I’m the son of rage and love…

Rage was sitting at the kitchen table, the paper hiding his face complete with small, mean looking glasses and a moustache that did nothing to hide his permanent frown. Love was standing at the kitchen counter, making breakfast for Rage to eat. He’d scoff it down without thanks, get up and go to work.

I sat with my long legs stretched out and my feet resting on the tables, crossed at the ankle while I leaned back in my chair, just watching them. They thought I didn’t notice the tension between them, that I didn’t see the pain behind her false smile or the emptiness in his eyes when he kissed her good morning.

But I saw it. I saw all of it. And I was so used to it that I just didn’t care. I found it kinda funny - they wouldn’t get a divorce because of me, because of how it would screw me up. I guess they didn’t realise that knowing your parents don’t love each other and you’re making them unhappy doesn’t screw you up quite as much as divorce.

I stifled a laugh and tilted my head back. My long black fringe took the hint and fell away from my eyes. The cool breeze coming from the open window danced across the sliver of exposed torso but I didn’t pull my shirt down. I liked it, it kept me awake in a world that was beyond mundane.

He got up to go to work eventually, not looking at me as he did. He doesn’t look at me anymore. Not since I bought my first boyfriend home. He probably won’t look at me again, not this lanky boy who’s too feminine to be his, this boy with dyed black hair and cold blue eyes and skin like he hadn’t seen sunshine in years. The boy that was his, but never really would be.

I sighed, sick of the kitchen with its pastel pale walls and cheerful faced cookie jar. It was just too much to take. If I sat in there too long, I could forget that my father hated me and that there were homeless kids with no food and countless infections, that there was war and unrest and hunger of all kinds. That kitchen was a lie.

My room was slightly better; it was dark without being bleak. Kind of like me. When I’m drunk anyway. Instead of painting it a clichéd black, I had painted it a deep red. With black curtains of course. Posters were everywhere, but the one thing that always caught my eye was the mural painted above my bed. My friend Roxie had done it for me and I loved it.

It was a giant cross with a little ledge on it. Sitting on the ledge was a long limbed boy with tight jeans and a studded belt, his halo askew among his black spiky hair. Scattered around the base of the cross were a dozen little houses, perfect in their simplicity and hopelessly realistic. Suburbia.

“Sonny, love, do you want a lift to school?” My mom called up the stairs, sounding like a cereal commercial mom.

“No mom, I’ll walk,” I replied, slipping into my favourite black jacket with the gold buttons and pushing my hair back from my eyes.

“Won’t you take something to eat?” She asked, sounding genuinely concerned as I walked down the stairs, slipping into my swagger as easily as I had slipped into my jacket.

“Sure,” I sighed, holding out my hand for the slice of toast she was holding out. I probably wasn’t going to eat it, but it would make her happy. I’d do anything to make her happy.

I nibbled thoughtfully on the toast while I walked down the street. It was bustling with high school kids; girls in skirts so short they could be arrested for crimes against feminism, jocks with their fancy jackets and vacant expressions and then the misfits, my children. Sometimes my friends.

“Hey hey Sonny, looking forward to the new school year?” Roxie giggled, falling into step beside me, her hips swinging and her pig tails falling about her bare shoulders. No one does corsets quite like Roxie.

“About as much as I’m looking forward to being gay at fifty. You?”

“I think it’ll be interesting,” she shrugged, reaching out and ripping the barely-eaten slice of toast in two. “I thought you were going blond this year?”

“I thought you were gonna start doing a blond this year,” I retorted, glancing back at the black-haired beauty trailing behind Roxie with a dopey grin on his face.

“I’ll take what I can get,” she laughed. “Have you got your evil lil eye on anyone? You haven’t had some action in forever!”

“Thanks for pointing that out. And no. I’m living love-free these days.”

“How come?”

“I listen to Bright Eyes way too much to get involved with someone, you know that,” I explained with a small smile.

“Ah. You know, there’s a new kid transferring this year. A boy. His family moved in across the street from me,” she said with a glint in her eye.

“Yeah?”

“Oh yeah. You should see him Sonny, he’s like…perfect. Tall, blond, blue eyed…” she sighed softly, her eyes glazed as she pictured her new god.

“Sounds like a walking cliché,” I quickly shook her shoulder.

“So are you,” she stuck her tongue out at me.

“Oh baby, I pull it off,” I pushed my fringe out of my eyes for the fiftieth time.

“Why don’t you cut that thing off?” Roxie asked.

“It’s a part of me. That’s like telling me to cut off my penis.”

“I’m sure your dad wouldn’t mind,” she laughed her cute laugh and I couldn’t help but smile.

The school building loomed in the distance, a relic held together by cheap glue and chewing gum. I squared my shoulders and took a deep breath, before walking through the gate into my own private Hell.

The first day back is a day of introductions. You get introduced to your new teachers, your old friend’s new boyfriend, your old friend’s new haircut…and the new kid. There’s always at least one new kid at our school. We live in such a nice area apparently, people are always moving here. It’s all leaves and suburban barbeques. It’s like Wisteria Lane, minus all the hot housewives, fabulous hair and murder.

This year it was Ryan Anderson’s turn. Ryan Anderson was a native of Chicago, the home of Fallout Boy and other such similar sounding bands. His mom had moved here after a divorce (yawn) and his interests include: football (double yawn), swimming (triple yawn) and girls (meh).

But give Roxie her due, he was attractive. He was tall enough to be graceful, but not tall enough to be clumsy. His shoulders were slightly rounded and not too wide and his smile was easy and warm. He looked…nice.

I don’t do nice. Nice leads you to bad places like church and dinner with the parents. Nice is for kids from perfect families, who never had sexuality issues (or hid them pretty well, whatever) who pray before they go to sleep and never break curfews.

Ryan sat down behind me, and I paid him no attention. My attention is like gold dust among the misfit kids. They think I’m some sort of hero. They think I don’t go home at night and cry myself to sleep like they do. That my eyeliner is always perfect and that my tight jeans don’t chafe my legs. They think I’m special, because I’ve always been this way, always been weird.

It’s odd, being worshipped for being different. It’s always been that way at my school. Sure, the pretty cheerleaders and the jocks are popular because some things never change. But I’m the King of The Misfits, a reluctant leader to these kids who supposedly don’t believe in being led. I’m the Vampire Lestat, St Jimmy, Jesus of Suburbia, I’m Lou Pucci in eyeliner and Gerard Way, I’m Billie-Joe Armstrong post American Idiot. I’m important to these people. I mean something. And I wouldn’t give that up.

Well…I thought I wouldn’t.