When I walked into the room Louie was just sitting there looking out the small window. His face was badly bruised. The bruising went from the pinkish colour from last night to a very dark ugly green and purple. The cut on his face was stitched up.
I lightly knocked on the door to try and not startle him. He didn’t even look over. He just continued to look out the window. “Leave me alone. I really don’t want to hear it anymore right now Micah. I am too tired to deal with you.” He sounded very lethargic and melancholy.
I closed the door quietly behind me and leaned on it. “I’m sorry Louie, but I’m not Micah.”
He turned around and smiled softly at me, “Oh Corey. I’m so sorry. I thought you were Micah coming back to yell at me.” He shifted slightly in the bed and tried to prop himself up better.
I pulled the chair from the corner up to the bed and sat down facing him so he didn’t have to strain to talk to me. “Don’t worry about sitting up or anything. You can lay back. I;m not going to yell at you or anything, man. I just wanted to check up on you.”
I smiled at him as he gingerly laid down on his side so he could face me better. “You know, we may be strangers but you definitely frightened me last night. If I’m being honest, I thought you were dying when you passed out on my table.”
He looked away from me and sighed, “I’m really sorry about that. It just happened that your lights were on so I thought if you were up I could get help. I really didn’t want to have to deal with Micahs bullcrap last night.”
I put my hand on his arm lightly to try and show I wasn’t mad at him. “Do not worry about it. I didn’t mind that you showed up at my house. After seeing how Micah is, I can understand why you would have wanted to avoid dealing with him too.”
I squeezed his arm lightly and smiled at him as I continued, “I know I am just a stranger but I can say wholeheartedly that I understand how whatever happened to you last night, you might want to hide that from family and friends.”
He put his other hand on top of mine and looked up at me, “To be honest with you, I’m scared Corey. I do not know how to handle what happened last night. I don’t know how to tell my family what has been happening for the last 5 months.”
“I cannot tell you what you should do, but I can listen to you if you ever feel the courage to talk about it. I am mad at you and I am not here to judge you. I am just here to listen to you and show you some sort of support. Maybe it will be easier to talk to me over your family.”
He rolled over on his back and looked up at the ceiling. The beeping of his heart monitor picked up and I could see his breathing had picked up and he had begun to cry. I patted his arm softly and scooted closer to the bed. “Hey I know this is hard. I didn't mean to make you upset.”
He just shook his head and sniffled. “No, you didn’t make me upset. I’m just used to everyone yelling at me or talking to me like I am a child. They all still see me as the small little Lou that could barely hold up his own. I know it is mostly because they are just worried about me,” he paused and tried to slow his breathing and stop crying. “I just wish they would just let me be who I want to be.”
I tilted my head to the side and raised an eyebrow at him. “What do you mean,” I paused. What if he doesn’t want me to know the answer to that. “Feel free not to answer that. You do not owe me, of all people, any explanations.”
He looked over at me and smiled again, wiping away his tears, “No. I-I think I am ready to finally talk to someone about everything that has been going on. As long as you think you are okay with hearing it. Us being basically strangers after all.”
“I think that maybe us having little to know about each other may actually help you be able to open up to someone finally. And if you wish it so, I can keep anything you tell me secret until you are ready to tell your family.”
“I suppose now is as best a time as any.”
The beeping from the heart monitor sped back up as Louie readjusted on the bed. He stared out the window again for what felt like 20 minutes before he cleared his throat and spoke, “If you have the time I will start from when I returned back home from college 2 years ago.” He turned and looked at me and whispered, “I learned a lot more than just computer science when I left this small town.”
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