Status Updates From Different for Boys

‘I look at him to find he's looking back at me. And he leans forward, just a little, then a little more.
And he reaches me.
And he kisses me.
Gently so as not to bump my nose or eye, he presses his lips to mine. And for a second, for a minute, for ever, every nerve in my body is right there, right at the point where we’re touching.
And boom, I think.
That's it.’

The milkshake mark ruffalo joke made me chuckle.

‘We just sit there like that for a long, long time, letting night fall outside, not saying anything at all, just the two of us sitting there, waiting for the month or year or whenever in our lives where we're allowed to stop being lonely.’

‘And for a minute, it feels like I'm going to cry, it really does, about how empty it all feels, about how difficult things are going to be at school for a while, about how much relief there is to still having friends like Freddie and Jack.’

"I know," I say.
He's quiet for a minute and then…"It isn't easy," he says, "having people think that about you. But most of them don't care, not really. They just love having something new to beat you up with. You have to show them it won't work..."
I breathe out, long and tired.
“…I think he just needed someone. Someone who cared only for him."

"You tried to tell me and I-"
"Oh, please," he says. "Like I didn't know you were
lying."
I blink. "You knew?"
"It was obvious," he says. "Well, obvious to me, but that's probably only because I was looking. If I'd known, I wouldn't have teased you."

‘THE EVENING AFTER THE END OF THE WORLD—"Parents say they want to know the truth…but they never really mean it."

‘He interrupts, looking around at the staring eyes on us, holding them until they look away. "Everyone's going to give you (shit) for a while, so what you got to do is make sure they know you don't care. Show them you don't. Come out for rugby. It'll pass."

‘I've never been so aware of eyes on me. On us.
I can feel all the eyes on us, and I can't believe Freddie's risking so much guilt by association.
Freddie shrugs. "If you can take a hit like that and get right back up, that's pretty much all rugby is. You're made for it."

Gotta love Freddie’s support.

‘I make it through. I don't know how…I leave school ground with the force field still in place…’

‘People snicker and stare at me as I walk by and there's like this force field around me on all sides that no one would dare to cross. I don't know why I don't lie about it, why I don't counter-argue, why I don't make Charlie the one in the force field.
Well, yes, I do, I guess.
I didn't think it was possible to feel lonelier. But there you go. Life will always surprise you with what it's capable of.’

‘The other boys just stare at me, whispering between
themselves. Laughing. Jack and Freddie are still watching me. And I know they know it's true. Even if I did deny it now, it'd be too late, plus it makes sense once someone points it out, doesn't it?’

‘Even now, I can see how scared he is. How he believed all along that I wouldn't stay with him, that I'd pick Freddie over him the second Freddie walked in the door, that it's not even a sex thing with Charlie.
It's that he doesn't believe anyone would ever bother
being his friend. That he's as lonely as I am. And that it was only a matter of time before I abandoned him to it.’

‘Why aren't I shouting back? Why can't I yell back all the things that Charlie and I have done together?
That he's done all these things, willingly, enthusiastically. With a word, I could bring him down, bring him down as bad as he's bringing me down now. But I'm not. Because it's Charlie.’

‘I hear snorts of surprise from the class and I see the
faces already starting to laugh. Not Freddie or Jack, though, who are just staring at me. Charlie's still screaming. I'm speechless. I'm just looking at Jack and Freddie, watching them see me not deny it, watching them realise it might be true, that it is true.’

“I hear him shouting over me. My hand's up to my eye and nose and I can already feel the bleeding. I've fallen off my chair to the floor, mostly out of surprise.
Charlie did hit me hard, but I'm already getting back to my feet when I realise what he's yelling.” (Slurs.)

I’m confused why some words are censored in the beginning-swearing or insinuated sex acts, but as the book progresses slurs aren’t.

‘I see the confusion on Charlie's face, the pain on it, …Charlies fists are up and here are all the people in the world he wants to hit, to take out all his Charlie pain on, Jack Taylor who he's made into his worst enemy, Freddie Smith who tried to make me play rugby and even Mr Bacon who's in the wrong place at the wrong time. But it's not any of them that he hits.
It's me.’

‘And I see Charlie's fists clenching and he's getting all red as he's staring at the wondering face of Jack, who's now looking over at me all astonished, and Freddie's looking at us like what the hell's going on and the whole class is looking, too, and it suddenly feels like I'm naked there and everyone can see and everyone knows.’

"Jack," I say, warning in my voice before I can stop
myself. Because I'm sure, I'm absolutely sure Jack wouldn't be teasing this way if he thought it was true.
And I know this because I see him realise it the second I warn him like that.’

My stomach hurts at the way he says it. And the hurt
must be on my face, too, because Jack sees it.
And that's when it happens. A few little words are all
it takes.
"Watch out, Charlie," Jack says, smirking. "You've got competition for the wife." And Charlie's eyes go wide, too wide, for a second too long…just being angry Charlie again, I see Jack look confused. And then surprised. Really surprised.

‘He's hostile all over the place, but I know he's telling me hes going to forget about what happened on Saturday, that we can just move on and pretend nothing happened.
Like we always do.
Then he stares at me.’

‘And I do a stupid thing.
I lean forward, my face heading towards Charlies, and for a second, for a real second there, he doesn't move, he sees me coming and he doesn't move, his eyes full of fear but his head steady, and I'm going to kiss him, going to kiss him right on the mouth.’

‘He looks back at me, and I can feel his skin under my fingertips, I can feel his heartbeat coming down from his neck, I can feel the warmth of him just humming there, and he's looking back at me, all affronted and angry, but still the Charlie I know, still the Charlie I've known for all these years, and also the one I've known for the past ten months since Christmas, the one that only I know.’

‘He looks at me, and his eyes are like someone I barely even know, like someone no one can know. And I grab his shoulder to stop him, his bare shoulder, and for a second there, everything stops.‘

‘reaching out to him. "It's okay with me, all right? It totally is. I won't tell anyone, but it's okay with me."
And I didn't see him again all summer, not for two full months until classes started again, and we both had to pretend like nothing had happened.’

The parallels between Jack and Charlie. Suppression and avoidance. Guilt and shame.

‘At my school, it was a secret, and you were on your own. I knew exactly how Jack felt. Of course I did. Why do you think I was spending all that time with Charlie? But I lied. God damn me to my dying day, because the biggest sin you can commit is failing a friend. But that's what I did.
I failed him.’

‘And here was one of my oldest friends, someone who I didn't have a thing against in the world, someone who was fun to be around and who'd never been anything but a good person to me. And of course I bloody knew how lonely it got…just that word, lonely, makes me feel so empty I don't even want to talk about it.‘

“…you could get your throat slit. You could get raped…”
It’s interesting how this is written. It’s not blanked out or censored. Sex acts and swearing are. But rape isn’t.

"I mean, do you have any idea how unbelievably
lonely it gets? Feeling like you're the only one?“
‘And then he looked at me…And there was a silence that, once again, I knew was asking me something. Asking me loud and clear.’