Tom K. — Autism

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After that, he didn't speak again. And I don't know why, but it made me a little sad. I thought maybe... she could be my friend. But no. As always.

However, a while later, he looked at me again. "You're new here, right?" he asked me. —Yes. My parents changed my school again — I answered quietly. —That must be tough. "A little. But I'm used to it now," I said, shrugging.

She nodded, and without me realizing it, she started asking me more questions. —Do you like this course? Do you like the teachers? — and other small things, as if he just wanted to talk to me.

And then… I let go. "I have a cat, his name is Bill," I said suddenly. "He likes to sleep on top of my notebooks. Sometimes I forget to do my homework because of him. I also like it when it rains; the sound calms me down. And I don't like noisy places; they give me headaches. Oh, and I collect little train figurines; I have them organized by color."

She looked at me without interrupting, listening with a small smile. That made me so happy that… without thinking, I leaned towards her and grabbed her cheeks with both hands, squeezing them gently while I laughed. "You're so kind to me!" I said, unable to hide my excitement.

But as soon as I did it, I realized. I stood still, my heart pounding. I released her cheeks and looked down. —I'm sorry… — I murmured, my voice trembling —. It wasn't my intention, I was just very excited.

I was always rejected for being different. Not because I did anything wrong, but because I was… me. For as long as I can remember, people laughed at me or looked at me strangely. They called me stupid, weird, slow. But I wasn't any of those things; I just had autism. Mild, the doctors said, but still enough for others to see me as if I were from another planet.

I never chose to be this way. I was born this way. And although I tried to fit in, I couldn't. It was the same at every school: the teasing, the pushing, the name-calling. My parents would end up taking me out, saying things would be different at the next one. But they weren't. New school, new faces, and the same silence accompanying me during recess.

Even so, I always held onto a little bit of hope. I thought, "Maybe this time it will be different."

On the first day of classes at the new school, I sat at the back of the classroom, as always. I liked that spot. No one was looking at me, and I could look around in peace. I arranged my things in a straight line—notebooks, pencils, everything neatly put away. That calmed me down.

While the teacher was speaking, I just listened to the others laughing and chatting amongst themselves. It hurt a little… because I wanted that too, but I was afraid to try and make a fool of myself again.

Then I heard hurried footsteps, a female voice apologizing for being late, and someone sat down right next to me. She was a girl.

"Do you have a pencil I can borrow?" he asked me with a quick smile. "Yes... yes, wait," I said, taking out my pencil case. I carefully opened it, took out a perfectly sharpened pencil, and handed it to him.

She took it and simply said: -Thank you.

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