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Where I come from, people don’t treat you nice.

That’s my abiding memory of where I come from.

That and…

Well, I wasn’t always like this, you know?

I try hard, but there I am going around and around in circles. Not all of the time, but sometimes it just kicks in and there I am, doing my thing. Only the thing I am doing isn’t my thing. It’s their thing. 

They taught me this and a whole bunch of other things and once these things became a habit, well I don’t think there’s any way of changing that. Not really there isn’t.

They hurt me, and that hurt changed me. I wasn’t always like this, but I can’t rightly recall what it was that I was like, only that I was somehow different. I was better, but then they hurt me real bad and my head it isn’t so good these days.

Then there are the dreams. 

The dreams are dark and there is fear. I think I dream of them, and things even worse than them. Sometimes I awake with such a rage, the dream is still real even though I am no longer sleeping and I want to defend myself in a way I never could back then. I want to strike out and fight! I need to break free of the fear and the tyranny and…

At some point I come back to myself and I realise that I am there no longer and I wonder why it is that I behave this way, even now. Even here, where they are not, in a place where they can no longer get to me. They still manage to somehow, and I don’t know what I can do about that.

But then I am there, and I always will be there because somehow they trapped me and my head, it doesn’t work as well as it used to. There are switches in there and they are not my switches and I do not control them. 

One of the switches makes no sense to me. None of the switches really make sense to me, but this one may be the worst of them. I see others of my kind and everything centres in on them and the moment. Everything else is gone and I am filled with an energy I cannot explain. I am excited to a point of elation. I am fit to burst and I need to run and my mouth is going ten to the dozen. I cannot see the world any longer, all that counts to me is who I see before me. I go berserk and I am no longer in control. 

This is not who I am.

If you were to see me at other times, you would know this also. 

I am calm and I am loving and I just want to belong. 

Sometimes I think I do. That I have found my home and everything is going to be alright, but they changed me. The people from where I originally come from hit me and kicked me and locked me away. They confined me in the tightest of prisons so I could barely move and I think I might have gone mad for a while back then.

I wasn’t good enough for them. 

I wasn’t fit for purpose. 

I didn’t do what I was required to do.

I wonder if they turned violent after they realised this?

Or was the violence always there? 

That’s what it feels like to me. That they hurt me from the very start and they never really told me what I was to do. I suppose I will never know now.

Now it is different.

Here it is different.

They are good to me.

I know this, but something in me is forever broken and I fail to respond to kindness the way I know I should do. It isn’t a lack of trust. At least I don’t think it is. I try. I really do, but they made me a certain way and I don’t think there is a way to go back and undo all that they have done. I cannot reset. I can only go around in my circles and wake up angry. 

I can only be me.

They call me Wee Man here. I don’t know why they call me that, but I like it.

*

He looks on at the little character that came from a bad place.

Wee Man is home now and everything is just fine.

Right now, the Wee Man is laying in the grass and enjoying the sun. He has been in the garden for most of the day and he is stretched out and having a moment. He doesn’t have a care in the world and neither do his two step-brothers. 

The man watches Wee Man get up and stretch, then stand to attention. The Man could watch him all day and he can’t help but smile. The smile falters a little as Wee Man walks over to the concrete slabs at the edge of the lawn and starts to lick them. 

The man feels sad whenever he sees that, and he often wonders what it was that they did to him to make him like this. Still, he does this less and less and the circling is most pronounced when the man is walking and Wee Man is his speedy little moon. The man has to remember that he has a small satellite that nearly gets under his feet, but somehow manages never to trip him. The man knows that it is important that he attend to this dance of the Wee Man’s so that they never get entangled, and that is fine by him. That is life and it is how everyone gets along.

The man’s patient and loving stare eventually attracts Wee Man’s attention. The man squats and taps his leg and Wee Man dutifully trots over. Wee Man stares intently up at the man. Whatever has happened in his life, he remains brave and fearless. The man thinks that maybe he was always that way and nothing in his past life forged this inner strength. The man is humbled by the little warrior before him, there is plenty to be learned from the companionship with the Wee Man. He drops a hand slowly to Wee Man’s nose for him to sniff at and then he strokes his neck, finding that rewarding spot that brings Wee Man’s leg up and down like he’s stamping the beat to a tune only he can hear. Wee Man gives forth a contended sigh and the man smiles.

They go indoors then and the man picks up a half read paperback and sits on the sofa, leaving just enough room for Wee Man to slip betwixt him and the arm of the seat. His two step-brothers bound onto the remainder of the sofa and vie with each other for what they consider to be the best spot. As far as the man can tell, the best spot is arbitrary and more to do with contest than locale.

Between the three of them, they indulge in several minutes of fidgeting around and on the man, and take it in turns to nudge the paperback with their noses. They demand the man’s attention and he gives it freely, but he will not put the paperback down. He has things to do and they will have to make do with only half the available fuss.

In the end they settle, and the man looks from one to the next, smiling broadly. The last of the three that he gazes upon is Wee Man. The sometimes ferocious little terrier is squeezed into his favourite spot. 

These days he lays on his back, totally exposed and vulnerable. He may still have those bad dreams of his, but in this place he never awakens in a rage. This is his spot, this is his place. 

This is his home.