I was in the boy's washroom when I saw someone burst through the door and rush to the stalls.  I had only caught a glimpse of him but I knew it was Anthony right away.  The stall door clattered shut behind him and he started to heave.  I guess this has become such a routine that his body would say, "Just get on with it already," and let him go right ahead.
I pushed open the English toffee-coloured door of the stall next to him and sat down, waiting for him to finish.  Anthony hadn't eaten breakfast.  He never did.  So there was nothing for him to do but dry heave until it felt like his intestines were about to climb up out of his throat.  No doubt his chiselled face facial features were beet red from the strain and his skin felt like a thousand needles were pricking it.
It ended with a gut-wrenching sob, a few deep breaths, and the toilet flushing.  I left my stall at the same time he did.  Anthony only looked a little surprised to see me.  I had once told him that I would be there whenever he needed me, and by God, he needed me right now.  There was a red liquid dotting his lips.  The poor boy had been coughing and heaving so hard that he hurt his throat.  I hugged him – softly, of course – and traced my fingers up and down the small of his back.  I shushed and told him that it was all right in my own calm monotone.
"I think I need to go lay down for a while," Anthony told me after he washed out his mouth and watched the last traces of bile swirl down the drain.  He had a study period right now.  It served to give him a longer lunch, though he didn't eat much.  I was still trapped in English class.
"Wait up for me; I'll drive you home."
Anthony only lived a short distance away.  I had to drive or take the bus.  He waited outside of my classroom as I faked sick and grabbed my things.  We both signed out at the office, though they insisted on calling my house because I was underage.
I watched Anthony slowly climb into the passenger seat of my Impala.  He may have felt sick, but he was still so graceful.  I got behind the wheel and looked him over.  He wouldn't ever lay his head against the back of the seat.  He said it made him feel uncomfortable.  And then he would shift and sprawl out his legs and rest his arms on his waist.
So casual.
So beautiful.
So Anthony.
"Are you going to be all right?" I asked him.  I wouldn't mind if I had to clean up his vomit from the floor.  I have a black lab named Joxer at home, so I'm used to it.  Anthony nodded and I turned the keys in the ignition.  The engine choked a little but eventually came to life.  We were off.
"They're trying to push you too hard again, aren't they?"
"Not really.  Just a little."
'A little' in Anthony's mind is 'a lot' in mine.  He has a tendency to trivialize important things.  But at the same time he can be a very emotional person when he's actually happy.  He can be moved by so little and understand so much of it at once.  I don't really get it, myself.  Emotion seems like far too much work for my tastes.
The only emotion I really understood was my love for Anthony.
The light turned green and I went straight into a roundabout.  Anthony was still trying to settle his stomach by taking deep breaths.  I reached over and rested my hand on his shoulder while concentrating on the traffic.  I steered into the suburbs where the houses all looked the same, keeping an eye out for number eighty-nine.
"I'm worried about you."
"I know."
There it was.  A plain, white, two-story house, just like all of the other ones in this neighbourhood.  The one with the clay snails in the front alongside the lawn gnomes.  The one with a fragmented stone path leading from the side of the garage to the front steps, surrounded by a mini-garden of azaleas and petunias.  His mother's choice of flowers.  Horrid combination, really.
No one was home yet.  Neither of his parents would be home until around six.  I opened the garage door while Anthony steered my car inside.  He's a very smooth driver.  There's never any worry about turning too far left or right, or having to worry about the slight adjustments on a straight road to make sure he doesn't go over the line or into the ditch.  Anthony fished out his house keys from his pocket with an awkward twist of his feet and flick of his wrist and let us both in through the side door.
I don't like Anthony's house.  It's full of gaudy paraphernalia that his mother and father bought with their dirty money.  We took a right and went to the kitchen in the back of the house and got ourselves both a glass of water.  Anthony trudged off to the first floor bathroom so he could find a Gravol, and left me to eye the floral border around the room, as well as the woodblock full of knives on the island I was sitting at and a clock radio in the corner.
When he came back we passed the living room that was full of bling for the suburban parent: flat screen, expensive painting over a faux-fireplace, leather couches, and a basket for Anthony's mother's crocheting.  No doubt his father thought that all of this crap made him look successful.  I think it made him look like a clone of a fake that was trying to overcompensate for something.
I followed Anthony up the stairs past pictures of him and his family and went to the room on our right: his bedroom.
Anthony's room is the best room in the whole house.  No ugly decorations, no desperate need to prove anything.  It was just naturally Anthony, and that suited him just fine.  A large bed with blue linens, a black computer desk in the corner in front of the window, and a large bookshelf against the wall full of trophies for his endeavours in sports.
I took my seat in his desk chair and watched him take off his blue sweater.  "You don't have to stay if you don't want to," he told me.
"I want to," I told him.
Anthony draped back the covers and lay down on the mattress, not bothering to cover himself up again.  He closed his eyes and the rise and fall of his chest slowed down, like the raging sea calming for the night after a storm.  I noticed a large blurry bruise on his left shoulder; a mix of navy and purple, with the slightest hint of teal.
Someone hurt my Anthony.
"What happened to you?" I asked him.
He opened his eyes and followed my gaze to his injury.  "Soccer practice last night.  I got a cleat in the shoulder.  At least it wasn't my face, eh?  That'd be a bit harder to cover up."
Anthony liked to trivialize things.  'I got a cleat in the shoulder' in his words meant 'I got beat up' in mine.
Someone hurt my Anthony.
I closed the distance and sat down on his bed so I could take a closer look.
Someone hurt my Anthony.
"Who did this to you?" I asked.
"It was just an accident," he lied.  "Sometimes your aim is a little off, or someone makes a move you don't expect them to make.  It's not like I haven't kicked anyone during soccer before."
I draped my hand on his bruise.  Anthony winced at the sudden pressure.  I leaned down and kissed it, half-hoping that all of those years that 'kissing it better' actually worked.  "It'll be okay," I reassured him, and felt around the dark flesh with my fingers.  If I made my hand into a fist, it fit the contours of the bruise just about right, with a bit of extra left over.  And I think my hands were about the size of Anthony's father's hands.  
They were trying to push him too hard again.
Did he do this to him?  In a fit of drunken rage he just suddenly attacked his son without warning?  Did he only punched him where it could easily be covered up?
I don't know.  But I don't like it.
I don't like it at all.
Someone hurt my Anthony.
Past tense.
I lay down next to him and rested my arm on his waist.  The Gravol was taking effect by now, so I wouldn't have to worry about making him feel sick.  "It's okay," I said as I gently kissed his cheek.
"Go to sleep.  I won't let them get you."