Hello! So, this is the brain child of not enough sleep and too much work over the summer. It will be updated irregularly, especially if no one is reading it. If you want an update, just message me and I'll get a move on. If you enjoy it, please review! I want to know what people think!

We're in the mall. It's Saturday afternoon. I check the watch Dad got me two weeks ago –"This way you can check the time whenever you want without having to ask someone,"- and see it is two thirty PM. The people are crowding in more and more by the minute, making it hard to breathe. Mattie's holding my hand –tightly –in an attempt to keep me still and relaxed. I wish he didn't have to. I can see the tension in his jaw every time someone walks anywhere close to me, his eyes dart around to try to see triggers before they can set me off. We're nearly to the door. After that, it's just across the parking lot to the car and things will be fine. We're a few yards from the door, nearly there. We're going to make it.

We don't make it. An announcement sounds over the loudspeaker and I first freeze, then fall to the floor in classic "Duck and Cover" position. My hands clap over my ears and I scream the same thing I always scream to block out the noise, to make it go away, "That's loud!"

At least, I try to. But the words don't sound right when I say them. They sound like empty noise. Noise without meaning. I try to force my tongue to form them, but somewhere along the way, the command gets lost and it just sounds like, "Ahhhhh!"

After a moment, the announcement is over and the area is much quieter. I start to get up because now the danger is gone and I'm safe again. There are some people around us. They're staring. At me. They have the same looks they always do. Pity. Sympathy. Poorly-hidden smug satisfaction. My episode of fear is something for them to gawk at. And I know what their faces say. I know what they're thinking. I can read people really well. Just not when they're talking to me. And these people aren't talking to me. They're staring at me and pitying my parents, my brother. They're thinking about how hard our lives must be. They're patting themselves on the back because their kid isn't like me. Because their kid is normal.

There's noise, and after a moment, I recognize it as Mattie talking to me. I look at him as best I can, first at his face, but then the panic comes back and my eyes turn toward his hoodie instead. There's a big white maple leaf on it, separated down the middle by a zipper. The strings to adjust the hood hang unevenly. I reach out to fix them and he lets me because he knows I won't budge until they're fixed. I won't function until they're fixed.

"Time to go," Mattie says after I've finished. He taps my watch that Dad got for me two weeks ago. "Time to go home," he repeats, and I try to nod, but it's not as fluid as when he does it. It's a jerky motion that brings my head from its normal position to a position where my chin is touching my chest. Another jerking motion and it's back to where it started. Dad smiles. I've gotten better at responding. Better about nodding. Mattie takes my hand and leads me outside. I stare back at the people, my upper body twisted around, making my steps even more crooked than usual. They're still staring. I look at Mattie, whose gaze is focused in front of us, and see his face is red. He doesn't turn to look back at the people. He knows they're still staring. He doesn't want to see them.

We get back to the car. I try to say sorry to him for causing a scene. It sounds like a low growl. He looks back at me and my eyes immediately focus on his hoodie again. I see him smile out of the corner of my eye, though. We get in the car. I'm on the right side, in the back. Just like always. It's my seat. Doctors tell Dad I have to sit there because of the visual stim of watching what's outside go by. I have to sit here because this way Mattie's on my left. He's always on my left. It's how we are. I like looking out the window, too.

Dad hands me the wire that plugs into the radio at one end and my iPod at the other. "Music," he says. "Talk."

We've worked out a system. I listen to music a lot; I always have my iPod with me. I tell him how I'm feeling with the songs. The title of the song I put on is what I want to say, or something like it. They got me a 64 gigabyte iPod, so I could have lots of words. Mattie adds them for me. I scroll through my list of songs to find what I have to say. Mattie speaks the titles as I start the songs.

"Broken," he says, as Seether begins to filter through the speakers.

"You're not broken, Alfred. You're just different," Dad says quickly. He's said it a million times. It sounds the exact same every time.

"Perfect," Mattie says as I switch songs.

Dad smiles at me in the rear view mirror. "Exactly," he keeps smiling as he speaks, "You're perfect just as you are."

I turn my attention to the window. I didn't mean it like that. I was using sarcasm, but he doesn't get that. You can't express tone through an iPod. I switch songs.

Mattie grins out of the corner of my eye as he gives the title, "Everyday Normal Guy."

Dad's eyes crinkle around the edges as he smiles bigger, "Matthew, what have you been putting on there for him?"

"Whatever he asks for," Mattie answers, and he's used to getting defensive when talking about me, and I hear it edging into his voice. "Sorry," he says after a brief pause. "I didn't mean to get snappy with you."

They talk for a bit and I stare out the window. It's Saturday. Saturday is one of Papa's days to cook. I hope he'll make burgers. They're my favorite food. And he knows just how to get them juicy and perfect. I want to ask him to make burgers, but I don't. The words are in my head, but my mouth doesn't want to say them. I grab a book sitting between Mattie and me. It's one of my communication books. I don't like to carry it in public, or people stare more than usual. I flip it to the first page and point at a picture of Papa with his name under it. Mattie looks over and speaks for me.

"Al says 'Papa.'"

Papa looks at me in the rear view mirror. I look at his reflection for a moment before flipping hurriedly through the book. I find the picture I want and point at it.

"Dinner," Mattie reads. I flip through the book again and point at the right picture when I find it. "Burgers," Mattie reads again. Papa's reflection smiles at this.

"What do you think, Arthur?" he asks Dad.

"If that's what you want, Alfred," he answers. I scroll through my songs again, choosing the one I want.

Mattie gives me a look when it comes on, but still says, "I Want it That Way."

Dad looks at Mattie this time in the rear view, "You gave him Backstreet Boys? Oh, Mattie." I go back to looking out the window.

Later, we're at home. I'm sitting on the floor in front of the TV, watching The Avengers. My action figures are lined up in front of me, in the same order as always: Captain America, Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, Black Widow, Hawkeye, and Loki. They stand at the ready, in case danger strikes. There's a noise in the room and it's bothering me. I try to ignore it, to block it out, like they want me to, but I can't. I try for a whole minute, but I just can't take it so I pause the movie and try to shout "Shh!" at the noise, but it comes at like a hiss. I turn around and see Dad is typing on his laptop at his living room desk. I try shushing him again, but he doesn't respond or stop. I go over and grab his hands, shushing him again.

He looks at me and I try my hardest to hold his gaze. It becomes too much after thirty-three seconds –I checked the watch that Dad got me two weeks ago –and my gaze quickly drops to his sweater vest. He smiles out of the corner of my eye as I study the stitches in his vest. It's green, and matches his eyes. I figure since it matches his eyes it's as good as looking him in the eye. His vest doesn't look at me with… expectations. Dad didn't for a while after my diagnosis either, but he does now. I've made a lot of progress in the last year, my doctors say, so now he has hope and expectations. I hate expectations. I hate when people look at me with expectations in their eyes. I hate disappointing them. But, even more, I hate when people look at me without expectations. When they just don't expect anything of me because they think I'm a hopeless case. The few mainstream classes I've taken have had teachers that do that. They see how difficult I am and they just kind of give up on me. Or worse, they hate me. It's hard to be hated because sometimes you have to hate back, and hating is very exhausting. When I had teachers that hated me, I came home tired and made Dad worry. I make him worry every day when I go to school now. I don't know why he's so worried, but I know he is because it shows in his eyes. It makes me worry about him and I end up worrying all day and then I don't get anything done and then my grades go down and then my teachers call home about my grades and then they hate me because no matter how many times they explain the material, I still don't get it. And it's hard to be hated. I don't think I'll go to school this week. I think I'll stay home and help out around the house to make things easier for Dad.

There's noise near me. Dad is talking to me. I try looking at him again, but I end up focusing on his eyebrows instead of his eyes. He knows where I'm actually looking, but he smiles anyway. Because I've met his expectations. I study his eyebrows –they're rather large –as he talks.

"Is my typing too noisy?" he asks. I nod, my head jerking down toward my chest, then coming back up; my eyes not moving from his eyebrows. "Would you like me to stop?" his voice is filled with expectations, and I hate that. I nod again. "Can you say stop?" he voices one of his expectations and I know I'm going to disappoint him, but I try anyway because not trying would be even more disappointing.

"Stop," I say, but I can tell it wasn't quite right because even though he's smiling and his eyes are crinkling simply because I tried, I can see a very brief flicker of disappointment in his eyes that's always there when I fail something.

"Alright, I'll stop. Finish your movie," he says and points at the TV. I return to my spot and continue watching.

And even though I've seen this movie at least once a day every day since I got the DVD –the day of its release –and I saw it in theaters five times –once with the whole family, once with just my parents because Mattie was at hockey practice, once with just Dad because Papa was at work, once with just Papa because Dad was with Mattie, and once with just Mattie because he wanted to do something special for our birthday –I still pay very careful attention to all the details. If I could speak properly, I could quote this entire movie by heart. Complete with timing, inflection, and tone. Sometimes, at night, I dream the movie and it's right, down to the last detail. I wish Dad knew how much I remembered about it so he would know I could remember things, even though I forget the things he tells me and I leave my lunch at home a lot and my shoes are often untied when I come home because they got undone in gym and I never fixed them because I figured I'd do it later. I wish he knew about how much I can remember and not just how much I forget.

Dad is driving me to Speech later. I'm sitting in the back seat again, even though he insisted I sit up front because he doesn't want to feel like a chauffeur. I always sit in the back. He's trying to get me to talk; to practice what my Speech Therapist has been working on with me. I'm ignoring him. I don't want to talk. We stop at a red light and he looks at me in the mirror. I look at his reflection. His eyes look like gemstones. Or moss. He doesn't like it like when I touch moss. He says it's dirty, but he also doesn't stop me because he's happy I'm touching anything at all. He's making noise. It's my name. He's talking to me.

"Do you want to put on some music?" he asks, and his eyes have those expectations in them again. I sigh but nod and he hands me the wire. I plug in my iPod and start scrolling. I don't want to talk. He asks me a question, "Are you looking forward to Speech?" I scroll through the songs and choose one from Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. He pauses to listen for a minute, then agrees, "A man's got to do what a man's got to do." He pauses before continuing, "I know it's tedious, but I think it's really helping you. You've progressed so much in the last year…"

Realizing he's off on one of his Expectations Rants, I look out the window and listen to the music. I love musicals. I'd love to be in one, but I can't dance. Or act. Or sing. Or talk. Or deal with the constant light changes and the volume of the music. And people don't like me. If I really wanted to, I bet I could get into the musical at my school. But Special Needs kids are never cast as leads. And I don't want to be ensemble. Ensemble is for the losers who aren't good enough.

I check the watch Dad got me two weeks ago and figure that if the Speech appointment only takes half an hour, and there's not a lot of traffic on the way home, I'll be able to watch The Avengers one more time. Dad is talking to me again.

"Alfred, you look upset. Are you ok?" he asks me, his gaze rapidly shifting from the road to me in the mirror to the road to me. I put on a song by Three Days Grace.

It takes him a few moments, but then he asks, "'Last to Know?' What does that mean?"

I don't bother explaining. I know he wouldn't get it.