Read Online Born Different by Faye Aitken-Smith - Free Book Online

one turned up.
Signing everything yourself. Raising no suspicions ever. That was
nothing short of genius. Most kids take their parents for granted
and wouldn’t brush their teeth if they thought they could get
around it or cheat it. They would leave plates and plates of food
under their beds until they turned green with mould, like Gabe did,
and not get out of bed until they were nagged and pushed. Frank had
to do all these things because there was no one there telling him
that he had to.
    Gabe thought
that Frank was such a nice kid really, soft and gentle on the
inside. Not that anyone in their right mind would initially judge
him that way at first sight. Frank looked like a little underweight
pit bull, all short and sinewy, twitchy and jumpy. Frank was a
nervous wreck, for all the exercise that he did; all that special
breathing and cardio and he still was like a cat on a hot tin
roof.
    Frank said he
was glad that his dad had buggered off as it meant that he didn’t
have to, “Look after his sorry arse too and get the back of his
hand for his trouble.” But he missed his mum, he hadn’t even had
the chance to grieve for her, let alone have the freedom to be an
angst riddled teenager. The other characters that have to be in
that play for Frank to take his part had gone, so Frank had to
adopt another role. He was winging it, perhaps not the best way,
but the only way he knew how. At the moment it felt like forever
but it wouldn’t be forever, would it? He was eighteen now, a man.
Frank had thought that it would all change the day he turned
eighteen but nothing had happened. Social services couldn’t kidnap
him now and take him away but the anxiety stayed put, it had become
a part of him, like he would always be waiting to get caught
out.
    Frank, like
Gabe, had also never had a proper girlfriend but that was purely
down to the fact that Frank didn’t like girls. Well, not in that
way. Frank was probably Gabe’s best friend out of the lot of
them.
    And then there
was Johnny. Johnny was the leader really, even though none of them
would ever say as much. Johnny was a charmer. Tall, dark, handsome
and smooth with it. Johnny was too handsome, the sort of handsome
that made people stop and stare or get all coy.
    Johnny couldn’t
read or write, he said that the words just looked all jumbled up to
him. He had never told the school this and they hadn’t noticed,
they just thought Johnny must be cocky and lazy, which he was too.
But Johnny could do maths in his head. Like any sum you gave him he
could do. Johnny was a numbers whizz kid.
    Johnny was also
manipulative, sneaky and probably a pathological liar. But what
people didn’t seem to understand was that there was something about
Johnny’s brain that was different, it was like something that you
were supposed to have was missing because for the part of his brain
that was so perceptive and accurate, there was a part that made up
stories and saw things other people didn’t. And sometimes his
personality changed so much it was like there were two Johnnys.
Gabe was no expert but he wouldn’t have been surprised to find out
that Johnny had been diagnosed with something, some identifiable
mental illness. Gabe thought he was getting worse but perhaps that
was just the dope that Johnny was smoking.
    And, if he was
going to be honest with himself and call a spade a spade, then
Johnny was really just a thief. Hopefully, Gabe thought, just for
now, just to get by. Not forever. Just till he had enough to go
legit. And if Johnny was good at stealing, he was even better at
selling. Johnny could sell you something you didn’t even know you
wanted, before you even had a chance to think about it.
    Johnny’s mum
had hooked up with a multi-millionaire when Johnny was still really
little. The ‘multi-millionaire’ had made his money in something to
do with refurbishing big institutions with all the newest in
innovation, technology and computers. Johnny’s mum had immediately
dumped