Eli sat at the edge of the cafeteria table, same spot every day—close enough to the others not to look like he was avoiding them, far enough to stay out of the noise. His tray had food he wouldn't eat, and his eyes kept drifting to the clock on the wall. Thirty-two minutes left. He could fake this for thirty-two more minutes.
The boys at the table were laughing at something that had nothing to do with him, but it still felt like a sound meant to keep him out. Their jokes were sharp, inside-coded, fast. Eli didn't even try to join anymore. He learned the hard way that his silence was more tolerable than his voice.
"Yo, Eli," one of them suddenly called out, smirking. "You ever think about talking more or nah? Or is bro writing a memoir in his head again?"
Laughter followed. He smiled the way people do when they're trying not to make it awkward. Not because it was funny. Not because it didn't sting.
He looked back down at his tray. The pasta had congealed. The apple was bruised.
He'd write about that later—"Today, I was a punchline. Again."
At home, it wasn't better. His brothers had already decided who he was: dramatic, sensitive, weird. One joke from them could ruin his whole evening. They did it like it was a game—poke until he reacted, then call the reaction proof that he was unstable.
Their favorite trick was pulling their mom into it. "He said this." "He slammed the door." "He's always moody." And she'd believe them. She always did. She never asked Eli for his side. Maybe she was tired, maybe she didn't want conflict, or maybe—just maybe—she believed he really was the problem.
Eli didn't know what was worse: being misunderstood or being invisible.
Later that night, he opened his notebook again. The page was already smudged from his last entry—something about how fake laughter felt louder than real pain. He wrote slowly, as if trying to bleed the weight from his chest onto the page:
"They all laughed. I laughed too, because not laughing would've made it worse. I'm not sad. I'm just... fading. I think that's worse."
He didn't cry. He hadn't cried in months.
Instead, he drew a box around the words "I'm just fading." Over and over until the page tore slightly in the corner.
Then he closed the book.
And went to bed.