Date: Sat, 10 Dec 2005 07:23:57 -0500 From: madasonaysha@aol.com Subject: "Expression Of Silence" chapter 1 gay college / gay interracial STORY SYNOPSIS/ AUTHOR NOTE: This is an alternate form of another story that I've written a while ago, not found on Nifty. I know you all must be sick of me and new stories without finishing the others, but this one is completed in 15 chapters which I will post directly to Nifty or if you can't wait, you can read them all at my yahoo group along with all of my other stories: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MaddyA_Stories Now here is the warning, this story will contain explicit scenes of self mutilation more commonly known as "Cutting" and also mentions of the sexual abuse of a child, but it will NOT be glorified one bit! This is NOT that type of story. This is a story about love, acceptance and healing so please, please, please know that! I'd love to know your thoughts on this story and you can send them to: Madasonaysha@aol.com or Madisonaysha@yahoo.com or post a message at my yahoo group and if you have a problem getting to it, just let me know and I'll send you an invite. ******************************************************************* "EXPRESSION OF SILENCE" By Madison A. Dante CHAPTER ONE: CRIMSON SEDUCTION The way the low golden light of the lamp hit the blade was almost romantic in a twisted sort of way. Seducing him as he fingered dirty finger nails across the small razor blade that he held in his palm. He knew he shouldn't do it, but it was the only thing that would make him feel good. There was this sadness somewhere inside of him that grew with each passing minute..hour..day...week until he felt consumed by it. The sadness that came from out of no where every now and then when he wasn't expecting it to. The sadness that made it hard for him to get out of bed some afternoons and that felt smothering yet inviting all at the same time. He didn't know why he felt so bad about everything. Fuck, his life was perfect...well, to most people it would be. He was rich..fuckingly disgustingly rich thanks to a skate-board and a little bit of luck in the sponsorship department and at twenty-two, while most of his friends were still in college, had already made enough money to retire comfortably. He had a great girl-friend who was always down for what ever he wanted to do and for that he loved her just that much more. He had known most of his friends for almost as long as he had known himself and they were the best mother fuckers he knew. He should have felt on top of the world, but instead he felt underneath it..smothered...choked and restrained. If felt like everyone always wanted a piece of him and wanted to leave nothing left for him..and it worked. He felt like he had nothing. He hadn't done this in a long time...fuck, that was a lie. He did it on occasion, just a few weeks ago, but usually only when he was stressed out about something and just needed something to help him deal. No, he wasn't stressed that night..just sad. He could hear his friends all downstairs laughing against the back drop of a Jay Z song that came courteous of Darnel, he was always trying to share his love of hip-hop with everyone, even if more times than none they wouldn't enjoy it. Darnel was one of his best friends and even after nearly ten years of friendship, he still didn't understand that if it wasn't heavy metal or country music, none of them would love it as much as he did. Michael almost smiled at trying to picture some of his friends downstairs trying to pretend the knew the words to 'Big Pimping'. Hell, even Darnel and all two hundred and thirty five pounds of his black, linesmen back body didn't even know them. His fingers started tingling in a teasing way...begging for him to just do it..get it over with. He knew he shouldn't do it because he didn't think he would stop this time. No, last time he did it he wondered what it would feel like if he dragged the blade across his wrist diagonally and pressed harder. He never cut anywhere other than his legs and never even thought about his arms let alone his wrists before. That scared him and he told himself that he wasn't going to cut again, but here he was tempting fate once again. He didn't know what made him tell all his friends that he needed to run up to his room and it didn't surprise him that no one questioned him as to why. He had long established that reputation of not being one to answer questions and he loved that about himself. He loved people thinking that he held so much mystery when really there was none. He was a shell of a man panged with insecurities and uncertainties like everyone else only he was smart and at thirteen after the "incident" that no one talks about happened, he found a solution for that. Cutting made everything feel better. It's hard to explain it unless you have done it. Its hard to explain why causing yourself pain can be the only way to make you feel better, but it does. It's like the world is full of so many things you can't control, but pain is something that you can. It's the act of knowing that your doing something that you and only YOU have power over is what makes it feel good. When he was cutting himself it made all the painful memories disappear, but they were memories and always came back later. He closed his eyes and remembered. <I>He was at Nana's house. His uncle Paul was supposed to be watching him, but he had left to go to the bar with some of his friends so it was just Michael and his cousin Steve. Michael was always the perceptive child, hell his mother Donna will tell you that. He didn't know what it was about his cousin Steve that he didn't like, but it was something "off" about him. Steve was in his late twenties and couldn't hold a job so he was living with his grand parents. He had been in and out of jail and was just one of those people your mother warned you about, but Steve was family and in the large Tancredi Italian clan that meant everything. Michael begged for Paul to take him along, but Paul just laughed and said that he had to go out and wasn't gonna take a kid with him. Michael ran out on the lawn after him, but Paul was already gone. He thought about just waiting on the porch swing until his Nana came back from the hair dresser, but it was February and his thin buggle boy shirt and jeans weren't keeping him warm. He had a plan. He was going to run into the kitchen then sneak up the back stairs, lock Nana's and Grampa's bedroom door and just wait in there until someone else came home. Only when he opened the door, Steve was standing there smiling at him. His face looked friendly. He had the Tancredi nose and wavy dark hair only his eyes were a weird shade of green that reminded Michael of the zombies in that scary movie that Jess made him watch. "Mickey! I'm gonna tell Nana you went out without your coat on!" Steve said with a smirk on his face the grew when he saw the distress on Michael's seven year old face. Steve knew he had him right where he wanted him. He asked Michael if he wanted him not to tell Nana and Michael begged for him not to. He told him that he needed his help moving some things around in his room and if he helped him, then he wouldn't tell. Michael could feel a tight knot forming in his stomach as he weighed his options. Nana would spank him again if she found out that he had went outside without a jacket on again, but something was telling him not to go up into that bedroom. But, when Steve reminded Michael that Nana would be really, really mad at Michael for not listening to her about wearing his coat, Michael went up the stairs with him. Snakes..Steve kept snakes in glass cages all around his dark and dank room. The whole place smelled like moth balls and cat piss and Michael wanted to leave as soon as he walked in, only Steve was behind him and wouldn't move. He asked Michael if he wanted to pet one of them. Steve laughed at the look of sheer terror that came across Michael's face as he yelled that he didn't want to. Steve laughed and ignored him as he pulled out the biggest snake in his collection. It was a colorless Boa Constrictor and Michael screamed and ran for the door as he heard it hiss in Steve's hands. The door was locked and Michael started to scream and bang on it for someone to help, but no one was outside to hear his cries and help. Steve continued laughing and Michael tried to think of a place he could hide and get away from the snake, but the room was too small for him to go anywhere else except on the bed. Steve laughed and threatened that he would throw the snake around Michael's neck unless he took off his shirt. Michael didn't even question him...he just took it off. He would have done anything that he asked as long as Steve kept that snake away from him. Cousin Steve smiled and placed the snake back in it's cage before he asked Michael if he wanted to play a game...games that he made him play until Michael was thirteen..</I> Michael opened his eyes and stared down at his bleeding palm. He had gripped the blade so hard that he had drawn blood. It wasn't very much and the pain felt more like an itch. No, that wasn't enough to make him feel better. He rolled up his sweat pants, just above the knee and pulled his leg up to his chest so his neck could rest on his knee. He looked down at the small pink jagged lines that had longed healed and knew he would me adding another member to the family. It was a good thing that he skated because no one ever asked him why his legs were so cut up and scarred. He had no time for any more thoughts of dissuasion. He knew that he no matter what he said to himself the end result would always be the same. He closed his eyes and pressed the cold metal blade on his calf and squeezed his eyes shut even tighter as he pressed harder. He usually liked music playing in the background while he did it, to help him get further lost, but he had no time for that. No, he had people downstairs and needed to make this quick. He dragged the blade slowly to prolong the sharp feeling of his flesh being torn. He sighed as crimson relief slowly began to ooze out and run down his towards his ankle. The rush was over too quickly so he needed to do it again..only once more and that would be enough for now. Like an orgasm, the feeling was intense and after he was done, he wanted to do it again and again, but he stopped himself. A knock came at the door startling him. He threw the ruby tipped razor behind his bed and opened the door. "Dude, what the fuck are you doing?" Tommy asked him with a smile on his golden, half black, half Korean face that Michael didn't return. Tommy's short dark brown hair was cropped closely to his head, a strong contrast to Michael's jet black hair which was long and down his back in deep waves of coal, falling just to his shoulders. "Hey Tommy. Nothing man." Michael replied as he closed his door behind him and started walking back down to the living room while running his hands over his sweat dripping hair and twisting it in his hand, wrapping it around his fist. He didn't want Tommy to look at him because he knew that Tommy would know something was wrong. The best and worst thing about Tommy is his perceptiveness. Out of all of his friends Tommy was the one who could ALWAYS tell when something was wrong with him. Where as most people would assume that Michael was just probably pissed off about something random and pointless, Tommy would be the one to probe to see if the problem was something deeper. "You okay? You look like shit." Tommy muttered peering his deep brown eyes at him. "Fuck off Tommy!" Michael yelled and immediately regretted his outburst. But, it was too late Tommy was muttering something under his breath and walked away. Michael watched Tommy sit down on the bottom stairs and just as he was about to go down and sit next to him and try to fix things, Kyle had beat him to the punch. Michael couldn't fight away that little knot that started to twist around in his stomach as he stood at the top of the stairs watching them. Kyle sat down on a step just below Tommy and he could see Kyle ask him what was wrong. He couldn't see Tommy's reply, but he saw Kyle's green eyes smile at what ever Tommy had said to him and they both stood up. He watched Kyle throw his baseball cap backwards of his long straight blonde hair and walk over to Susanna. He said something in her ear that made her smile and for a moment Michael felt jealous that someone other than him had made his girlfriend smile. Michael made his way down the stairs and walked over to them just in time to hear Kyle say that he and Tommy were leaving. "Leaving? Where you guys going?" Michael asked as he glanced quickly over to Tommy who stood near the front door waiting to leave. A sadness washed over him as Tommy turned to look away. "Oh, man. Where just..gotta um.do some stuff. See ya tomorrow." Kyle replied quickly and it was obvious to Michael that he was lying. Kyle was another one his close friends and he didn't want to think of the reasons why he would be lying. No, he didn't want to think about that because if he did, then the pain would come back and he didn't know how far he would take go if it did. So, he told Kyle that he would see them tomorrow and watched as Tommy smiled and patted Kyle on the back as they walked out of the door. Michael could feel his fingers tingling again and had to down three beers until it stopped.... TBC (c) Madison Dante 2005 FEEDBACK IS GREATLY ENCOURAGED! Want to know what happens next? Join my yahoo group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MaddyA_Stories