When I was six, there was a woman named Barbara whose house I went to every day for an entire summer. She was a learning aid for autistic kids who were language-deficient. The only thing I remember about my time there was the caterpillars in her backyard, of which there were hundreds. I often played in the grass and watched them closely with fascination. Once, I witnessed a caterpillar cross the entire length of the backyard from start to finish. It took about three or so hours to make the journey. When my dad finally came to pick me up, I was saddened more than anything to see it go. I waved goodbye, and he took me inside.

Before we left, I was put in a children’s room while my dad discussed with Barbara what I had learned that day. The room was covered with wallpaper of all different shapes and patterns, bean bags, toys, and games. The only thing I liked doing in that room, the second I was alone, was flipping the light switch on and off as fast as I could. That was the only thing in a space designed for kids that was of any interest to me. I experienced pure joy watching the whole room light up, an explosion of visual stimuli spattered across the walls and ceiling, and then seeing it magically disappear. Poof! Darkness.

My dad enrolled me in a special needs program on the Brooklyn-Manhattan border. On the first day of kindergarten, I was taken to a small room on the fourth floor of the elementary school with four chairs lined up. They were the kind of chairs with metal legs that looked tiny to an adult but were too heavy for kids to carry. There was also a window in the corner with a view looking down at the street.

Three other kids entered after me, one at a time. The first had snot drooling from his nose. He wore oversized glasses and corduroy pants. The second was a girl who I no longer remember. The third chewed at his sleeve while rubbing his thumb up and down his elbow. He began rubbing quicker and quicker until he suddenly let out a deafening, passionless cry. I sat attentively still, gripping the seat, not knowing what would happen next. What was I doing here on the first day of school? Did the teachers think I was like them?

I wanted friends more than anything since I wasn’t making them at school. Two older kids approached me one day at a playground by my house and offered to be my friends. I was sitting all alone on a tire swing.

“Sure!” I said.

Then, they began winding me—winding and winding until the three metal cables were locked together at the very top, where they formed a vertex. One of them got out their phone and started recording while the other let go. I began spinning more and more rapidly, the frictionless attachment to the tree flowing in circles with ease, picking up acceleration. Faster and faster, the tire spun, my field of vision blurring together like a giant color pallet against a fan. When the tire slowed down, I threw up enough to fill a bucket. I looked around to see if my new best friends were still there to take care of me. There was no one in sight.

My obsessiveness started kicking in around the same age. I loved watching Tetris and playing with the Rubik’s Cube; they were clean and predictable. I loved collecting little figurines of wild animals as long as they were roughly the same height. When I came into my room, I checked to make sure the notebooks were stacked neatly on top of each other. Every sheet on the bed needed to be squarely tucked in. There were never any posters hanging on the wall or elaborate decorations. The less stuff in a room, the less chaotic it was. And that’s how it had to be.

The only exception to that was the stars that lit up my room at night. Not the glow-in-the-dark kind you stick to the ceiling, but a lamp that projects them through a semi-covered bulb. I always found peace under them. To the stars, I was free to be whoever I wanted to be. To the stars, I was just as normal as everybody else.

Ervin Brown is originally from New York. His prose and poetry have appeared in Willows Wept Review, The Closed Eye Open, Beyond Words Literary Magazine, and Wild Roof Journal, among others. He has an MFA in Writing from the University of New Hampshire.