I was an ordinary child. I liked to play outside with my friends. I'd come into the kitchen tromping mud from my boots and shedding grass from my hair. I'd rush to tell my mom all about the games I played with Joshua Next Door, like pirates and wizards and treasure hunters. Especially treasure hunters. Then she'd tell me to clean up the mess I made on the floor. It was those moments when my grin would slip. I'd refuse. We'd argue for just a moment, until she promised that I could have a cookie and a glass of lemonade. I liked lemonade.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I loved the old folks' home more than almost anywhere else in the world, and I would beg my parents to take me there every Saturday. My great-grandfather had Room A47 all to himself, but he wasn't like some of the other old folks. They stayed cooped up in their rooms watching TV or bundled in their wheelchairs staring out the window, but not Granddad Chester. He'd let me wrap my tiny fingers around his wrist, and together we'd stroll down the halls saying "Good afternoon, Patty," and "You look lovely, Dana," like real gentlemen.

I was an ordinary child. I loved it when my dad came home. I used to sit for hours by the window, and as soon as his battered brown car rolled down the road I'd run to greet him barefoot down the driveway. He'd yell at me to get out of the way- It was a little game we played, see - but once he parked he'd step out and pick me up in his arms and swing me high above his head. Then he would pilot the Spencer 747 into the house and through the kitchen. I'd kiss Mom's cheek, and he'd kiss her lips, and then we'd all crash-land together on the couch.

I wasn't an ordinary child. The other boys my age liked to play Pokémon, but I was more interested in hunting around our basement for lost treasures. We kept a thousand cardboard boxes down there. Most of them were filled with dusty binders of receipts and wedding invitations and things, but sometimes I got lucky and pulled out a photo album of my parents and my grandparents when they were kids, or an old record that I'd bring upstairs so I could beg my parents to put it on. I remember once that I pulled out an old guitar. I propped it up on a stack of boxes so I could play the strings, but I slipped and the guitar crashed to the ground and got a crack through its middle. I don't know why Dad yelled at me for that. The guitar had been down there so long he'd probably forgotten it was there.

I was an ordinary child. I had a stuffed giraffe named Michael. He was my best friend, but only in secret. Joshua Next Door and I always teased Lilac Overton about Binkie, her ragged rabbit. Josh would never have forgiven me if he knew about the secret friendship with my giraffe. But Michael didn't mind. He was a good listener. I told him my secrets, and put him in charge of guarding my rock collection. We got into lots of trouble together. He was missing an ear and always bleeding stuffing from one leg, but he never complained. That's just what a good friend he was.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I thought that bugs were icky and gross, and I almost threw up when Dad showed me a big hairy black spider he'd crushed with his shoe. I wouldn't pour salt on slugs if you paid me. One time when I was out in the trees with Joshua Next Door, we saw a really long centipede as wide as the space between my teeth. I freaked out and took off for home. Josh called me a girl and a scaredy-cat and a few other names, but he was running right beside me when the thing turned out to be a biter. It was all I could do not to panic whenever Dad took me out for father-son bonding time hunting crickets in the grass. He probably would have called me worse names than Josh did if he found out that even ladybugs gave me chills.

I was an ordinary child. I had a secret crush on Katie Evans, who went to daycare with me on Fridays. She always had her hair in a tight black braid, and I used to pull on it when I thought no one was looking. That would make her mad. She would cry until Miss Ryans brought her a cookie to calm her down, and then during snack time she would steal my crackers. I'd get back at her by blowing crumbs in her face, and she'd pour juice in my hair. One time I threw Princess Quack, her favorite toy duck, onto the top shelf of the closet where even Miss Ryans wouldn't be able to reach it. I was always getting into trouble like that. Mom used to ruffle my hair down over my eye and say I couldn't resist causing a little chaos.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I taught myself how to do tricks on the couch even before Kitty-Corner Russell's parents got him an in-ground trampoline. The other boys spent hours in a single afternoon before they could perform even the mildest of front flips. Me? By the end of the first week I had an entire routine worthy of the Olympics down pat. I'd start from the far corner of the yard and come running, and then I'd do a cartwheel and land with my feet on the grass and flip back with my hands on the tramp. I could do just two flips like that before I'd get dizzy and slip and go rolling in the grass, laughing and tussling with the others as they playfully ganged up on me for "cheating".

I was an ordinary child. I didn't like raisins on my toast or fruit bits in my yogurt. I never touched my broccoli, even if Dad told me I'd go to bed without dinner. Sometimes if Mom cut off the leafy tops then I'd finally give in and stick them one by one through the gap in my teeth. On several occasions I stashed them in my pockets and my sleeves to dump in the trash can later, until Dad found out what I was doing. Then he really did send me to bed without dinner, and no desserts until my next birthday.

I wasn't an ordinary child. It would be many months - even years - before I started school, but I was determined to get a head start. My mom's mom had come from Russia, and in that one Christmas I knew her before she died, I pounced on her immediately, begging for words to add to my collection. I always wanted to hear words. I knew five different "hellos" and just as many good-byes, and a whole bunch of silly ones like "That's a nice mustache" and "There's a rooster in the bathroom" and "Cookie, please". I'd teach her Spanish in return - the little things I'd picked up from my dad - and we'd have a multi-lingual party right there in the living room.

I was an ordinary child. I loved the weekends when my parents would let me stay up late watching movies. Mom would make popcorn, and Dad would put in an old black-and-white film with gunshots and knife fights and tough guys who spoke with thick accents and drove nice cars and won all the ladies. Sometimes when things got too violent I'd pull a blanket over my head and cuddle up beside my mother until the scene was over. My worst nightmares were the times when I yawned too much, or if my dad decided that my feet were too cold, and they sent me up to bed at the most exciting part of the movie. I'd perch on the stairs, listening to the words even if I couldn't see the screen.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I never went swimming in the pond or the public pool down Southern Way. I kept my clothes on when I jumped through sprinklers or engaged in water fights with Josh and Russ. One time I made the mistake of dangling upside-down from the monkey bars at Lilac Overton's, and Russ saw the long red scar across my ribs. I lied and told him that it was from my cat, until Josh pointed out that I didn't have a cat. I had to bribe them and Harry McGrady and Lilac with popsicles from the ice cream truck before they promised not to tell, and pay for it with quarters from my own pocket.

I was an ordinary child. I wanted to be a dinosaur-bone-hunter when I grew up. I must have drawn hundreds of pictures of the dinosaurs I was going to name, like Momraptor and Dadadactyl and Spencersaurus. I'd tack them on my bedroom walls and gaze at them by the light of my glow-in-the-dark sticker stars. Weeks later, one by one, those drawings were recycled into paper boats that Joshua Next Door and I would sail across Skip Pond.

I wasn't an ordinary child. The other kids would talk sometimes about all the fun things they would do with their dads, like fishing and hunting ducks and building treehouses and playing football. Not me, though. With my dad it was work, work, work all day, and then when he came home late in the evening when it was getting dark, he would eat dinner with us, spend half an hour watching the news, and spend the rest of the night working if there wasn't a game on. Sometimes when he came home he was mad. He'd yell a lot and kick chairs and slam the walls and sweep vases of flowers off the counters. More and more he stopped coming home at all, it seemed- Only late after I had gone to bed, and he would be gone before I woke up the next morning.

I was an ordinary child. I never wore my helmet even though my mom told me to. I chased Katie Evans and Alice and Mary around on the playground with the other boys, trying to get them to kiss me. I carved my initials into scraps of wood with my dad's pocketknife. I climbed into the big tree in our front yard and stayed out there all day, dropping water balloons on anybody unlucky enough to come by. I played Cowboys and Indians, and I was always a cowboy. I poked at worms in the garden. I made snowmen in the front yard. I spent evenings curled up with picture books about bears and snakes that Mom brought me from the library. I snuck soda pop from my dad's "secret" mini-fridge. I avoided teenagers at all costs. I played jump rope and hopscotch on the sidewalk.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I went to other kids' birthday parties, but I never had any of my own- not with them. At home, there were presents and balloons and cake, and Granddad Chester would always come, but for the most part my friends never saw the inside of my house. I would have sleepovers with Russ and snacktime with Lilac, but it seemed that what happened behind our doors stayed behind our doors. And when we had vacations, it was never further than the zoo or the odd art museum. My parents never took me to the beach. I wasn't even allowed to go to the farm with the rest of my daycare class on field trip day. My street and a small patch of the woods was about the extent of my world. I never knew any different.

I was an ordinary child. A mischief maker, sure, but ordinary nonetheless. I loved my mother with all my heart, and she loved me too. Every piece of me. She'd tell me so at night when she'd tuck me into bed. She'd cover my head and whisper in my ear and tell me to go to sleep, even though I could hear Dad yelling downstairs. She'd put bandages on the small scratches and wet the deeper ones with a soft, warm cloth. I remember sitting on the sink in tears, shoulders shaking, as she dabbed at each and every bruise. I remember the way she hugged me, pressed tight against her chest back when it wasn't weird. Back when I was in my dark moments and didn't want to push her away.

I wasn't an ordinary child. Even as a baby I was skinny as a pencil, with arms and legs that looked like they'd snap at the flit of a butterfly's wing. I remember my Mom fretting over me, constantly afraid that I would pass out and die from lack of nutrition. She needn't have worried. My body may have been small, but it was strong. Though I'd get a perpetually runny nose every time winter rolled around, I never got sick more than once in my life. I never even caught the chicken pox, though I always wondered what it would feel like. Joshua Next Door said it was magic. We took that idea and ran with it. One time we got out candles and pinecones and interesting rocks and make a circle, and he sat right in the middle while I painted symbols on his forehead and arms and pretended I was bestowing my powers upon him. We'd hardly finished when Gloves, his sister's cat, ran across the yard and jumped into my lap. I was sneezing the rest of the day after that. Oh mighty Spencer, brought so low by the mere presence of cat hair…

I was an ordinary child. Maybe I was reckless and maybe I got angry, but I wanted to make my parents proud. My dad especially, because winning his approval took hard, hard work, and if you didn't win it then you paid the fine. It was rough, though, listening to Dad, because he'd tell me to do things like go to my room and not come out again, even though it was only ten o'clock in the morning. Or sometimes he'd tell me to count all the shirts and pants we had in the house, or sculpt fish out of butter, or clean up shards of glass from a cup that he himself had dropped, or wash the carpet with a rag. He took my skateboard and my bike. He burned some of my drawings. And he wasn't always kind to my mom. But if I ever tried to protest, he'd yell at me for not being obedient, for not being good.

I wasn't an ordinary child. It was moments like that, the "not good" moments, I would curl up on my bed and wish with all my heart that I could be good. I imagined myself like that on occasion, as a boy who was good. When New Year's rolled around one time, I resolved to become just like that good boy, even if it took me all year. I gave him all the good traits that I wanted to have. He was obedient, of course. He always tried to tell the truth, because he was an awful liar. He loved helping others, and was just a smidge of a pushover. Maybe a little cautious and shy, not leaping into a situation without first checking to see if it was safe. If he ever had a wife, I knew he'd love her a lot. He'd treat her like a real gentleman would, pulling out chairs for her and letting her step across puddles on his jacket. He was friendly. Dumb, yes, and maybe a little awkward… but friendly. Maybe he liked grape juice and action movies. Maybe he was afraid of lightning and cats. Maybe he never bothered to gel down his hair. If he were real, he'd be my big brother and never leave me - he'd always try to come back, even if he had to fight off a whole storm of people just to make it to the top. I gave the imaginary boy these silly little traits - these good little traits - and I named him Mike, after my giraffe.

I was an ordinary child. As days went by and summer faded away, I went outside less and less. I stayed in the basement closet, and not by my own choice. I kept to myself as much as possible when I was out. I didn't ask anything of my parents. I just read books and played with toys by myself. Even when my dad wasn't home, I tried to stay out of the way. I set up elaborate contraptions with catapults and blocks. I made plans that I pretended would let me take over the world someday. I practiced doing backflips off my bed into pillows and blankets to muffle the noise. I watched black-and-white movies on a VCR that my mom smuggled upstairs and tucked under my bed. I made sock puppets and practiced my ventriloquy. I drew treasure maps that led to imaginary places. I pretended to be a tough guy- the kind of guy that would have fought my dad even if he ended up with broken bones. Bit by bit, my natural defiance ebbed away every time my dad came home. I gave him what he wanted and poured everything I had into my fantasy world.

I wasn't an ordinary child. I don't know when I first noticed that I was slipping. I think I had been breaking (and they had been growing) for a long time, and that when I finally realized it, it was too late. I swear, though… I swear I remember my last moment of being whole. To my embarrassment, I was scared. Mom was in the background lying on the floor with a bright red burn mark on her face, and my dad was coming for me. I was covered in sweat. My shoe was wedged beneath a cardboard box. I was holding Michael close. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't handle it. And suddenly all of the emotions, the thoughts, the feelings, the traits, the… the everything… It all boiled too hot and erupted all over, and suddenly I wasn't entirely…

… Sorry. I don't remember anything from then on, only that…

… I was an ordinary child. I didn't have many friends… any friends. Well, maybe one or two in passing. I didn't mind. I didn't need them. I didn't need anyone spreading rumors about me behind my back. I didn't need anyone at all.

I had a garden snake named Sylvia that I'd caught in the backyard, and she was the only friend I needed. I kept to myself for the most part. I drew pictures in the dirt with long sticks. I read books. Early Saturday mornings I'd ride my bike down to the corner store and pick up bread and milk, and a few pieces of penny candy if I had any coins left over. Mother didn't mind; she didn't mind anything. She was an author and an artist, see, and always had a million and a half thoughts running through her frazzled head. My father had been dead for as long as I could remember.

I kept to my books. I married a girl from the town when I was eighteen, because that was what I was supposed to do. We were happy for eleven years, until we lost our twin sons to fever. Our oldest daughter ran off with some little Hispanic kid not long after that. Seventeen years later when the fever struck again, it took my wife and my precious baby girl.

So I lived alone, and I tried to forget them. I didn't need them. I didn't need anyone.

I vas being ze ordinary child. I vas born far away in her mo'zher country of Russia, but came to Canada vhen adopted at ze age of eight. Svetlana knows of her parents, vaguely, but zhere is not much to be telling. She vas never knowing her fa'zher… only zhat he and her mo'zher had birth of her vhen zhey vere very young- sixteen, seventeen or so. She hardly remembers her mo'zher at all.

Svetlana grew up vith her aunt for ze first few years of her life. She got along vell vith her cousins- zhey vere more like sisters to her zhan cousins, really. Zhey had money enough zhat ve could all practice our gymnastics together. Ve learned to cook. Zhings vere good, until ze money vrunned out. Every day for ze months and months, zhere vas less of ze food… and less… and less… And finally Svetlana vas sick of vatching her cousins, her zisters, starving zemselves. Zere vould be more food for zhem vithout her.

So she vrunned avay. She left ze town, she left ze next town and ze next, until she vas gone so far she knew zhey vould never be finding her again. She… stretched ze truth about her family and joined ze orphanage- Zhey, at least, received donations, even if ze meals vere still small. She practiced her gymnastics every day. Alvays she vas dreaming of becoming Olympian for her country, and practiced all day, every day, vhenever she was there and did not have ze schooling to be attending. Vith medals like zhose, vith all of ze people vatching her on TV… she vould never vant for money again. And zhen, finally… she could be going home vith ze crown of glory and kiss her zisters and her aunt, and never be needing to leave again.

I was an ordinary child. Passed the summers workin' 'longside my uncle Vinnie. He wasn't the only family I had, but he was the only family I needed. He never criticized me, never told me what a' do, never asked me ta scram. He was a man of few words, my uncle Vinnie; never heard him say much more than "Hand me that wrench" or "Go get yourself a glass of lemonade, Vite; you've earned it." I earned every one a' those lemonades.

I worked my little tail off in that car shop- there was nothing in the world I liked to do more. Once when it was stuffy I took off my shirt an' went and doused myself off with the hose. When I came back, Uncle Vinnie was using it as an oil rag. Became our little joke after that. I didn't mind it. The girls didn't either. They'd come down to the garage in twos'n threes on Friday afternoons to hover sticky n' hot like dragonflies. They'd call my name, I'd flash them a smile and they'd run off giggling. They'd come back shortly with a pitcher of freshly-squeezed lemonade. Like I said, I earned every glass.

I miss those lemonade summers most of all.

I was an ordinary child. Ever since I was four I longed to be an explorer like my old man. T'was all I ever thought about. I grew up surrounded by open fields, and I'd spend hours on hands and knees in the dirt with a garden trough, proddin' at worms and interesting rocks. Never bugs with legs though- I hate to confess it, but I'd freak at the first beetle I saw. Snakes don't bother me. Bats ain't a problem. But insects? Forget it- Can't stand the creepy-crawlies.

I still wanted ta adventure, though, despite that little setback (and my itsy bitsy fear of heights, because it wasn't that bad, honest). My dreams and wakin' hours alike were full of dark caves and wild animals and sheer cliffs of ice. More than anythin' else, I wanted ta see a kangaroo real live an' in person. Used a' daydream about ridin' mine ta school and tyin' it up to the bike rack out front.

T'was love in an instant when I met Nellie in first grade. I remember it was first, because of the number one. We planned ta move to the Yukon and stay out there for the rest of our lives; we even got married out on the school playground one hazy afternoon. She was my first an' my last kiss… Her teary-eyed parents left me with her prized fedora after she drowned in the lake. It was my own stupid fault. No one ever told me she couldn't swim.

I was an ordinary child. Didn't grow up on the streets, wasn't stolen from the cradle and raised by wolves- No sob story background for me.

There isn't much to tell. Who's asking, anyway? Grew up in a small house where it was me and my mom, and a couple new boyfriends every other week. They'd get her drunk and let her pass out on the couch downstairs. It was my job to shoo him off whenever that happened. Nobody was going to touch my mother. Not if they valued their fingers. Which, I may as well say, at least one of them didn't. He never came back after I sliced them off.

Not much more to say than that. I like music. Doesn't everyone? Birds are nice- 'specially the parakeets. They won't ignore you. They'll mimic and whistle and sing their little hearts out, and they won't go blabbing your secrets around like macaws- Especially not if you tell them all your secrets in Spanish.

What else? I might be willing to do you a favor for a piece of gingerbread, but applesauce is a no. I look good in green, but then again I look good in just about anything. Not red, though. I hate red. Red is prison, red is blood. Red is slap marks and scars. Red is burning skin. Red is the maple leaf on the flag of this country- a country I won't ever be particularly proud of. I'd rather take her away to an island that doesn't belong to anybody else. Am I not proud since it was his country, and he boasted about it so? Maybe that's the reason. I don't know, and don't really care. Red is roses left beside a lying love poem. Red is a sweater left on the floor when he moves in for the kill. Red is the setting sun of yet another awful evening. Red is apples. And I really, really hate apples, too.

I was an ordinary child. Even when I was little I was never a good liar. But that doesn't matter since I make a habit of trying to tell the truth anyway. After all, I really don't have much to hide. Really.

I'd take carrots over broccoli, and peaches over either one. When I was six I wanted to own a puppy. As I walked up the street running a stick along the wrought-iron fences, I would daydream about standing on the corner patting my knees and calling "Here boy! Here Spencer!" I can't whistle though, or at least not anything with an actual tune. Never learned.

I'm a squishy romantic at heart, with a tendency to fall in love with any girl to show me kindness. It's gotten me into trouble more times than I can count. And sometimes I can be too hesitant for my own good. It's a curse, and because of it I live my life always looking back and wishing over could-have-beens.

I wouldn't dream of breaking a promise, or going against the rules. I literally just… can't. That's not what good boys do. Once when I was seven - eight, I think actually - one of my friends hit a baseball through Old Mrs. Gilette's front window. Neil wanted to pin the crime on Jason Fetter up the street, but I told Mrs. Gilette the truth and we paid for it out of our toy store and ice cream money. Neil left me forever after that.

I've always loved helping others, though; after school three days a week, I teach the little kids at the daycare how to read and do simple math. It comes real easy to some. I wish it had been that way for me, but I wasn't born with the sharpest of minds. I just count myself lucky that being friendly comes naturally to me, even if math doesn't, and even if I don't have nearly as much common sense as some of the people I know.

But I do know some things. I know I hate storms. I think I might be allergic to cat hair. I'd like to be an actor when I grow up; I've had plenty of practice trying to be someone else. I'm left-handed. I like to watch ultimate kickboxing, and I like to dance. I love the taste of grape juice. I can't stand to gel down my hair, because once that stuff gets on my hands then the smell and taste won't leave until late in the afternoon, no matter how many times I wash. Come to think of it, actually, I always have to waste hours at the sink scrubbing my skin until it begins to peel and burn, and then I still can't stop myself sometimes.

I wish that was the worst of my worries now. After all… My name is Mike. And I am no ordinary child.

A/N: Yep, my headcanon for Mike is that he has a secret- He's not the original personality. I based this theory off the story of a real-life woman named Pamela Edwards (Her birth name was Karen, but Pamela was the most prominent piece after her mind split). Look her up sometime, maybe.