The Lost Boys

2

He was never called by a name. Unless his name was 'it', or 'thing', or 'don't look at me, filth'. He supposed everything had a name, like Bodega Mania or the truck that had 'If it's fresh, it's the best', on it's side that passed every couple of days. 

It was hard for the boy. To learn, that is. Because he could never speak, the words he practiced had to be repeated over and over in his head to even remember how the sounds were made. It became so bad that his mind created "friends" that had the ability to speak with their minds just so he wouldn't lose himself completely.

Because he taught himself to read, the range of his vocabulary only expanded when the billboard outside his window changed. He didn't know what writing was. The words he learned were sounded out in his head, and since his parents hardly spoke by him or near him, if they didn't say it, he had to make it up. It never occurred to him it could be wrong. Half of his vocabulary was the curses spat at him when he was given food or other things, and the poor kid didn't even know the difference between negative and positive language.

He only heard seconds of music, when a particularly loud car would pass. But he soaked those seconds up, learning how mimic the sounds very, very softly, because even he couldn't do it properly in his head. It was a genius like talent that was honed for the years he spent in that room. No matter what beat or melody he was exposed to, he could hum the exact copy back.

It was a child that was the first to see him. He was used to being looked through, or looked past, but this little girl looked up and made a face at him. It was a smile. 

He didn't know what that was either.

She looked up directly at his tiny window and smiled at him. She tugged on the coat of the man that was next to her and pointed up and began to move her lips. He couldn't hear, but he saw the man shrug her off one, two times, before sighing and looking up. 

He was the second person that saw him. He cried like a baby as they stared at him. And for the first time since he could remember he touched the glass. His parents told him that if he ever even tried touching or opening the window, they'd throw him out of it. He was small back then and he believed every word.

But now, all he wanted, more than anything in the world was to go to that girl and that man and- and- he didn't know exactly. He didn't know the word. He couldn't express the emotions that ran through his body with the small amount of words he knew.

It was joy. It was grief. It was relief. He wanted to hug them.

He had never been hugged.

The police that retrieved him later said it was a miracle. In many of his situations of children being isolated from birth, the kids would make no attempt to escape. There wasn't even a thought of hope or anything beyond what they knew. It was a miracle, they said, a miracle that he was bright enough after all that suffering to want more.

He didn't know what a miracle was.

They found out that the boy's name was Yasif Khalid, born in 1957, the only surviving twin after a freak accident killed his brother at 2 years old.

It was months later he met Oliver. Oliver was the lightest human being Yasif ever saw. He thought he was an angel.

Yasif struggled day in and day out with catching up. But 15 years locked up? He had no chance.

Not until Ollie. The first time they met, Yasif knew the boy was different. Usually people would look at him with sad eyes and he didn't know why- not really. But when Oliver introduced himself, all he could see was warmth. "Tell me your name." The younger boy had asked.

"....It." Yasif had whispered, unsure of the foreign name given to him too late.

"No." Oliver held his hand. "You are Yasif. You aren't 'it'. You never were."

And he hugged him. Yasif never felt more comforted, literally in his life.

"What is friends, Ollie?"

"Friends is what we are."

"We are?"

"Always Yasif. Trust me- you won't be left all alone ever again."