Chapter 3: Do you understand?

"Ow..."

I was trying to put my contacts in as smoothly as possible. I hated putting them on, but between the contacts or the glasses, I would always choose the contacts. It's not that I disliked my glasses. It was just that I lost them very frequently and it was very hard to see things from far away without them. I swear my family is cursed, the way we lose things so often is astounding. 

As I look into the mirror in the bathroom, I apply a generous amount of moisturizing cream to my face. My dark-brown skin shines as I thoroughly rub around the edges of my eyes. "Huh.", I said aloud. Usually around this time, JJ was banging on the door to the bathroom, since it was about time for him to get ready for school. I decided not to mess with my black, curly-bobbed hair and exit the bathroom to wake up JJ. Sometimes when my parents are really busy in the morning, I help them out by getting JJ ready for school.

JJs bedroom door was open slightly. When I peek inside, I see that he is staring into the mirror on his closet door in his t-shirt and pajama bottoms, wide awake. I was gonna knock on the door, but I always have to remind him about that every time he walks into my room. So, I decide against it and loudly burst into the room. "Watcha doin' in here, buddy!", I say as I barge in. JJ was surprised by my sudden visit as he jumped away from the loud noise. When he realized it was me, he started getting angry.

"Wha- who told you that you could come in here?!", he yells as he got into a defensive stance.

"Now you know what I mean when I say KNOCK before you walk in. And even then, you still need my permission to open my door."

JJ really didn't have a comeback to this. He averts his eyes when he sees the grin plastered on my face. As I take a quick look around the room, I see that JJ has a couple of clothes laid out on his bed. There are three different shirts with graphic designs on them, two pairs of pants, and a pair of shorts. It looks like JJ has been awake for a while preparing for school on his own. Which I find weird, since he doesn't like getting up for school in the first place. I mean, I don't blame him. I hated going to school when I was younger too.

I point at one of the shirts on the bed, "When did you like getting up early for school?"

My question brings JJs attention back to the pile of clothes. His shoulders slump a bit as he stares at the outfits he has ready.

Oh no... Is something wrong?

"Hey, sis?"

"W-what?"

JJ stays silent for a few seconds, still focused on his clothes. Then he raises his head and looks me in the eyes.

"Can you help me choose something to wear?"

"..."

What... that's it?

"Sure! But why are you asking me? Wouldn't dad be able to help you out?"

JJ turns back to his bed. He takes another few seconds to... gather his thoughts?

"Do you ever feel like... you're not good enough?"

My eyes grow wide with concern over what JJ just said.

"I-I mean! What I meant to say was-!". JJ stutters over his words as he tries to correct himself. I can feel that hes starting to work himself into a panic.

Okay... this is serious. Nows not the time for jokes.

I turn around and walk to the door to JJs room. After shutting and locking the door so no one walks in, I walk back to the bed and sit down. I pat the space next to me and wait for him to sit. He hesitates, then slowly walks over and plops down by my side. I put an arm around his shoulders and pull him into a hug. He leans into it after a moment, his breathing beginning to calm. I give his arm a little rub and give him some time to pull himself together as we sit in silence.

When I feel that JJs had enough time I ask him, "So... What's the problem? Tell me what's going on."

He looks up at me, then when he feels ready to talk, I let him go so he can sit up straight. He lets out a long sigh.

"I... Don't 'feel right' in my clothes."

Hmm?

"What do you mean? Like... are they too tight or something? If so, we can talk to mom and dad about it and we can buy you new clothes."

"No, it's not that. It's just..."

JJ stops talking and reaches behind him. He then picks up one of the shirts he was thinking about wearing today. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.

"When I look at the shirt, I can imagine someone like dad, or my friend Malik wearing this and being... what's the word... Happy? Confident? Like, they look cool in whatever they wear. I feel like I could wear the exact same thing as them, but I won't feel the same as they do in it. And I tried talking to dad about it, but you know how he gets when you talk to him. You know what I mean?"

Huh...

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I... don't really know what to feel about what JJ just told me. I've usually liked whatever I wore. And if I didn't, I would just wear something I did like. When I was a little kid, mom liked to put me in frilly dresses and skirts. Now that I'm in high school, even though I still like things like that, I also like to wear pants and shorts from time to time. I looked at a pile of clothes JJ had scattered on the floor. There was a mix of different colored long and short sleeved t-shirts, pants, and shorts. There must be something here that makes him feel comfortable.

"I kinda know what you mean? There are some things that I just won't wear y'know? That just means we gotta find something that does make you feel cool. There's a lot of different kinds of clothes, so you have a bunch of options, okay?", I smiled at what I thought was a good answer, hoping that it gave him some type of clarity.

Instead, JJ was staring me right in the face. For a split second, there was anger on his face. Then, it fell away to confusion. Embarrassed, JJ said, "Uh... Sorry.", as he looked away. Whatever just happened, confused and worried me all at once.

Was what I said that bad?

We were both quiet for a bit. I tried to think of something to say in the meantime. If we spent anymore tome waiting around, I was going to be late for the bus and JJ still needed to get ready for school. I threw a smile in my face and turned to JJ.

"How about I choose something for you to wear and you get ready for school? I promise you'll love it!"

I could still feel his uneasiness as he looked back at me. It felt like he didn't want to trust me with this.

"C'mon, I guarantee you will feel cool in what I choose for you. And if you don't, I'll help you find something that will. Deal?"

"Uh... Yeah, okay. I'll go get ready then." He flashed me an uneasy smile as he got up from the bed. I gave him another quick hug before he left to the bathroom.

Once he left the room, I stood up and began looking through the clothes JJ had chosen to wear today.

He still looked uncomfortable there...

I pick up a red shirt with a superhero on it who was wearing a black costume. I carefully spread it out onto the bed and reach to the pile of clothes for a pair of shorts. I know that JJ usually chose to wear long sleeved shirts, but its super hot outside right now. As I look through the pile, something caught my attention from the corner of my eye.

Speaking of long sleeves...

Inside of JJs unzipped backpack was my old hoodie. I gave it to JJ last winter, when he came home shivering in the cold one day without the jacket mom had bought for him. From what he had told me, he had accidently left it in class that day and when he went back to get it, it was gone. The one I gave him is a plain, black zip-up hoodie, so I don't think anyone would realize it was for girls. I hoped he wasn't going to wear it again. He came home last week wearing it even though it was clearly too hot for that. JJ was really hard-headed when it came to this particular hoodie.

Oh shit! The time!

I quickly ducked down onto my hands and knees. "I know he has got them somewhere...", I say as I look for my brothers' shoes. He usually threw them under his bed when he takes them off. I grab the red pair of sneakers I saw and placed them on the floor with the red super-hero shirt and a pair of shorts spread out on the bed. JJ was still in the bathroom when I finished, so I grab my backpack and head for the door.

"Hey! You heading out?"

My dad was standing in the kitchen, scrambling up some eggs in a pan. He was fully geared up in his work outfit and about to head out to work after he ate his all-protein breakfast.

Well... He's here right now. Might as well talk to him about JJ.

"Yeah, I was.", I say as I walk into the kitchen. Placing my backpack on a chair nearby, I turned around and hopped up onto the counter next to my dad. He looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "I thought you were about to go?"

"I am. Just wanted to talk to you about JJ before I go."

When dad hears that, he scrapes the eggs onto a nearby plate. "What's wrong with him now?", He asks me, with concern in his voice.

I tilted my head at that. "Now? Are we talking about the same thing? About the clothes?"

Suddenly, the playful energy that my dad usually greets me with disappeared. He removed the pan from the stove. Then, he turned back to me with his arms folded across his chest and gave me his full attention as he started shaking his head side to side, like he couldn't believe what he was hearing. After a moment, he looks back to me with an expression that JJ and I know all too well.

God damnit! Not this again...

"I've already talked to him about this. He's talking about "not feeling right" in his clothes, but I've already told him what he needs to do. He has to start with his confidence. If he works on his confidence, that will fix that feeling he's getting. See, he just needs to read one of these books I got over here and then..."

My entire body went slack. I was definitely going to miss the bus now. My dad has a habit of literally rambling on for hours when he gets to talking about life advice. JJ and I like to call this his "Pastor phase" because of it. One time, he kept me up an hour and a half past my bedtime when I was younger, and the only reason I got out of it was because my mom intervened.

As he continues to preach on about "How it's just a mental obstacle" or something, I pull out my phone and check the time. It's a minute past my bus's pick-up time. And if I didn't try to catch the bus now, I would have to get a ride to school with dad, and that would give him more time to preach to me. So, I immediately hop down from the counter and grab my stuff while my dad is still talking.

"Sorry dad! Gotta go right now or I'm gonna miss the bus!", I say, completely ignoring the rest of whatever he was talking about. He's a little flustered, suddenly being cut off like that. He quickly regains his composure and tells me to have a good day at school as I sprint out the front door.

Speed walking down the sidewalk to the corner of the street where the bus would pick us up, I thought back to JJ. I really wanted to see him in the outfit I chose for him, just to let him know that he was going to be okay.

Well... I did tell him that he would look great in what I chose for him. Hopefully, he'd have a good day at school.

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