You've really got a hold on me

1/1

It begins in september when they're at the table after Mike comes home from school and says he met a boy on the playground. Nancy is sitting across from their father, and Mike from their mother, who'll occasionally slip him a tiny smile or wink, like she always does when she sees he's in a good mood.

That night there was something different about him, and Nancy knew instantly, as it was a wild contrast to her prediction of his behavior and attitude following a first day of elementary, because he despised kindergarten and preschool and fought with their mother each morning to go. She'd expected him to be annoyed, frowning deeply, eyes hooded with the unpleasant thought of having to go back the very next day. Irritated. But he's not. He's jittery like he's just eaten a whole forty piece haul of cheap halloween candy, and his gaze keeps flickering back and forth between their parents.

She figures that he's waiting for a pause in their fickle conversation, because like Nancy, he knows what interrupting will earn him. Mike swallows and tries to take a shot at a gap of silence where their father fits more food into his mouth, and succeeds.

Mike fizzes. He starts going on about the mass of alphabet posters in his new classroom and Miss Down, his teacher that is surprisingly nice, though, he doesn't speak too-too kindly of her and then he says she yelled at a boy named Lucas for shooting a spitball at her. Mike says that there's a sandbox outside in the playground now, but it was full of clumsy kids that were tripping and falling all over him, so he left and went to the swings instead. Will, is his new friend, the one he met not long afterwards. Mike said he shared his markers with Will because he likes to color and didn't have any.

Nancy remains quiet beside him, listening, raising her eyebrows at her green beans because Mike's expression and tone are too fervent and genuine and new for it all to pass as a lie, even though Mike tends to be a fairly good liar.

At the news, their mother smiles brightly, sensing the rare slip of pride in her son's voice, and tells him she told him so–that of course he would make a friend.

Mike's face hardens and he goes a bit quiet as their father asks for the boy's last name, he apparently doesn't know it yet.

For once Nancy doesn't mind that Mike is chattering on, at least he's sensible and dinner isn't as quiet as it normally is.

–

Nancy comes to find out that Will, Mike's friend, is not exactly the most normal kid.

Mike invites him over after school one friday and Will sticks to him like a tattoo.

Nancy had always thought that Mike was withdrawn. He didn't want to go to classmates' birthday parties and hated sports and activities, or essentially anything that easily provided socialization. He especially disliked being near children of his age or in general as they had snotty noses and wiped it on their sleeves and didn't cover their mouth when they coughed. He wasn't even too fond of visits with grandma–said she smelled like mothballs–which were moderately excusable as Nancy didn't enjoy those much either, hence the scent and her abrupt greeting kisses that were placed permanently far too near her mouth. But she begins to understand, eyes straying along as Mike tries to get Will to accompany him through the dining room where their father is reading the newspaper, that there is certainly another level of shy, and maybe a difference can be seen between not wanting to socialize, being afraid to, and not knowing how to.

He won't look at her, not in her face or eyes. He seems like he's constantly got a wet coat draped across his shoulders and his head nearly always stays slightly bowed, gaze unconditionally loyal to the floor if he is around anyone that isn't Mike. Every glance she gets at him he's biting and chewing his bottom lip until it's about to fall off, and she doesn't see him smile that day, not genuinely, only at her mother when she asks him if he would like anything to eat or drink, and in that exception it is the most polite thing ever, shown with a gentle shake of his head to a magnet on the refrigerator.