Annoying

They say every person you meet has a story to tell. So let me tell you one of these stories.

I only met him thanks to my friend Emma, who was an exchange student like me. She was a shy girl, the mousy type, as some would say, with gorgeous brown eyes, a quiet voice and a thick french accent. He was her host brother, eighteen years old, so two years older than me at the time, about as Irish as they come and the most annoying person I had met in a while. Everything about him seemed crooked. His nose, his teeth, his neck, the way he smirked. Even the way he walked, pulling one leg behind, was somehow crooked.

So, anyway, whenever my friend and I would meet up, he would tag along. I did not understand why. He was not interested in talking, shopping or exploring the city with us. All he ever wanted to do was shop for video games and then sit in a fast-food restaurant for hours, talking to us nonstop about stuff that solely interested him.

He never even bothered learning my name. He would constantly be swearing. He also vaped and smoked like a chimney.

Honestly, at first I just found him annoying. I thought he was bad company. If he would at the very least try to make some sort of conversation - But No. He just talked and talked and talked. About the weirdest things really.

I could not stand him and the dislike was mutual. We would spend a big part of our weekly hangouts just bickering.

“Why are you friends with her, Emma?” he would often say while rolling his eyes at me “She is such a Bitch.”

"Don't call me a bitch!" I snapped.

He grinned. "Well, what else would I call ya? I can't pronounce your name and you're acting like one."

“Why do you always have to bring him along, Emma?” I asked my friend once when we were alone. “It does not even seem like he wants to be here. And he is so rude!”

She just shrugged and mumbled an apology, saying her host parents wanted it that way. `'To be safe.' I had no idea why. Emma was eighteen and so was he. Weren't they adults? I had never been obliged to take any one of my hostsiblings anywhere with me when hanging out with friends.

But anyway, over time the arguments between me and Emma's hostbrother grew into something like a friendship. This, of course did not stop us from annoying the hell out of each other. We would bicker and bicker while poor Emma was just trying to keep the peace. I always closely observed how he treated her, after I had heard a rumor about him having slept with his last hostsister, which I found disgusting. I had to admit though, he was pretty nice to Emma. A lot nicer than he was to me. And not weird nice, like he was trying to get with her or anything, just normal nice. He called her a Bitch too, once or twice on occasion, but other than that he treated her like a sister and even showed a surprising amount of patience when her accent was once again hard to understand or she struggled with forming a sentence.

Maybe he wasn't actually that bad, I thought, but I still hated him! I hated the way he talked and his stupid grin and how we were always sitting in a McDonalds because of him, because he refused to ever eat anywhere else! I hated the fact that he had a girlfriend and that his eyes were green and that I had noticed that his eyes were green! Even though he was older than me I found him childish. I felt that bickering with him made me childish too, and not in a good way, but I couldn't help it. He was just so annoying!

One day, when we were fighting, I threatened him with physical violence and he told me that that would easily cause him to die, because he was born with some sort of fracture in his neck. That was the reason he always hung out with me and Emma, it was too dangerous for him to be in the city on his own in case something happened. “That is also why I always walk like I´m fucking drunk.” He explained.

I just nodded at that. It made sense and as awful as that was for him and as sorry as I felt, it did not change the way I saw him. Not a lot at least.

Not like something that he told me a few weeks later when me, Emma and him were walking through the park together, talking about police stations for some reason.

“I've been to one before.” He told us. I saw an opportunity to mock him and asked “Why? Did you get arrested?”

“No.” he said, getting his cigarettes out. “I was there as a witness.”

I had never before seen him this serious before. That stupid crooked smirk was gone. His face looked really empty without it. His eyes looked empty too.

“I had to answer their questions about some guy from my old school. He was a bully. He used to bully me and my mates. In all ways possible. You don't even want to know what he did to us. And what it felt like-“He shook his head. “I'm not even gonna tell you what it felt like. I went through hell. Trust me: I went through hell!” He paused. “That guy would always tell us to jump from a bridge or hang ourselves and stuff. And well, one of us did it.”

“What?”

“My best friend´'s been dead for nearly two years.”

I tried to think of something to say. “Oh my god, I am so sorr-“

He looked at me, his voice breaking. “No, don't. Please just don't.”

I grew quiet and was never able to see him the same since that day. I desperately wished he would just go back to being annoying.