A day of freedom, a lifetime of oppression.

Chapter 1 - Crash Landing in Your Broadcast

No one has ever supported me in writing the way she does.

The thought took root in my mind, as Candy continued to explain how I could best begin writing my first novel. She had done it before, and she was now helping me with my fledgling steps.

Soft waves of R&B music emanated from her speakers - the playlist I had shared with her the day before because I had wanted to sing one of the songs to her. The song was titled 'Go Crazy'.

Candy had only recently recovered from a fever, but she had come on-line tonight to appear on my iPhone screen. I talked to her in a chatbox shared by many other fans of her broadcast.

I sometimes felt slightly bad when we had conversations in code, that the rest of the audience would often have no clue about. After all, I had always tried to avoid attention by remaining in the shadows. And I had quite the inkling that Candy would be fun to be in the shadows with.

She's giving me writing lessons on a broadcast I should be paying for.

I felt grateful in a way that was unfamiliar to me. For a long time, I had been conditioned to feel nothing but resentment for the people in my life.

"Oh baby, don't worry, the only thing you'll be sweating from is pleasure." I laughed as I typed the words into the chatbox. I had rushed to type them as soon as they popped into mind so that the moment was maintained.

Candy read it out loud on her broadcast and laughed. "Someone sounds experienced."

No, Candy was not that kind of broadcaster. She was a broadcaster on a PG13 platform that allowed no drugs, pornography or violence. Also no sex, probably. But the conversations that we had were pure sex.

A fan of hers had just asked her out to 'exercise', and she had just deftly dodged the euphemism by light-heartedly explaining that she did not like to sweat late at night.

I was not a pervert. I was simply expressing my affection in the only way I knew how. The broad landscape of expression of emotions was by default, a fog of unexplored land to someone suffering from Autism. And somehow, Candy seemed to understand that.

My parents must have noticed my limited methods of expressing affection when I was of quite a young age, too. The showers with Dad had stopped. Mom had become physically distant. I had been moved from my parents' bed into my brother's room.

And there, my shows of affection had conveniently stopped.

It was hard not to feel like a freak. I was already very prone to avoiding social interaction. Now, that limitation had been augmented by the fact that I would be inappropriate at any time I chose to express my positive emotions toward someone.

I had kept to myself in class, from Nursery to High School. I also preferred interaction on the Internet to meeting people in-person. As for friends, I only had a few from childhood to speak of, but I guess that was all I needed.

How many writers had been published before the age of 16? None that I knew of. Which meant that the number of them which existed was extremely small. She could be famous for all I knew. Then again, she really did seem like a prodigy.

One probably had to be a prodigy to understand me right off the bat. My anxieties had caused me to communicate in a very indirect manner from youth. It was a rule that I use metaphor and implication to communicate my most intense thoughts and emotions.

Cryptic communication made me feel less exposed. I had always felt a strong aversion to merely stating the underlying, intended message. Perhaps it was because I subconsciously felt that my thoughts and emotions were disgusting.