The Wounds Within My Heart By James
Disclaimer
If you're not of the legal age to read this story, or if you're offended by this type of material then leave now. This story may at times contain sex and romantic moments between consenting teenaged males. It also may contain scenes of Hate Speech towards people of different races, sexual orientations, disability groups and others. If you can't handle reading about that, then leave.
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Finally, if you like this story and haven't done this already, invite my E-mail address jamesheady1985@gmail.com to Red Lobster. Once there, only when the food is served let them know that Shrimp Scampi was accidently spilled into their chicken and rice.
Thanks to K. for another really well-done editing job. Your editing work really helps with the story. Thank you.
The Wounds Within My Heart
Book One
Nohea
Part One
New Friends
Chapter Two
As you've probably guessed, I'm a part of a fairly well-off family, at least financially speaking. That's true. My mom worked as a CEO for a fashion company located in the city where we lived. My mother's name was Barbra Wilson, and her husband was Ray Wilson. They married a couple of months after getting together when I was about two months old. According to what mom said, my dad left just a couple of days after I was born. She went on to say that he couldn't deal with the fact that I was blind.
In all the time I was here on Earth, she never let me meet him, nor did she even try to set up visits so he and I could meet face-to-face. More on that later though.
Ray Wilson was a military man as I had mentioned earlier. He had been out of active duty for the last two years. While on active duty, he was gone a lot, but when he was home, he made it clear to me that I was to be the perfect well-behaved child. He would scream a lot when I spilled something, or forgot something concerning my schooling. One of his punishments was to make me stand straight up against the wall while he stood just inches from my face screaming at me for almost ten minutes. Sometimes though, it would be longer. Surprisingly, he never hit me. I didn't understand that, and when I asked him about it a couple of years ago, he told me that I wasn't worth going to prison over. Even at that age, I thought it was Bullshit what he said. Still though, I let it go. I wasn't trying to give him any new ideas for punishments. He was already enough of an abusive Bastard as it was.
Having served in the military for so long, he brought home a really impressive pay check. Adding that to the $90.00-an-hour pay check my mom brought home insured a comfortable life for us.
I could afford anything I wanted, within reason. Any sort of piece of adaptive technology that could help with my blindness not being a huge limitation could be mine without any problem. I could have had the best sound system in my room, or the best entertainment center in there as well. I settled though for a flat screen TV, and a set of speakers I would connect to my iPod. They were up there in price, but I wanted that particular set of speakers since they had the best sound. I was able to get the above-mentioned items I wanted thanks to my mom and her husband's incomes, but even for all the time I lived with them, I never cared about the rich life style in which I was born.
Our household wasn't a very religious one. Sometimes my mom, Ray and I would go to church as a family for Christmas Services, or for Easter Services. Unless it was those two holidays, my mom and Ray never went. I was usually the one who would go if not every Sunday, then as many as I could.
Greg Henderson was the pastor at the church I attended which was about five minutes from our house. He had been almost like a father to me as I got to know him. He was kind, caring and had no use for the Burn in Hell type of Christianity that was so popular with most preachers around the city. He was also one who took a stand in support of the LGBT Community when most of his colleagues didn't. As a result of this, his popularity wasn't huge around our city. I was glad to see that he accepted everyone as they were. I didn't understand those who thought that external image and a person's personal appearance was all that there was to the individual.
Bottom line, I wasn't popular with my mom and Ray, if you already couldn't tell. Whether it be my lack of interest in embracing my family's wealth, my blindness, or having an active religious life. Any one of those three things on their own was enough to make me an outcast with my family. I was starting to get to the point of not caring what my Mom and Ray thought of me. Sure the way they treated me hurt, but I was able to find things to distract me from the unpleasant living situation I was in while living with them.
To make a long story short, I was a boy who liked to be around people, loved listening to a good book or album, as well as wanting to do good for people. I don't mean just because I had the money to do so, but because I really wanted people around me to be alright, and to have what they needed in life. My mom and Ray saw me as being too soft, and always said that they wish that I would toughen up. They would also say that they wished that I could get a girlfriend, hopefully soon. In other words, I couldn't seem to do anything right according to their standards.
So that was how things were for me for those first 13 years of my life. I was thinking about all of this as I finished up the last class of the day. It was Tuesday, the last day of August, but the first day of school for us. The classes for that day were light with teachers mainly going over the class rules for each class. Homework hadn't been assigned for that day, and that was something for which I was truly grateful. I was especially glad about this since it meant that I could see Pietro. I had planned that the night before when I said goodbye to him.
After making sure that I had everything packed up, I left class to return back to my dorm. Once I let Doug Fields know I was back, I put my class materials in my room. Just then, there was a knock on my half-open door.
"Hey Wilson, you going with us to that dance on Thursday at the end of this week?" Aiden, one of the boys next-door to me, asked.
"Oh fuck," I thought in my head. "It's not even a month or two into the school year, and there's already a fucking dance planned!"
I hated the dances the school put on. To say nothing about the fact that there were too many people packed into the gym, there was also the blasting music that was either Rap, Techno, or whatever the current Pop Bullshit was at that moment. Sometimes I'd dance with a couple of girls, which was uncomfortable as hell, but I didn't know why at that time. Mostly though, I would just wonder around the gym looking for one of my friends to talk to. Shout over the music too, was more like it. For the most part though, I would just sit outside on one of the benches reading until the dance was over.
One might be wondering why I went to the school dances if I didn't enjoy them. With the pressure from some of my guy friends not with-standing, all dorm supervisors would, which practically made it a given that I would go whether I wanted to or not.
"A dance all-fucking-ready?" I said, tossing down one of my school books on the desk, totally annoyed now. "They couldn't wait until the end of September like they did last year?"
"Oh come on Wilson," Aiden said, walking into my room and flopping down on my bed as if he owned the place. "It's not that bad. You got to dance with a couple of hot babes at the dances you went to last year. You'll get to do that again this year I'm sure. Besides, it'll give you more practice. Who knows, maybe you and a girl might get a little more personal practice in with each other after the dance."
"Aiden!" I said even more annoyed now. "First of all, I'm still only 13, and second, I'm not even looking for anyone. I'm still waiting to find the right person."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah," he said waving his hand as if waving away an annoying fly. "You're beliefs in relationships and dating being sacred and all that. I guess if I continued to wear a device of torture around my neck day after day, I'd probably have the no-fun kind of thinking you have."
The device of torture he rudely pointed out, was the silver cross I had around my neck. Greg gave it to me as a Christmas gift back when I was 11. I loved it, and when wearing it, I felt even closer to God. It also served as a reminder to me about continuing to do the right things in life.
I knew what Aiden meant though when he called it a device of torture. That's how some Atheists thought about the matter, but it was also how people who were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints viewed the wearing of a cross as well. Aiden was a Latter-day Saint, and though he wasn't the type to push his religion down the throats of teachers, he was someone who would try to get other kids involved. I made it clear right from the start that I wasn't going to be a convert. He still tried to hint things to me, but I would brush them off.
"Okay, so I'm a square," I said sitting down at the desk. "When is this dance supposed to take place?"
"I'll have to check the schedule again," he said standing up. "Who knows, once you get to the gym, there might be a cute girl you can get to know. We wouldn't want kids getting any ideas that you play for teams you shouldn't, now would we?"
He smirked as he said that last part, looking at me before leaving, and closing the door behind him.
"Fucking smug little Bastard," I thought as I checked the clock on my iPod.
Aiden was a year older than I was, but he acted much older than that. He was good at leading activities, as well as helping with organizing certain school events. He was also good at yelling at kids as if he was a 14-year-old staff member. He got in my face several times the first year I was there, and he tried it once more towards the end of the year. At that point, I leaned just inches from his face, and after asking if he'd like to spend half of his Summer Break in the hospital, he backed down. Up until that point, I hadn't been one to fight or threaten anyone. I was usually one who was scared of violence. I thought that people could, for the most part, talk out issues they had with one another. I still believed that, but after getting through that first year at the blind school, I was a bit more hardened.
Aiden backed off for the last several weeks of my first year there, and seemed to replace verbally bullying me with now nagging me about my dating life. It seemed from the conversation I had just had with him, that he was continuing on with trying to be my dating coach. It was annoying with him acting like that at first. At this point though, I was down-right sick of it. Like me, Aiden Foster was a rich kid from one of the other well-off towns about an hour away from the school. He came from a huge Mormon family, and he had seven brothers and one sister who was about a year old. He carried himself as if he was hot shit, and that annoyed me to start with just on general principles.
In short, Aiden and I were friends, but had we known each other in my neighborhood back home, I don't think that he and I would have been friends. My mom and Ray probably would have tried to push us together though. It wouldn't have surprised me since status and image was all they really cared about in life. I was just glad that I only had to listen to Aiden's Bullshit for a few days out of the week at the school.
I pushed thoughts of Aiden Foster out of my head at that point, then checked my clock once more. It was 3:40 P.M. Putting my iPod in my bag, I let Doug Fields know where I would be. Exiting the dorm, I went over to Pietro's dorm and announced myself. Jack Smith was the dorm supervisor for that dorm at the time, and he was a little more down-to-earth than some of the others. He let me know that Pietro was in his room. After he told me where it was, I went in the direction he described. I knocked on the opened door, and I could just barely see Pietro laying on his bed.
When he saw me, he made a vocal sound that left no doubt as to how happy he was to see me. He got up from the bed, and walked over to me as quickly as his unsteady legs would allow. I wrapped my arms around him as quickly as he took me in his. It felt good to be back in his arms, and like the night, before I felt a void deep within my heart fill up. For the second time, I realized as he held me, that the huge void being filled in my heart had been there. I knew that it always been there.
I was coming to realize something else as we stood there with me in Pietro's embrace. I was realizing that being in his arms felt like coming home. It was a feeling that I hadn't ever really known before. I loved the feelings awakening within my heart at that moment, and I never wanted that moment to end!
I separated from Pietro's embrace after another moment though. I didn't want the staff walking in on us. I never understood why they were all weird about physical contact between kids, especially between boys. While some were a little more okay with it, others, such as Doug Fields, acted as if they were about to have a stroke if two boys' hands even so much as brushed together on accident.
After stepping back from Pietro, it was only at that point that I could hear that he had been listening to music that was turned down to a low volume.
"So you were just listening to music since you were back here in your room this afternoon?" I asked.
He gave me one tap, and guided me over to where his stereo sat. I use the word stereo for lack of a better term. It was a set of speakers to which a music player had been connected.
"Is it alright if I go through some of what you have here?" I asked.
He gave me one tap.
I went through some of the songs he had. The music player had no Text-To-Speech, and the setup appeared to be a simple skip forward, skip back function for selecting tracks. A play-stop button was inbetween the back and forward buttons. I figured that the setup was easy for Pietro with his inability to read text, especially what would have appeared on the player's screen.
Going through the tracks was cool, and there was a lot of Classic Rock from groups like Pink Floyd, Queen, Billy Joel and others. It had some of the stuff on there that I had on my iPod. I was glad to see that he enjoyed some of the music I liked.
"You and I seem to like a lot of the same groups and singers," I said placing his music player back down on the desk.
Pietro smiled, then guided me over to the bed. I sat down after he sat. He then put his arm around me, and it felt good to be with him like that again.
I leaned against him further, and he tightened his grip around my shoulders a little more. I felt truly protected at that point, and I could have sat with him like that for the rest of the night.
"I really like spending time with you," I said turning my face to look directly at him. "I really love talking to you. I do have to be honest though, I worry about how much of what I say that you understand. I hope I don't upset you saying that, but I really don't want to go on about stuff, just assuming that you know about every single thing I'm talking about."
He squeezed my shoulder gently, and I smiled.
"Are you saying that I don't have anything to worry about?" I asked.
One tap.
"That's good," I said.
With that, I told him about my day. Then after getting up to close the door, I sat back down with Pietro immediately putting his arm around me again. I then told him about my conversation with Aiden, then I told him about who Aiden was.
Pietro made a sound of annoyance at how I described Aiden's smug and better-than-everyone else attitude.
"I know," I said. "I don't like shit like that either."
There was a long moment where nothing was said, then as I shifted a little, the light from the over-head light must have glinted off of my cross. Pietro moved his left hand up to my chest, and I looked down to see his hand reaching for the pendant.
"Oh, you must have seen the light reflecting off of it," I said.
One tap.
"I'm guessing you've seen these before?" I went on.
One tap.
I removed the neckless and let him take it. He held it up so that the light reflected fully off of it. He made a few vocal sounds of what could only be joy and fascination. I was glad that seeing my cross shine was making him happy.
After another moment of holding it up to the light, Pietro stood up and leaned over me attempting to put the neckless around my neck again. I showed him how to fasten the clasp, and he quickly got the hang of it. He leaned closer as he got the clasp fastened again, and I could sense his lovely grey eyes looking deeply into my own.
Having Pietro that close to me brought a deep and intense fluttering throughout my stomach! I hadn't ever felt anything like that before. When his arm brushed the side of my neck after he moved it away once the neckless settled, I felt a deep electric sensation rush through me! It felt like how one feels when a rollercoaster drops suddenly, but with a deep intense pleasure mixed throughout! I felt that at that moment, and though I kept the gasp suppressed, I heard Pietro gasp as if feeling it as well when he straightened up again.
He sat back down, and I scooted closer to him then he was taking me into his arms as if he had been longing to do it all day.
I hugged him back, and it was true Heaven being there with him like that. I leaned against him with my arms wrapped around him as he held me, rubbing my back up and down gently. I could also smell him at that point. He smelled like whatever deodorant he had on, and I could also smell some of his own natural scent. It was an amazing smell, and deeply comforting!
"It feels really good being with you like this," I said looking up at him. "I know we've only known each other since last night. Still though, I feel so safe and cared for when I'm with you."
Pietro smiled, and hugged me tighter for a moment before letting go, and then he just sat there, holding my hand while continuing to look directly at me. It was like time stood still just for us, and like we were the only ones there! It was truly amazing!
After another moment, Pietro motioned for me to separate, and I let his hand go. He then had my hand rest on his while he tipped it up near his mouth. His hand was positioned as if holding a glass.
"You want something to drink?" I asked.
One tap.
"There's a pop machine next to my dorm," I said. "Would you like something from there.
One tap.
He stood up at that point, and after taking my arm, we walked out of his room. After letting Jack Smith know where we would be, I guided Pietro to where the pop machine was. Once reading off all the choices, he put his finger on the button labeled Pepsi. Fortunately, the buttons were labeled in Braille along with being in print. I put in the change, pressed the button, and handed him the can once it came out. I then got a Pepsi for myself, and we headed back to his dorm.
"Did you want to sit out here on the bench we sat at last night, or go back in your room?" I asked.
He placed his finger on the left side of the back of my right hand.
"That sounds good," I answered.
Once seated, we enjoyed our drinks as I told him more about what other hobbies I had. I told him about the books and authors I liked reading, as well as telling him more about what other kinds of music I liked listening to. I also told him about what happened to cause me to go blind. He made a vocal sound of sadness, then squeezed my hand gently.
"I hope you don't feel sorry for me," I said looking at him.
Two taps.
"Do you just feel sad for everything I had to go through?" I asked.
One tap.
"Yeah, going through the pain from the Glaucoma, as well as going through the surgeries have been the hardest part of it all."
He squeezed my shoulder softly, then finished the last of his Pepsi.
I soon finished what was left in my own can, and after throwing away our cans, Pietro returned to the bench, sitting down again.
He then thanked me for the drink in the way we came up with last night, and I smiled.
"You're welcome," I said. "Anytime. Also, you don't have to pay me back for the Pepsi. That was totally on me."
He smiled, then hugged me.
"You're welcome," I replied.
Soon it was getting to be time for dinner. I let Pietro know this after hearing the bell that rang 15 minutes before 5:00 P.M. The bell was mainly there to let all the students know that they needed to be ready for when it was time to go eat.
"It won't be long until dinner time," I said. "I don't know what we're having, but I hope it's edible."
Pietro laughed, and I joined him.
I let Pietro know that I'd be back. I went into my dorm and checked the Braille menu they had on a bulletin board beside the front office. I read the selection for that evening, then returned to where Pietro sat waiting for me.
"Okay, tonight we're having a true gourmet masterpiece," I said as if introducing the finest piece of Classical Music known to man. "Keep in mind that I'm quoting this directly from the menu. We're having Spicey Chicken Sandwich with Bun. It comes with a side of Bullshit, oops. I mean a side of Green Beans and a side of fries."
Pietro was laughing, and his laughing got even more lively when I said a side of Bullshit before saying what the actual sides were.
"I don't really understand what they get out of calling it a Spicey Chicken Sandwich with Bun," I went on. "I mean, like no shit. If it's called a Spicey Chicken Sandwich, then we could easily figure that a fucking bun comes with it."
Pietro was laughing harder now, and I was glad that I could bring him as much joy and laughter as I was.
"Hopefully the sandwich at least will be good," I said.
Pietro gave one tap as if to agree.
It was getting even closer to 5:00 P.M., and I let Pietro know that I would have to get going so I could be ready to go up to the school to eat with the rest of the kids in my dorm.
We walked back to Pietro's dorm, and after a long hug, I told him that I would see him later. I walked away from his dorm feeling more joy than I could have put into words!
Wednesday of that week was a bad day for me. I knew that I would have Dave Connelly for my Computer Class. When I got a copy of my schedule that Tuesday morning, I read his name beside the class name, and tried to remain calm. I had him the year before, and he was no stranger to flying off the handle, as well as making sarcastic comments, many of which seemed to be spoken specifically to hurt.
I learned quickly after about three days in his class, to be afraid of him. Now as this year was getting started, I was beginning to feel anger at him. He had been tolerable that Tuesday, but that was like saying that getting scratched by a rat was tolerable rather than getting bit by it. Unfortunately, Connelly started his Bullshit barely a couple of minutes into that Wednesday's class.
Dave Connelly was totally blind, and was 35 years old. According to him, he had been born blind due to some eye condition I couldn't remember the name of. He also was a staunch member of the National Federation of the Blind, which is an advocacy group of blind people with varying degrees of vision loss. I had been to a few of their meetings, and hated every moment of it. Not only did they sound like dumb asses who talked out of both sides of their mouths, but they also sounded like those who kept a copy of Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand by their bedsides every night.
On one hand, they would acknowledge the Ableism thrown at us by society, and would talk about how it needed to change. On the other hand though, they still talked as if every single blind person had a huge income from which they could just casually grab $5000 to buy the hottest new electronic note-taking device for the blind such as the Braille Note Touch, or the Braille Sense. They were mostly against welfare programs like SSI, Social Security Disability and the accommodations where blind kids would be given extra time to take tests if the tests included graphics and pictures.
They would also give the attitudes that, if a blind person wasn't fully independent and needed even 1% of help or assistance, then they were deserving of their circumstances. That's what I meant when I mentioned Ayn Rand and Atlas Shrugged a moment ago. The organization would also talk about how the Vocational Rehabilitation System did things to limit types of jobs blind adults could get. The Vocational Rehabilitation System helped pay for adults to go to college, as well as paying for them to work with Job Development Agencies. These agencies would help them find jobs.
The jobs that the system seemed to always push blind people towards would be jobs such as answering phones at an office all day, or doing data entry for an office job for eight hours a day. Most blind people who wanted to do jobs of their own choosing were continuously pushed towards the above-mentioned two options of jobs. While the NFB talked about how this system was horrible, they would, like abused spouses, go back to them whenever they needed money or assistance. It was disgusting, and I had no use for Bullshit like that!
In short, Dave Connelly fit right in with those people. I could easily see him at the meetings agreeing with every single thing they said. That made me dislike the abusive Cock Sucker all the more!
As I said, he got right to work being his abusive self that Wednesday morning, the first week of school. Clearly this second year of being with him wasn't going to be any easier. He started in with me shortly after the class got seated when I asked if there were any other files that needed to be opened in addition to our notes.
"Mr. Wilson!" he said raising his voice slightly. "Didn't you just hear me say that you needed to open your notes that you started writing yesterday!"
"I heard you say that," I said, working to keep a firm tone in my voice. I would be damned if that Bastard was going to make me cry in front of him.
That hadn't happened yet, but it came close several times the year before.
"So what's this crap about opening other files that don't have anything to do with what we're working on now!" he yelled raising his voice another level.
"I was just making sure I wasn't missing anything," I said struggling to keep my voice firm.
"I'm glad to see you're attempting to pay at least a little attention to detail," he said acidly. "No, you're dealing with the notes and file specific to said notes. When you need to open any additional documents, I'll be sure to let you know."
"Okay," I said. "I understand."
"That's a matter of opinion, but I'll take your word for it," he said.
There was laughter from a couple of the boys who looked up to him. One of them was Aiden Foster, and I wasn't the least bit surprised.
Aiden hadn't had him for Computer Class the year before, but did have him for after-school tech lessons, and liked him immediately. Of course he did. They both lacked a huge amount of empathy and understanding for anyone who wasn't privileged, mean-spirited and well-off.
Things continued without any issues until the last ten minutes of class. Though I had saved all the changes I had been making to my document, the computer crashed and restarted. I called for Connelly, and he came over. I explained the situation.
"I just had that computer checked yesterday after the class we had," he said smugly. "Unless it was a Blue Screen of Death, then you probably hit a key stroke that did something."
"All I did was hit Alt-F4 to close the document, then I was Alt-Tabbing to close the internet," I said. "I'm sure I didn't hit anything else."
"Yeah, sure," he said giving a snort of disgust. "I'll never understand how all these other kids master this stuff like ducks to water, but you're always having some sort of problem. I keep telling you about how you need to follow directions. Clearly it's not working."
"Like I said," I went on. "I don't know what I did."
"Well, you better figure it out soon!" he said losing his patients completely now. "You think a boss is going to put up with you needing someone to hold your hand all the time when you get a job once you become an adult! No, they're not! You had better start learning this stuff now! I've had enough of this. Other people might put up with your crap, but I won't!"
"I'm trying to learn this," I said struggling to keep my voice from shaking and a creeping nausea from getting stronger.
"Yeah, sure," he said. "That's why I'm standing here practically holding your hand through all this, like you're some mentally challenged child. Never mind though, we only have one more minute of class. I'll look at the computer and see what you did."
"Okay," I said as I stood up quickly, putting everything in my bag.
I left the room, and my nausea was in full force now. That was one thing that started as I began attending the school last year. I began feeling nausea sometime within the second week of being there, and a couple of days after that, I threw up in the boy's restroom for the first time. I figured that it was stress, since I had been dealing with a lot of shit from earlier that particular day. My throwing up didn't happen too often, but there were a couple of days towards the end of the year that saw me in the restroom throwing up two extra times.
When I told my mom what had happened the first time I threw up, she, as usual, did nothing. She said that I needed to learn to relax. Now though, as I ran into the boy's restroom that Wednesday my first week back at the school, I felt my stomach fluttering more rapidly. I found one of the empty stalls, and once in, I began throwing up everything I ate that morning. I was lucky to be over the toilet bowl just in time.
After everything was up, I stood there waiting for my legs to stop feeling like rubber. It passed, then I washed my face, ate a couple of breath mints and headed to my next class. I was trying to wrap my mind around the fact that the first week barely passed, and already I was having trouble getting through it all. Then, with my heart racing, I wondered hard about how I would even begin getting through the next week then the one after that. , As I neared the door to the room were my next class was, I remembered thinking about how I felt. It was like I was in a deep dark hole, screaming to be let out. No one heard of course. That made it feel even worse. With those thoughts running around in my mind I opened the door and entered the class room.
I saw all the outlines of kids sitting at their desks, and could hear them talking as they waited on the teacher to arrive. Sitting down, I took in everything, and could hardly understand how it worked that I was among several other kids in that room, but felt more alone than I ever had before. I thought about Pietro at that point, and began calming down. He was at least one rare person in that school who had been kind as well as caring towards me.
I hoped that he and I would be friends for always. I knew at that moment that I couldn't ever picture my life without him. That thought continued to stay with me as the teacher came in and introduced herself. We began class after that.
Author's Notes
I hope everyone has enjoyed this chapter. Nohea and Pietro are clearly getting closer, and even more comfortable around each other. That will continue, and I hope you guys like how things go in the next chapter.
As for what happened between David Connelly and Nohea, I can imagine that that wasn't easy to read. You'll get to see how that situation continues to unfold as well. I hope you guys like what I do with that as we go forward. Also, I wanted to say since I haven't addressed it yet, but anything sexual will be happening at a slow pace. In other words, there won't be sex immediately by Chapter Three. However as those of you who've been reading for years know, that's how it goes with my stories.
All that being said, I hope everyone is having a good evening, and I'll see you all in Chapter Three.