my best friends had been all snarky, telling me that she would never go out with a guy prettier than herself. But, unlike the redheaded gay boy, Ash wasn’t pretty...

  He was drop-dead gorgeous.

  So much so that I had to wipe my chin every so often just to check I wasn’t drooling.

  And anyway, Cassidy had just said that out of jealousy, because the fat bitch had wanted Ash just as much as I did, and would’ve dropped her parachute knickers in a second for him.

  I frowned, wondering whether that was why Ash’s attention kept wandering to Tiana. Was he getting bored with me because I was holding out on sex? We had kissed and touched each other, even got half-naked more than once, but whenever he asked for sex, I always said no. Though, over the past week I’d started wondering whether I should say yes. Actually, I’d almost said it at the weekend, but had chickened out. Not only was I a virgin, I didn’t want anyone else knowing we’d done it, especially Ash’s best mate. I’d never hear the end of it if Joel found out. He was a complete turd. He had the most disgusting mouth. I’d already smacked it once when he’d waggled his tongue at me, calling me fishy.