Lay sighed as he reached for the door knob.

He didn't want to go inside but he knew he had to, it would  only cause more trouble for him if he didn't.

In the living room his stepfather sat.

Another man was sitting beside him, as they watched the telly.

"Oh, there he is, come here, Lay."

_______________________

Lay swayed to the sound of his own humming.

The small restaurant seemed to be fuller today out of all days, so naturally Lay found himself sitting in the back corner of the place.

He waited patiently for Leo to arrive.

Leo wasn't actually late, it was Lay who had come twenty minutes earlier,  so he wouldn’t be late.

This was a natural thing for Lay to do.

Finally the door opened and in stepped in Leo.

He wasn't carrying 'Honey  '  this time but instead had a small notebook.

"Hello Lay, did you get something to eat?" Lay shook his head and explained the he did not eat outside the house because there would be germs on his plate.

The waitress arrived and Leo ordered a small root beer to go.

"Okay  we'll then let's get started then shall we?" Leo took out a small piece of paper and a pen and handed them to Lay.

"Um before we get started, why are we doing this on Saturday, it's the most crowded day." Lay mumbled not to be rude.

Leo smirked lightly and fixed his seating.

"I know, that's the point."

"Right." Lay sighed, he didn’t know what was going to be the result of an of this but it was quite nerve wrecking.

"So I want you to write down on this piece of paper , 10 things that you would never do without your gloves. " Lay stared at the paper , gulping, he reached for the pen and started writing down a small list, taking a small gasp on every new word that he jolted down.

"Done."

Leo picked at the paper and read the words carefully.

1. Touch doorknobs.

2. Touch things that are not mine.

3. Eat outside the house.

4. Stand beside a person that is sick.

5. Shake hands with another person.

6. Share food and drinks with others.

7. Let people in my room.

8.Shop for books.

9. Sit down without cleaning the seat.

10. ---------

Leo squinted his eyes and furrowed his eyebrows.

"Why is number 10 empty?" Lay frowned and pointed to the paper. "That is my secret."

Leo took this as a  challenge, he would challenge himself to find out the secret no matter what.

He slid the small notebook across the table and in front of  Lay.

"In this Notebook, I need you to write down what happened to make you this way, not right now, but you can give me the book whenever you want to. "

Lay bit his lip, this was something he never wanted to do, tell someone his story. He couldn’t let Leo know what had happened, how he became like this.

But he also knew knew that the only way he was going to heal if he did tell someone, so he excepted.

He flipped through the pages quickly, only to stop to see a sealed envelop in the back.

"What is this for?"

Leo placed a smug smile onto his fair face.

"You  can't open that until we accomplish this. "

" And if we don't? " This was getting quite exciting, Lay had to admit that.

"Than you will never know."Lay nodded and played with the tips of his sweater.

“First things first's, I want you to go and open the door, without gloves.”

Leo smiled and stood up slowly.

“Take all the time you want, I’m going to take an extra long time paying .”

Lay sat there, unnerved.

It sounded simple. Take off his gloves and open the door.

The door that millions of other people had touched before him.

The boy sighed and decided it would be best if he just did it, because he would be here all day if he didn’t.

Lay slowly pulled off his white gloves, he reached for the door knob slowly before retreating backwards. Lay honestly didn’t know what he was afraid of, touching the door wouldn’t harm him, right?

Once again Lay reach out for the door then tightly gripped his hands around it. It was cold, it felt dirty, disgusting.

Lay snatched his hand away, jumping back , he grabbed his hand sanitizer and wiped his hands. They still felt dirty, so Lay kept wiping.

Lay didn’t know how long he was wiping his hands but somehow Leo grabbed hold of his wrist and was saying something, telling him something.

Something that Lay didn’t exactly hear, because all he could think about was being dirty.

“Stop!”  Leo shouted.

Lay sighed and dropped his hands down.

This wasn't how he wanted to heal, this was hard.

"You're ruining your beautiful hands. "

Lay scoffed softly,  beautiful hands, thus was not something he had heard before.

"But they were dirty, I felt it." Lay whined only to have Leo shake his head and frown.

"I know you think  they're dirty, but they're clean, if you keep wiping your hands then you won't get better.

Lay nodded, he understood that he couldn't clean his hands afterwards, because he would never get to  number ten.

"Let's try this again."

This time Leo watched as Lay placed his hand on the doorknob and slowly open it.

He had done it!

Lay touched something outside without his gloves.

Lay resisted reaching for the sanitizer and scrubbing his hands clean, since Leo had a long smile spread across his face.

"Task one finished, no you must finish the rest, but I think that's it for the day.”

Leo grabbed his bag.

“I’ll see you next saturday.” Leo left.

Lay sighed and put on his gloves again.

Maybe this wasn’t so bad.

Leo had managed to help him touch a doorknob without his gloves.

Sure his hands felt dirty, but he actually did it!

Lay smiled then laughed.

“See you next saturday.”

He smiled before heading home.