Small insults had never seemed to pierce him, but now you saw him recoil at the casual cruelty of jocks, at the hateful slurs flung at students perceived as gay. You noticed the profound sadness in his gaze for those struggling to hold back tears, and the equally profound sadness in the tears he stifled himself. The notion of Michael being gay had never truly entered your mind-perhaps he was simply feeling for them, as anyone with a heart would. Yet, a persistent whisper told you there was more to it.

He began to retreat, his usual hangouts replaced by hasty departures for home, or early exits from school with vague explanations of "something came up." You were intimately familiar with his home life: a father lost to drink, a mother conspicuously absent. Your thoughts immediately spiraled to abuse, but what could you do? Michael's fierce loyalty to his father would never allow him to be put behind bars.

The increasing visibility of his bruises, coupled with his constant exhaustion at school, gnawed at you. One afternoon, you couldn't help yourself. You followed him home. His bedroom window was wide open, and the sounds ripped through the quiet: screams, then the sharp crack of shattering glass. "You stupid ****!" His father's voice, laced with venom. The barrage of insults continued, but Michael was nowhere to be seen or heard. You waited until the car roared away, then slipped through the window.

"Michael?" you whispered, your voice trembling. You couldn't see him. His bed was in disarray, and a thick, cloying smell of mold permeated the air. With every tentative step, your foot sank into something cold and sticky.

Your heart hammered against your ribs, a frantic bird trapped in a cage. "Michael?" you called out again, louder this time, your voice cracking with a fear you'd never known. The only response was the oppressive silence of the room, heavy with the cloying scent of mildew and something else... something metallic and unsettling. Your eyes struggled to adjust to the dim light filtering through the grimy window. You scanned the room, your gaze snagging on a dark shape sprawled on the floor near the overturned bedside table. Your breath hitched. It was Michael.

You rushed to him, your knees hitting the sticky floor. He was lying on his side, his body unnaturally still. You gently rolled him over. A dark, wet stain bloomed on the side of his head, matted in his hair. Beside him lay shattered pieces of a glass bottle, glinting dully in the weak light. You didn't need to see more to understand.

Your hand trembled as you reached out, your fingers brushing against something papery clutched in his hand. Carefully, you unfolded it. It was a letter, the paper slightly crumpled and stained. The first page was filled with lines upon lines of neat handwriting: "1. Your laugh," "2. The way you..." "3. How you always..." It continued, a seemingly endless list of small, precious details. Tears welled in your eyes as you scanned the pages, each reason a testament to the depth of his affection.

Finally, on the last page, in stark contrast to the overflowing reasons before, was a single, devastating sentence: "1. You're a boy"

Your breath caught in your throat. The weight of his unspoken pain, his hidden struggles, crashed down on you. The love in those hundred reasons felt like a physical ache, a beautiful testament overshadowed by the crushing weight of the one that ended it all. The silence in the room seemed to press in on you, broken only by the ragged sound of your own breathing.