This home, though it has been only 5 years since we rented it, has changed a lot over that period of time. Once full of color now has become what the surrounding world was, colorless. There were 4 of us living in this apartment, one of which was me. I knew Greg the longest since we were in the same orphanage together.
I knew at an early age that I wasn't perceive as normal to the outside world. I had no parents. I didn't know my biological parents. Fuck it, I didn't want to. My fellow orphans became my family but later on I didn't care much as many of them were sent to foster families. I watch as kid after kid waved goodbye. I too was sent many times to live with foster families but none of which ever worked out.
Even though I masterminded a lot of devilish acts as a kid, especially to get out of the foster parent's home, I was always the one who got bullied. I was little in physique and grew slower than the other boys at the orphanage. I was tormented by this one deaf boy almost everyday. Each day I force myself to learn sign language so that one day, at least for one day, I could beat him up. I knew if I learned sign language it won't be much of a case in sympathy and that then, we were even. Him with his hearing impairment and me with my scrawny physique.
That day came and I went to confront him. Needless to say, he didn't at all looked happy. His size twice as big as mine and with hands as big as king kong's he ran to me with anger. If this was a movie, he'd be running in slow motion. Unfortunately this was more a slapstick comedy than a full on action drama. I was a bit surprise that for one he could move that fast, and secondly why he's even beating me up in the first place. Okay, I might have lied, maybe it was because of my endless cussing. Okay, I might have lied about that too, it was more of a one finger hand gesture than a poetic line of cussing.
I was out of breath by the time he was finish beating me up, and by the looks of things so did he. So what it was only because of the energy needed to do the beating up, I still managed to make him sweat in my books. A mental win I thought. I did however learned that I could still think to myself while getting beaten up. It was another mental win. Even though I was thinking of why I learned sign language instead of self defense, I still prefer it to be rationalized as a mental win. Eat that deaf boy as I said to him in my mind.
I grew up knowing one thing from that encounter, don't fight those who are bigger physically than you. The other thing that I got from all of the beatings was a best friend in Greg. He was beside me throughout all the beating. Even though he was getting beaten himself, I did feel we would stick together for a long time. A combat brother. The kinds where you hear from veteran soldiers who was at 'nam and Korea but on a smaller scale.
