The moon looked bigger than it usually did. Was it hurtling toward earth? Or perhaps it was earth that was doing the hurtling. I suppose it didn't really matter, as long as the clouds didn't get in the way.
I was lying on my back in the dry grass, gazing into the night sky, connecting the stars with invisible lines and forming images of strange creatures and even stranger human faces. The simplicity of the moment was a welcomed distraction from the events of the past week. Suspended from school for five days for fighting, as if that would fix me. It wasn't the name calling or the laughing that got to me. Heck, it wasn't even the paper ball that came hurtling across the room and hit me in the head. It was when he called me 'weird, just like your dad'. I suppose he wasn't wrong. Dad was the only one who really understood me, and that might have been because he was weird, just like me.
But dad wasn't around anymore, and so I was alone. No, it was even worse than that. I was lonely. Ever since dad died, there hadn't been anybody who truly understood me. They know my name, they know my address, they even know my age, but nobody really knows me.
It didn't matter how much I tried to explain what I was thinking or feeling, they only ever looked at me with this strange look, like I was a creature from a foreign world. Much like the creature I am looking at right now in the stars. 'Xylothians' seemed like an appropriate name for the alien race. Perhaps I really belonged there. Maybe I was from there.
A noise sounded to my right, so I strained to sit upright and turned around to see what it was.
Nothing.
Weird. I could have sworn I heard something.
I decided I had enough stargazing for one night and headed inside. Before I made it to the front door, I heard the same sound again. I snapped my head in the direction of the noise and saw a creature that was clearly not of this world, staring at me. It had green skin, five arms spread out evenly across the top half of its body, four legs, and an eyeball right in the middle of its torso, taking up most of its body. It was short, about the size of a cat. I would have screamed, but it looked exactly like a Xylothian. I knew this creature.
"Hello", I said.
"Hello", it replied, but in a dialect that was what I would imagine a talking worm would sound like.
"What are you doing here?"
"I am lost. I don't know where I am," it said, matter of factly.
"I can help you," I said, feeling sympathy for the creature.
"How?" it asked.
"Follow me. I will help you find other Xylothians, so you can go home."
The creature blinked its gigantic eyeball and followed me. Where was I going to take it? I didn't know where the other Xylothians were. But I had to find them if I was going to help this poor, lost alien. If I were a Xylothian, where would I go? The grocery store, of course! Xylothians loved eating, so it made perfect sense that they would go there.
"Come on, mate," I said excitedly. "I reckon I know where they are." I took off at a full sprint down the street, the way to the store clear in my mind. Looking back, the Xylothian was keeping pace. Its legs were stout, but it had four of them, so keeping up with a two-legger was no problem for it.
We soon arrived at the grocery store, and I grabbed the front door handle. To my surprise, it was locked. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised. It was after sunset, after all.
"They aren't here," I said.
"That's okay," the Xylothian replied, two of its arms mysteriously having vanished during the run, only three now remaining. It had grown a bit as well, now standing the same height as me.
'Where else could they have gone?' I wondered? The park!
I grabbed the Xylothian by one of its three remaining arms and ran toward the park. The run to the park was further than to the grocery store, so I was puffed out when we arrived, although the Xylothian didn't seem to be. The park was empty, with only the swing rocking slightly in the breeze. I should have known. Children and Xylothians both go inside at night, so it's not like they would be wandering around at a park after dark.
"They aren't here, either," I said, the disappointment evident in my voice.
"That's okay," the Xylothian replied. It looked even more human than before, now resembling a boy. It had two arms and two legs, and the gigantic eyeball on its torso had split into two, although they still weren't sitting where the head should be. The green skin had also changed to a light shade of orange.
We walked back to my house, defeated. As we arrived at the front door, I turned to face the Xylothian. There was a protracted silence that was broken by the sound of the front door opening. It was mom.
"Come in, dear," she said. "You can play with your friend tomorrow.
My friend? Couldn't mom see that this was not a boy? He was a Xylothian. He was different.
I turned from mom back to the Xylothian, except it didn't look anything like a Xylothian anymore. It looked like a regular boy.
"Wanna play at the park tomorrow?" he said.
"But we are different," I replied.
A look of sadness emerged on his face.
"I didn't mean it like that. I mean, you are a Xylothian, and I am a human. How could we be..." I realised how stupid I was being. It didn't matter if he was different. It didn't matter if he was a Xylothian. I could still be his friend.
"Sure, I said. We can play at the park tomorrow."
The Xylothian boy smiled at me, and he walked around to the house next door.
"He seems like a nice boy," mom said. "He is our new neighbor."
"Our neighbor?" I asked, confused. How could Xylothians live next door?
"I am glad you've made a friend," she said, a tear escaping her eye.
Yes, I did have a friend. And he was weird, like dad. Weird, like me.
Matthew Norman
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