Someone Like You

11

Warnings:
-Mentions physical (child) abuse
-Disordered eating

George's POV

Clay's "friends" ignored him for the rest of the hour so eventually he sat with me during the break. He was eating a sandwich as I just stared at my hands while I kept thinking.

I was not dumb, I knew that Clay wasn't just using an example when we talked during art class. He drew an eye covered in bruises, he wore makeup to hide countless bruises on his face and "used an example" about his father abusing him. Unfortunately I didn't think that was an example.

It made me sad to imagine Clay's dad beating Clay every day, I found it really difficult to imagine the pain he had to go through every day... if it was actually true and his dad hurt him every single day, I completely understood his behaviour.

'George, are you going to eat too?' he smiled with a sweet face. I shrugged softly.

'I'm not so hungry, it's fine. I didn't take much with me anyway.'

He turned quiet and looked at his hands. 'George... you are not starving yourself, right?' he whispered. 'What we said to you wasn't true, okay? I know I was a dick and I regret it a lot, but I promise you I didn't mean it.'

'Sapnap meant it,' I answered quietly. 'And it's fine, I'm not starving myself.'

Technically that wasn't a lie. I just ate less and not only because I wanted to lose some weight, but also because we barely had any food in our house since we were so poor.

Clay dropped the subject and smiled at me. 'I enjoy spending time with you. You make me feel safe when I don't feel safe at- I mean...'

I smiled at him and switched the topic so he wouldn't feel uncomfortable about him almost revealing his secret.

~~~

Clay and I were sitting next to each other on the bus. Luckily none of his friends were here too which made both me and Clay feel safe.

I noticed more and more behaviour in Clay that made me realise he was actually getting abused at home. He jumped when someone touched him, but he really enjoyed to be touched in a non sexual way if he knew someone was going to touch him.

The bus stopped and Clay and I stepped out together. I walked slowly since Clay's leg seemed to be hurting too. He was smiling as we walked to my house.

'My parents aren't at home, I think,' I told him. 'They are barely at home to work because you know... never mind.'

'Because you don't have a lot of money at home?' Clay asked as he walked closer to me, wrapping his arm around my shoulders.

I nodded slowly. 'I guess we don't, but it's fine! I'd rather not talk about this, I'm sorry for bringing it up. Is it okay if we don't talk about this?'

'Of course that's okay, we won't talk about it anymore,' he nodded.

I opened the door to my house and let him go in first. He smiled as he looked around. 'Looks nice. Is this a picture with your parents?' he asked, pointing to the photo frame that hung on the wall.

I nodded. 'It's an old picture. I think that's four years ago.'

He nodded as he turned back to me.

'So... I don't have much to drink if that's okay. I just have water. We also don't really have food, but I can prepare you a sandwich and skip mine.'

'Don't worry, I'm not hungry. I think I still have biscuits left in my lunchbox that we can share. Oh, and water is completely fine.'

I nodded and walked to the kitchen, filling two cups with water. He grabbed one of them and I pointed to a door that led upstairs. 'We can go to my room or just stay here. Anything is fine with me.'

'Oh, I don't mind. We can go to your room,' he answered me with a happy smile on his face.

'Okay.' I opened the door and walked to the stairs, slowly going up as he went after me. 'We just have two rooms and this is mine.'

I opened the door to my room. I was suddenly pretty conscious of my room, afraid he wouldn't like it. My room was dark and pretty messy since I laid my books all over the floor, including multiple papers and assignments. It was quite boring actually, but I didn't have money to buy things to make it seem a bit less boring.

Clay shrugged. 'Your room is chill, I like it.'

'You can sit down on my bed if you like,' I told him as he sat down, lifting his hand up to his face.

I was about to look away as he groaned, I looked at him with a confused face.

'I forgot that it was bruised and I had an itch,' he mumbled quietly. 'That hurts.'

'It's not good for your skin to constantly keep this stuff on your face. Would you like me to help take it off? You can trust me.'

He nodded slowly. 'But it hurts a lot so please be careful.'

'Of course.' I walked off to get a towel with some water and went back, sitting next to Clay on the bed.

'George? You're not like- taking a picture or anything, right? This needs to stay between us.'

'I promise you that I won't tell anyone.'

I softly dabbed the towel on his cheek first, removing the makeup as carefully and gently as I could. It took a while before it all came off and when I had been dabbing it onto his skin for half an hour, all the makeup was removed. He avoided looking at me so I slowly lifted my hand up to his face.

'I'm sorry, I know I look awful,' he whispered, trying to look away.

'Don't say such a thing, this is not your fault, okay? You look just as great as you look with that makeup.'

'George?' he mumbled as he moved closer to me. He seemed to take a really deep breath and then rested his head on my shoulder.

'Yeah?'

'I trust you. You make me feel safe when it's not safe at home,' he admitted. I was surprised he told me this and I wrapped my arm around him.

'You're safe with me, I promise you. Whenever it's unsafe at home, you can always come to me.'

'I never had a safe place to stay,' he mumbled, sniffing softly. I laid down with him next to me and he curled himself up. 'Stay with me, please.'

1113 words