The boy with the torn in his side radio you have to hum cause you can’t remember
to hum cause you can’t remember the words.
By: Peter Wentz
The Boy
This story is a complete waste of the eyesight you will lost
reading it. When you are done you’ll ask yourself what the
point was. There isn’t one. Every life has a lull in it that gets so
bad and seems so long that you can’t remember when or why
it started. It skips around and probably isn’t worth it but to me it
reads like the bible. This is the story of a lull.....read it like a
crime scene report or an autopsy, because that’s all it ever
was.
This is not the kind of boy who deserves a story. He is not the
kind of boy that deserves to be remembered. He is not the
kind of boy who has a name. Or at least not one that he can
remember. Neither did his mother or father... they barely
remembered he was alive. He is the kind of kid that just gets
by. He is the kind of kid who you forget about as soon as you
meet him. He is the B-side to your hit single. He is the crust on
the bread, the ash on the cigarette. He is every face you have
ever forgotten (he is us). The kids at his school would have
hated him if they had even noticed his existence. When you’re
always alone it feels strange when you are together with
anyone. He gets up every morning with the same stupid smile
on his stupid face. He looks in the mirror at his chipped teeth
and scars. The mouse brown hair that looks like it needs a
haircut (but not in a good way). His wrists a bad day away
from being slit. His left leg just shorter than his right, giving him
a look of being permanently disheveled. And smiles.
That’s how stupid this boy is. He is the straight to video sequel
to your summer hit movie. He is the verse to that song on the
You couldn’t break this kid’s heart, he is so far beyond that.
This is the kind of kid who blew out the candles on hope all
alone for too many birthdays to remember. And no one has
ever fallen in love with anyone with a smile that’s dripping with
“please die”. So why is he smiling? Because he can hear the
droning guitars and words streaming under the bathroom door.
They wrote his moods.
The boy wished he could live in the “humdrum towns” and
“coastal villages”. He sang “I wish I weren’t me” over and over
again just flat of the key of love until he forgot the words and
could only hum along. Everyday was the same. The same
stupid smile on the same stupid boy. Until the days blurred into
a haze and the boy dropped into a depression. Not a cool dark
room and cigarette depression like the songs he loved, but
one that felt like he was being smothered by a safe, suburban,
monotonous blanket. Everything felt like a headache to the
boy. Every face, every stupid stuttered sentence all wrapped
up into the biggest headache ever. So the boy took an aspirin.
And another and another and then went to sleep, lullabyed by
hopes he would never wake up (see also: “tell my mom, I’m
sorry- I just can’t be bothered anymore”). When he woke up
the headache was gone and in it’s place was a stomachache
that felt like bird beaks and teeth, and a new headache in the
form of his mother’s worry. She said he was okay he just got
confused. She said he was okay but he just needed to talk to
someone. So the stupid, stuttering, ugly boy was sent to a
doctor.
 The Doctor
The boy had never been more scared in his life. But he
explained his headaches, the songs and his dreams, and sat
there with that stupid chipped grin on his face. He was ecstatic
to have someone listen to him even if his mother had to pay
them to do it. The doctor listened to the boy talk about how the
vinyl feels and how the places looked inside his head. And
then he gave the boy a bottle of pills and told him to put away
his records and take one when he felt sick in his own skin or
like he was breathing on the bottom of the ocean (see also:
breathless). These were the headaches and the depression,
but they were just thoughts that could be wished away with a
simple pill. These were the reasons the stupid, stuttering, ugly,
forgettable boy wasn’t popular. Why he couldn't fit in. Why he
was so morbid. But the boy was too stupid to know this and so
he took his grin and the pills and walked home. First he threw
out all of his records, trashed his heart and then he went to
sleep. The first night wasn’t bad at all. He had a dream that he
was trapped inside a burning glass box. His lungs seared as
the glass melted. There were just enough holes poked in the
glass for him to gasp through for someone to come and save
him. To bring on the mo(u)rning. But there wasn’t anyone
there and even if there was he was pretty sure they wouldn’t
come for a mess like him. He woke up as alive as he ever felt.
The second night was a little bit harder. He felt homesick for
places he had never been. He missed hearts he had never
loved.
The third night was unbearable. He crawled along the floor
towards the crack of light in the bathroom door. He opened it
and found the pills the therapist had given him. The bottle read
“Clandestine Industries” on the side. The boy should have
found this quite strange but instead he was blissfully unaware
(being the stupid little wretch that he was). He took one out. It
was huge and black. He closed his eyes, put the pill in his
mouth and took a sip of water. But the pill went halfway down
the boy’s throat and stopped. This stupid and ugly, stuttering
and forgettable mess of a boy was choking. And just as he
was sure it would no go down, it did. The boy’s eyes felt like
they had weights on them. He collapsed on the tile and fell
asleep. As his eyes shut the boy couldn’t help but notice how
big and yellow the moon looked. When The Boy woke up it
was morning, or so he thought. There was a gray light
everywhere. His house felt older. The Boy pulled himself to his
feet. He felt different, lighter. The Boy shouted and no one
answered. No one told him to be quiet or that he was late for
school. He went downstairs and opened the door. The sky was
overcast. There were no birds or green trees. The Boy ran
inside. He believed that this must be a dream. He ran to the
bathroom mirror and looked in it.
The Boy had become more stunted and ugly (if that was
possible) and to make matters stranger he now had a stem of
thorns running through his side. He pulled on them and felt a
drop of blood fall onto the tile. He laughed to himself at how
much he felt like “The Boy with the Thorn in his Side”, just like
the song. Everything felt like the inside of a song. His lungs
breathed in for the first time. The Boy ran downstairs and
outside again. He felt alive for the first time. He felt like the last
bullet in a gun meant for revenge, sealed with a kiss. He felt
understood. He felt memorable. There were no birds singing;
only bats and owls flew through the air hooting and swooping
at The Boy. Even the rocks seemed interested in him. The Boy
loved all his new attention. He walked around the gray twilight
and explored this new world until he felt it begin to grow dark.
The sun fell into oranges and reds that looked like the end of
the world, burning into something past what words could ever
describe. The Boy felt like a weight had come off of his
shoulders, or that he had imagined that there was any weight
there in the first place. He fell in love with sunsets at 4 in the
afternoon.
 As The Boy walked into he house he felt himself becoming
heavier with every step. He also noticed the sun was peaking
around the overhanging clouds, as though he hadn’t noticed it Exploring
all day. He began to feel stupid and forgettable again. He
looked down at the stem as it began to wither. The Boy began
The rest of The Boy’s time was spent exploring. He began with
to panic. He ran back to the bathroom retracing his steps. He
the house, which was a twisted version of the one he lived in
was losing his world, trying desperately to hold on. He looked
with his parents. Darker. Grayer. Everything within the house
down at the floor and saw dark black tablets lying in an open
and world was in strange proportion. Bigger and more twisted
bottle on the floor. That must be it, The Boy thought. The pills.
than he had ever seen. Wolves lived in the walls. They
He picked one up and swallowed it whole. This time it went
seemed almost robotic as their dark gray fur jagged out, and
down easily without water. And as it did the clouds blocked out
breath that seemed to be like fire. Their teeth spun in rows like
the light once again and the sun began to set much faster. He
sharks. They lunged at The Boy and tried to snatch him as he
could once again hear the bats tapping on the window. The
snickered down the stairs. On the first few nights The Boy
songs were his again. This world was his again.......no heart
slept in his room next to a coffin that took the place of his bed.
was safe. Thank god The Doctor had given him these pills.
The things outside laughed loudly just so The Boy couldn’t
And this world. Little did he know that back in the real world
sleep. But as he became more and more comfortable he
(where he was just a nervous, stuttering , ugly forgettable boy)
opened the coffin and began lying in it till he grew tired enough
the doctor was on the phone explaining to his mother how he
to sleep. It was the only piece of furniture in the entire house.
had given the boy sugar tablet placebos and told him to try to
One night he was awoken by the laughing outside of his
make some new friends. He felt like he now had a place and a
window. He peered out his window into the darkness. He saw
name. And The Boy with the Thorn in His Side was in love with
lights bursting not far away. They were brilliant. Fireworks
his new world. The Boy spent minutes that became like
strobing in the darkness. Every time one burst and popped it
months in his new world. Every time he fell asleep he would
would illuminate two sets of eyes. It sent shivers down The
dream himself back into the boring, hateful world he cam from.
Boy’s spine, not of fear but anticipation.
He saw his mother and father talking to the doctor who gave
him the pills. Everyone thought The Boy had simply run
The Boy had been bursting to share this world with someone
away......when they even noticed he was gone. He saw people
and he was finally getting his chance. “He-ll-o” he stuttered.
spending more time thinking about him now that he was gone
His voice was hoarse from not being used. It felt rusty.
than they had ever spent when he was alive. These dreams
Suddenly the darkness consumed everything. The fireworks
always ended with the doctor reaching his hand in so cold, and
stopped. Desperate, The Boy ran down the stairs waking the
grabbing him as if to hold him in the world. Each time it was
wolves in the wall on the way. He ran 40 or 50 feet until he hit
becoming harder as if to hold him in that world. Each time it
the shadows of two people. He could barely make them out.
was becoming harder to wake from. So every time his eyelids
One of them lit a match glowing and revealing two pale faces.
grew heavy or the thorns began to die he would swallow a pill.
The stars crossed and The Boy wished he could have hung
Ironically, his nightmares in this world were of the world he
himself on them. He stuttered again, tripping on his tongue.
came from
This caused the girls to giggle more. “What’s your name?”,
The Boy asked. The girl with the darker hair replied “Rattail” clouds spread to show the sun. The pills in the bottle grew
and lifted her arm jiggling a dead rat she had tied on her wrist fewer and fewer as The Boy had the dream of the doctor les
like some morbid form of jewelry: the rodent gold standard, the and less. He had all but forgotten about the “real world”, until
retching and unraveling of style (have you ever seen someone one day the boy held the bottle that read “Clandestine
and known that they owned you before they even spoke). It Industries” and saw that there were only a few pills left. So the
would almost be seductive if it wasn’t so dreadful. The girl was boy began to ration them. This made the dreams stretch out
pale with jet black hair. Strange. But The Boy was in love. The for longer and the daylight creep in more and more. The Boy
girl continued, “This is my sister Flattop”, gesturing to the tall realized he was losing his world. He was sure of it this time.
girl hovering wit her patched dress inches from the ground.
She held and axe in one hand. Nothing seemed strange to the
boy anymore in this world. The girl’s linked hands. Baths
swooped overhead like doves. The Boy asked her if she
wanted to know his name. The goddamn kid had cobwebs on
the zippers of his pants. She laughed again, glancing down at
the thorn now dripping blood, as if he couldn’t be more
obvious. Instead she asked him if he wanted to light
dandelions with them. He paused. Another fit of laughter.
“You’ve never lit dandelions?” she asked, then picked a huge
white flower off the ground and lit it. It burst above into one of
the brilliant strobes he had seen earlier. They began picking
them in bunches and throwing them lit into the night sky. The
white ones disappearing in flashes of light and the yellow ones
popping loudly and drifting into hazes of smoke in the
moonlight.

This went on until the sun began to rise and the new friends
parted ways. The Boy went back to sleep happily in his coffin.
He dreamt that the pills ran out and he found himself back in
his former world in the doctor’s office. The doctor’s breath
heating up the entire room. The boy was trapped. He was
hated and stupid and ugly and forgettable again. He pried his
eyes open and wished himself out of the dream. He awoke in
the coffin again in a cold sweat. The black and red velvet felt
so safe. The Boy met with his new friends again and again as
the days stretched into routine. The thorns bled when he spent
time with Flattop and Rattail and withered when the gray
 The Plan overcast as usual. They climbed the hill made of skulls to the
cooked tree at the top. There they found a boy, who was too
pretty for his own good, dangling. The rope around his neck
He began to devise a plan to save himself. Realizing the
was tattered. The noose was pulled tight. The Boy with the
connection between his dreams and his new world, he made
Thorn in His Side gasped at the sight. Flies buzzed like angels
himself fall asleep and dreamt himself into the doctor's office.
around the hanging boy’s head. The pretty boy looked up and
He had Flattop and Rattail wait outside of the coffin and watch
winked. The hanging boy looked familiar. He looked to The
to pull him out. Inside the doctor’s office, the boy frantically
Boy like a toy he had one owned and forgotten about. As the
pulled out drawers in search of the pills. He found a closet full
girls pulled down the hanging boy, he explained that he had
of files of boys and girls, and a lock. Smashing it open, he
spent his days in a dark closet for as long as he could
found bottles of big black pills with the same “Clandestine
remember, then had one day woken up here. “Of course” The
Industries” label on them. He grabbed as many as would fit in
Boy remembered. This toy had been a Buddy Doll, “a little
his pockets and ran out the door.
boy’s best friend”. At least that’s how the marketing went. This
buddy doll was far more worn. He was dirty and tired looking.
By now the breathing was hot on his neck, but The Boy
He explained how all the years of being dragged around half-
couldn’t see anything but a shadow as he burst out the office
alive made him want to be dead (we are all the corpses bored
doors. He had one more stop: back to the house he had grown
with our own funerals, the boys you left behind). He was
up in with the parents who now missed the boy more than they
forgotten about (The Boy knew how it felt). My Dead Buddy.
had ever loved him before. There The Boy pulled the withered
They began walking down the hill and through the dandelion
thorn from his side and in the blood he scrawled “I love you. I
pasture. The Boy laughed about the fact that back home these
am never coming back.” With that he shouted for Flattop and
flowers were weeds but here they were Flattop and Rattail’s
Rattail to pull him out. As he did the shadow’s arms reached
fireworks. Buddy lagged behind them, noose and all, running
for him and he felt caught for a moment. It was the coldest
to catch up every few feet. He described a man in a white suit
second of The Boy’s life. It felt like it lasted forever, as if his
he had seen beneath him on the hill that night, studying the
heart had stopped. The Boy breathed in deep as he collapsed
house. The Boy stopped dead in his tracks. The blood ran
on the floor on top of the girls. He hid the pills. He found
from his face like the air escaping in his dream. He grabbed
explaining anything to them, especially of another world, would
Rattail’s hand. He was scared. It pushed other feelings
only induce them into fits of laughter. He felt a chill. It was as if
through him like a car crash. He dropped an “I love you” (thank
someone had followed him through. But The Boy buried the
god the wind caught it before it was heard).
feeling and allowed himself to be content with the satisfaction
of having all the pills he would need for a long time.
That night buddy and The Boy hid in the tree on skull hill while
the girls lay in wait in the dandelion pasture. The claw-like
That night the wolves in the walls didn’t howl at all. As they lit
fingers of the tree wrapped around them as sleep came near.
dandelions, The boy saw a figure far off on the skull hill. It
Eventually they smelled hot, acrid breath and felt it heating the
appeared to be staring at them, or rather him, as it paced like
air around them. It made The Boy feel the same sick feeling of
a caged animal. The next day The Boy went with Flattop and
bird beaks and claws in his stomach as before. They peered
Rattail to see where the figure was standing. The day was
down through the darkness. They heard growling behind row
upon row of shark teeth snapping at the air. Leashed to a large
figure in white were the wolves, which had been released from
the walls of the boy’s house. The figure was huge. Apparently
coming through to this world caused a transformation of sorts.
Your insides became your outsides. Everyone was ugly. The
Doctor was huge and disproportioned. His teeth were large
and his white suit was a dirty off-white now. His empty eyes
looked towards The Boy’s house as he sniffed at the air.
Coming from the openings in the legs of his pants and his
sleeves were even dirtier looking tentacles that appeared to be
holding the leash to the wolves. The tentacles spun in all
directions and they seemed to be searching for something; a
thought or a heart beat. In the distant black air fireworks burst
in brilliant colors. The doctor strode forth with the wolves,
gnashing their teeth. Separating them from each other was a
strain on the eyes. It became hard to tell which was a more
brutal animal. The Boy cried out for Rattail as he slid from the
tree. Buddy fell through the branches moments later. They ran
down the hill slipping on bones, The Boy grabbing a few as he
ran. As they reached the pasture they saw The Doctor’s huge
body walking towards the house. Behind him, his tentacles
dragged Flattop and Rattail by their throats. The Boy caught
up with them just inside the huge door and Buddy threw his
noose around the necks of the wolves. With a great force he
sent them slamming into the wall. The wolves seemed to fall to
pieces and slide back together, teeth spinning and snapping at
the room. Yet they were trapped back in the wall.
The Doctor spun and pinned The Boy up against the wall with
another tentacle. Buddy tried to run but was caught in his own
noose against the wall and found himself hanging, half dead
again. The Doctor's focus was on The Boy again. The Boy
couldn’t breathe. His lungs felt like they were exploding. It’s
funny the thoughts that run through your head when you feel
your life slipping. Had The Doctor made this world? Had this
been an experiment or a dream? The Boy choked. He woke
up on the floor upstairs. The Doctor was leaning over him with
a huge needle. He had locked the girls in the coffin with chains
attached to a massive heart shaped lock. The scene looked
like a wedding party gone bad. The bride was beautiful (too
bad she’d never make it to the honeymoon) turning blue with
the bridesmaid locked in a pine box. The groom with the
coldest feet ever, left at the alter.
The Doctor held the thorns between clamps, sticking them with
the needle and injecting a dark fluid. The Boy felt sick. He no
longer felt safe in his own skin. The thorns began to wither.
The Boy felt himself slipping back to his old self. He saw the
clouds disappearing outside. The sun ripped through the room
lighting every inch of dust and dirt, imprisoning them all within
the moment. The bats began to fate into blue sky. He felt
inside his pockets for the bones he had picked up on the way
down the hill. He sharpened his flaws and disappointments
into daggers. The room slowed. Every single grain on the floor
came into focus in The Boy’s eye - like a bullet through a flock
of birds.
 Getting Revenge Good night was goodbye. Rattail said “I guess we are all there
ever was”. Somehow it made sense. Or maybe not. He
hugged her tight, mixing their tears to be bottled and
He smashed The Doctor in the face with a bone, stunning him.
fermented, so they could be drunk on each other when this
He grabbed the keys from around The Doctor’s neck and
was all over. Hope never wanted them, but they too it anyway.
unlocked the chains from the coffin. The girls were blue inside
and the rush of air brought life to their eyes.
The Boy then lay in the coffin and fell asleep. He dreamt
himself awake. He woke up as alive as he ever was. He was in
The girls jumped out and helped to hold The Doctor down as
his bed in a cold sweat.
they used a hammer to drive the bones into his feet, holding
him in place. Dark black blood spouted out from his feet. The
Doctor expressed no emotion or reaction to the pain, though He reached down for the thorns, but couldn’t feel a thing. Only
he tried to lift his feet which were trapped in place. Maybe if he huge scars stuck out where the thorns once were. Every song
could have read The Boy’s eyes he would have seen “say a that ever mad eth boy feel in love ran though his head at once.
prayer for everything you’ve ever loved cause you will never The doctor never returned to his office and his parents began
see it again”. The Boy no longer cared for himself or his heart to look for a new physician. The boy prayed for car crashes
but only to save this place, to save this new world. He ran to and heart attacks to take him back. Somehow they dreams
the bathroom and got a bottle of pills and needle and thread. and nightmares were like life on the run, and there was
The Doctor was now thrashing like a rabid animal as he saw nothing chasing him anymore.
The Boy with the pills. His teeth seemed to enlarge and
sharpen to knives as The Boy drew close, like an animal
caught in a trap, lashing out at everything in a last act of
desperation.

But you couldn’t touch this kid right now, bullets would have
dodged him. He shoved the pills down The Doctor's throat
before Rattail stitched his mouth shut so he couldn’t spit them
out. The Doctor’s tentacles because to wither and fall off, each
one still searching, grabbing for The Boy. He thrashed about.
And then as the clouds drifted back together, and the room
returned to its usual gray, he disappeared.

The Boy went downstairs and saw Buddy hanging there, finally
resting. Dead or alive, he looked peaceful, so The Boy left him
there like a toy on the shelf. He looked down at the withering
thorns and realized he had used all of the pills to get rid of The
Doctor. The Boy felt tired. He hugged Flattop and Rattail.
 The Ending is All That Matters

As he grew older the nightmares were harder and harder to

come by. He became forgetful of how to get back and forth,
finding the heart shaped lock on more and more of the places
he was trying to get to. Stuck where flies weren't angels,
where dandelions were just weeds. Here is The Boy with the
Thorn in His Side, dying in your world. A man made monster
with every human emotion, overdosed on worthlessness in a
world that could never wrap it’s head around him (so don’t
even try).

When it’s all over just remember every single word you ever
said was always just a bullet to his head. Bury him
underground between friends and love - the only things that
are gonna make it to the end with him. Look for his body
buried beneath where the yellow weeds are growing and know
he’s still living in his nightmares.

This story never really had a point. It’s just a lull - a skip in the
record. We are addresses in ghost towns. We are old wishes
that never came true. We are hand grenades (and every word
you say pulls the pin). We are all gods, we are all monsters. It
never really begins or ends because Somewhere, there is a
kid that looks and feels just think thi(u)s. To you this kid is
probably just a headache, but to me he is gold.

“behind the hatred there lies a murderous desire for love”

143
There’s not a siren that can keep me from your window.
There’s not a pill that can keep you from my mind...