the first thing jimmy ever learned how to do was to tie his shoes.
his father had sat him down on the living room carpet one evening, placing a pair of his new kindergarten big-boy shoes in between the two of them, and he had told jimmy that they were going to learn how to tie them.
he grabbed the ends of the laces and held them in between his pointer and his thumb, letting the rope fall and tighten as he pulled sightly, hissing like a snake. jimmy laughed when his father rubbed the aglet against the skin on his ankle, and his mother laughed from the hallway when his father tackled him in a tickle fight.
and his father gave him a pair of his brand new shoes and taught him how to tie a know. and then his father gave him a pair of his brand new shoes and showed him how to make bunny-ears. and then his father slipped a pair of his brand new shoes onto his feet and taught him how to tighten and tie his shoes.
it was the first thing that jimmy had ever really learned how to do. it was the first thing that made jimmy realize that he wanted to learn more.
his parents just looked so happy.
they cooed and clapped their hands as he walked down the hallway, boastfully taking large steps in order to show off the way his shoes stuck to his heel and the arch’s blended willingly with his foot.
they continued to compliment his knot-work for the next month before they left the house, praising the tightness and the perfectly round loops. his parents told jimmy that they were so proud of him, and jimmy went to bed happy.
he wanted his parents to always look happy. especially when they were looking at him.
the second thing jimmy learned how to do was his multiplication tables; and it only grew from there.
the third thing jimmy learned how to do was fix the family’s ac after an especially hot winter. the fourth thing jimmy learned how to do was create his own self-functioning flight device. the fifth thing he learned how to do was build a fresh water filter, which he sold to the government in hopes that they could help people he couldn’t.
and after the second thing (third thing, fourth thing, fifth thing) jimmy’s parents twirled him around in the air and gushed over the way that he was “their perfect little boy.”
he was the perfect little boy who got college letters from ivy league colleges while the rest of his classmates made pasta art. he was the perfect little boy who joined his parents for their perfect little meal as they talked about their day. he was the perfect little boy who tied perfect little knots on his perfect little shoes.
maybe if he was a different person, with different parents, he would have a different life.
he would have looked at the difficult puzzle that were his unknotted laces and would have looked at his parents, who has left him alone with his shoes to go do other things, and he would have tucked his laces inside his shoes and dealt with the blisters on his heel and the pain in the arch of his foot.
(there is a boy that is a different person, with different parents, who had a different life, who still walks the planet with his laces tucked inside his shoes and goes to bed while massaging blood red feet)
but he is not a different person, and jimmy’s parents look happy.
a myriad of positive feedback and different inventions later, and jimmy has found that he throws himself head first into his makeshift lab because he wants to.
he doesn’t want to make his parents happy (though that’s a cool side effect). he doesn’t want to boastfully show off his tied knots (though he probably still will). he doesn’t want to receive things from colleges or receive keys to the city.
he throws himself headfirst into his lab because he wants to. because he’s been raised to be curious.
and a myriad of new discoveries later, jimmy meets a boy his age.
the boy reminds him of his father, with the way that he grabs onto jimmys inventions and pretends that they’re snakes. with his stupidly humorous wit and sharp brown hair.
the boy reminds him of his mother, with the way that he sees the way that jimmys in danger and stupidly jumps in to save him. with his aura of power and magical ability to summon anything jimmy’s looking for.
the boy reminds him of—well—jimmy. with the way that he curiously pokes at the way that the machine buzzes in his lab. with his odd physical features and his loving relationship with his parents. the way he hugs the hologram with pink hair and mooches off the hologram with green hair’s food.
(the boy reminds him of jimmy in the way that his laces are tucked loosely inside his shoe.)
jimmy asks him about this, because he’s curious, and his curiosity had only ever been met with a positive response.
(“why are your laced untied?” jimmy asks. they’re older then they were when they first met: they met friends and they came close to dying and they lost friends.
“what do you mean?” the boy asks, running a tongue against his large front teeth.
they’re sitting in the back of the boys truck, which he got from his holograms as soon as he turned sixteen. they got take out from the mexican restaurant they went to and are sharing a place of chips while staring at the stars. jimmy has already told the boy that the stars are more impressive when you look at them from space. the boy agrees.
“your laces,” jimmy repeats, gesturing towards the end of the truck, where their feet lie. “they’re untied. why?”
“never learned how to tie them,” the boy says with a shrug. it’s not a big deal to him—he’s a different person, with different parents, and a different life.
“really?” jimmy asks, eyes wide.
“why didn’t you ever replace them, then?” jimmy continues, even though he’s known the boy for almost five years, and he knows the way that his voice is curt and end on a high note. he knows that the boy would rather drop it, but jimmy is too curious for his own good.
hes always been too curious for his own good.
“replace them?” the boy asks, his eyes going wide. “with what?”
“velcro exists for a reason,” jimmy says, shrugging his shoulders again. “so do slip-ons.”
“huh.” the other boy responds with.
and that is the end of their conversation)
and a myriad of late nights jimmy spends laughing until his side aches later, and the boy comes to him with a pair of shoes in his hand.
he tells jimmy that he never learned how to tie his shoes. he tells jimmy that he just got used to the constant blisters of his feet while jimmy looks through his closet for his old pair of big boy shoes. he tells jimmy that he never really thought that he could learn how to tie his shoes past the age of ten after jimmy sits him down in his living room.
jimmy is patient with him—he tells him about the snakebite of the smooth aglets and the knots in his memory. he tackles him when he manages to finally pull the loops tight, and he laughs when the boy slides them onto his feet and tries again.
the boy does is again and again throughout the day. he makes excuses to take off his shoes just so he can tie them again. he sits down on the ground and he slowly mumbles the steps to himself before he finishes and looks up at jimmy with an expectant smile.
jimmy applauds every single time.
later, the boy will sit on jimmys bed as he shows jimmy the places on his heel where he bled so bad it scarred. jimmy runs a finger against the white mark and looks at the boy with a concerned frown.
the boy tells him not to worry.
the boy tells him that he never has to worry about bleeding heels again now that jimmys here.
and the boy looks so happy.
just like jimmys parents.
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