The crisp air bit his face and stung his cheeks, and brought him back to earth.

"They hate me," he said to no one.

"Probably," Nico said, and Clancy nodded.

"They think I'm special," he sneered, the word tasting dirty in his mouth.

"Don't talk like that," Clancy said immediately.

"Like what? Don't be mean to myself? Because I hate myself so bad."

"Me too," Nico said.

"Like growly. Slimy. Growly and slimy. That's how you said it." Clancy shifted his weight and stared at the rain falling down. It was beginning to slow now, and left a clean, fresh smell hanging off the boards.

Growly and slimy. For some odd reason, that made perfect sense to him. "Sorry," he said.

"It just reminds me of...of stuff. Of the place I came from."

Clancy had never mentioned coming from a place before. "What place?"

"A bad one. A city. A place where no one's special and it's good to die."

"It is good to die," Tyler said.

"Then it's over," Nico said.

"Then you go to heaven."

"Or hell."

"I don't think I'll go to hell," Tyler said, rubbing his arms and watching the rain fall gently. He held his hand out and let the icy drops collect in his hand. He felt suddenly hyper aware of the world around him. The air was blue from the dying daylight, and he could hear his family talking inside, their muffled voices bubbling like hot tea.

"You like boys," Nico says.

Tyler blushed slightly. He hadn't told anyone yet. He wasn't even sure if he did. "And what if I do?"

"The neighbor lady said you'd go to hell."

"Me?"

"Not specifically. She said boys who like boys go to hell."

"I don't think so."

"Why not?"

"Because God loves us and I don't think He'd do that."

"Does he love you?" Nico asked, and he turned to stare at him almost blankly.

Tyler was silent for a moment. "I don't know," he finally said.

Two yellow headlights cut through the rain and pulled up in the driveway. Then they stopped and turned off without going into the garage.

"There's Dad," Tyler said.

His father climbed out of the car and came toward him. He never walked toward him like that. Like he was in a hurry. Like he had to protect something. Tyler watched him without blinking, careful to keep his expression neutral.

"Hey, Tyler," his father said, smiling a forced smile, like his mother, like he'd eaten a frog.

"Hey," Tyler said.

"How's my buddy doing?"

"I'm not your buddy," he said.

"Oh? Too old for nicknames?"

"But not too old for imaginary friends."

His father actually recoiled slightly. Tyler ignored him and stepped down the single stair on the porch, feeling the freezing rain land lightly in his hair. He liked how his footsteps sounded crisp on the sidewalk and echoed twice behind him.

"I'm going to the park," he declared.

"Oh - okay?"

His father didn't make any move to stop him, and that made Tyler feel a tug in his chest, a sort of greyish mushy feeling. He thought maybe he was waiting for his father to tell him to come back, to tell him that they could talk together, or something. But none of that happened.

The eerie blue darkness made him feel like he was being watched. The streets were silent, giving him room to think. And he thought and he thought about how awful he was, and how messed up he was, and how he could never say anything right and how no one in his family truly cared about him.

"What do you mean, nobody's special where you come from?" he asked Clancy, staring up at the sky.

"Names aren't spoken," Clancy said softly. "Everyone's the same. Everyone's the same."

"That would be awful."

"It's like that here, too. Just not as bad."

A raindrop landed right in Tyler's eye, and he quickly looked down, blinking it away. It felt like a tear running down his face. "I guess. Everyone's the same."

"You're thinking different," Clancy suddenly said.

"What?"

"I'm talking different." Clancy pointed at himself and then at Tyler. "So you're thinking different."

"None of that makes sense, you know that, right?" Nico said.

"How are you thinking?" Clancy asked.

"What does that even mean?" Nico whined.

"I'm thinking that orange is a very confused color," Tyler declared. He was thinking different, and he rather liked it. It made him feel...different. This way, he could think about whatever he wanted and even if it didn't make sense to anyone else, it made sense to him.

"I think so, too." Clancy looked up briefly before staring at the ground with Tyler. "And how the cracks in the sidewalk hide the most beautiful things."

"Like ants," Nico said sarcastically.

"Like ants," Tyler echoed. "And those yellow flowers."

"And pennies," Clancy added.

"Okay, what is going on?" Nico demanded. "You're talking all weird and I don't like it."

"I'm just trying to figure out how to think," Tyler said, jumping over a puddle and splashing in the mud. "And I think I'm figuring it out. I like it this way. It's quiet and calm."

"Like baby blue," Clancy said.

"Yeah, like that."

"Well, I don't like it, and I want you to stop," Nico ordered.

"Why don't you like it?"

"Because it's not normal. It's weird. It's freakish." Nico laughed a little. "And I thought you were trying to prove that you weren't a freak."

"I'm not a freak," he insisted.

"Normal people don't talk about how confused the color orange is."

"You're very orange," Clancy giggled under his breath. Nico spun on him and he shrieked and stumbled into the gutter. "Sorry," he muttered.

"I don't know, I just think it's nice," Tyler said, putting his hands in his pockets. He was freezing, but he didn't want to turn around and go home, not yet. He wasn't ready.

Nico laughed sarcastically again. "How is confusing everyone nice?"

Tyler shrugged. "It's nice to come up with something that's your very own. Something that nobody else understands. I think...it gives a reason."

"A reason for what?"

He shrugged again. "I don't know yet."

As they approached the park, they grew quiet and Tyler had space to think again. This time, he thought about the ants in the cracks of the sidewalk, and how insignificant he was to the universe, like a tiny little ant. No one noticed when one ant went missing. No one cared about the load the ant carried.

I wonder if God thinks we're all tiny ants. He looked up at the sky again, as if searching for an answer in the clouds.

"What's that?" Clancy suddenly whispered, pointing to a dark figure coming toward them. Tyler froze instantly, stumbling from the sudden force.

As the figure came closer, it approached a street lamp, but it - he, Tyler was pretty sure - was careful to keep out of the light. Then he stopped and looked up, right at them. "Who's there?" he demanded.

Tyler frowned. "Josh?"

The figure tipped his head slightly to one side. "Tyler? What are you doing out here?"

"I was just thinking about the existential and how we're all just tiny ants in the universe and how nothing really matters in the end." He paused. "And how orange is a very confused color," he added matter-of-factly. He slowly stepped closer, trying to see Josh's face in the darkness. "What about you?"

"I don't want to go home."

Tyler nodded. "I understand that."

Josh stiffened. "No, you don't."

Tyler's brow furrowed in confusion. "What?"

"No, you don't. That's what I said. You don't understand." Josh's voice was hard and had a rough edge to it, like a serrated knife.

"Uh-oh," Clancy whispered. He moved to stand behind Tyler and hide from Josh.

"Sorry," Tyler mumbled.

There was a tense silence for a long minute before Josh sighed. "No, it's not your fault." He ran his hand through his cotton candy hair, leaving his beanie askew. "It's not your fault you don't know, and I hope you never know at all."

"Okay," Tyler said, blinking and feeling very orange.

Again, there was a pause.

"You sound different," Josh said eventually.

"I know. I'm thinking different."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm trying something. I don't know how to describe it." Tyler shifted his weight to balance on one foot. "It's thinking about how orange is a confused color. And how bitter sweet nostalgia tastes like the twenty-second of August."

"Here we go again," Nico grumbled, rolling his eyes.

Josh thought for a moment. "And how the storm today was like...like a trombone? You know, warm and bold and soft at the same time."

Tyler nodded. "I think so."

"That's pretty cool."

"Sick."

"What?"

"You said it a while ago. Sick. Like awesome."

Josh laughed lightly, and the darkness around the street lamp didn't seem as pressing as it had been. "Yeah, I remember. That's sick."

Tyler cracked a smile. "Sick."

"You guys are idiots," Nico grumbled.

"You know what, Tyler? I changed my mind," Josh said, looking at him with coffee eyes that seemed to almost glow. "You're pretty weird. But that makes you way more fun to hang out with. If you weren't weird, you'd be boring."

"Everyone would be the same," Tyler said, remembering what Clancy had said earlier.

Josh thought about it for a minute. "Yeah, I guess they would. Then it's a good thing you're weird." He flashed a bright sort of smile that said something like I'm here and it's great! even though he had said it wasn't great at all.

"You have a nice smile," Tyler said without thinking.

Josh smiled again without showing his teeth this time. It was shy and full of blush but the corners of his eyes still crinkled like shiny silver wrapping paper on Christmas morning. "Thank you."

And when Tyler went home again, he was cold and wet and thinking about how he could make Josh smile like that again.