Let me pose a question. What is it that causes a social trend to die?
The common response, of course, would be tied to the momentary popularity of said trend. Maybe it was no longer popular, or nobody thought much of it anymore. Or maybe it is tied to a decline in popularity rather than a nebulous ‘amount’. Whichever the more common response is, it doesn’t change the fact that I disagree with it. What I believe causes a trend to die is, simply put, the subsequent mockery by its own followers. The moment a trend is mocked as ‘mainstream’ or ‘basic’, it is already on its deathbed. I should know. After all, that was effectively the story of my life.
The moment I was born, I became the fad that creates a million fans. Of course, I don’t mean that literally. I was simply a genetic oddity that sparked fascination among doctors and citizens alike. As soon as they looked into my eyes, they saw something thought impossible: bright red irises, and black pupils. Effectively, I had the red equivalent of what most people would consider ‘eye color’. Of course, red eyes in and of themselves are nothing out of the ordinary. The color, while indeed rare, is commonly linked with albinism, or can occur as a result of blood vessels becoming visible through the iris. However, that was exactly what made me so “special”. There was no evidence that I suffered from albinism, or that my eyes were at all abnormal. In fact, all signs pointed to my strange eye color being a result of natural pigmentation in my eye, like any other common color. As a result, my birth certificate read: ‘Retter Hanson, Eye Color: Red’. I imagine it was all they could do to not add ‘(Please don’t ask questions).’
Thankfully, while doctors were apparently eager to run experiments on me for the sake of “research”, my parents were adamantly opposed to any work that wasn’t directly related to my health. Considering the pushovers they are, I could only imagine that their response was driven by a momentary determination rather than their nature. Of course, that only got the doctors off my back. The rest of my life was another story.
When I was first introduced by the teacher in my first school class, the first question anyone asked was, “Why are his eyes red?” In the overly sensitive world we live in today, I imagine the teacher had quite the conversation with that kid afterward. Not that it had any effect on the rest of my time in elementary school, however. While the first year or so was like any fad, with everyone wanting to be friends with “red-eyes” as if it was cool, by the time I was in second grade I was the one kid nobody wanted to be friends with. I’m not sure whether they were just getting conscious of their own popularity, or were scared of me, or both, but all of a sudden everyone began avoiding me like the plague. Before long, I was the target of active bullying. People must have realized that the young red-eyed kid was all alone, and decided to rub it in a little bit. Needless to say, the teachers never stepped in, and my parents were too gutless to do anything about it themselves. I was effectively all alone in the world by that point.
At least, until that day.
It was a nondescript day in October of my junior year of high school, during lunch. I always fancied eating lunch in a particular corner of the courtyard. Most people ate with their friends in the giant cafeteria the school housed, meaning the courtyard was usually empty. Combine that with a nicely placed tree for some valuable shade and a convenient bench, and it was perfect for a recluse like myself. I had been eating there for two years at that point, and not once did anyone take a seat next to me, only stopping by to gawk (or, if they were bolder, spit on me).
On this day, however, things were different. I had taken a step away from the bench for several minutes to visit the bathroom. Even though I had already eaten, I didn’t feel the need to bring my backpack with me, since I would just find myself back here anyway and there wasn’t enough time in the transit period for anyone to do anything suspicious. I had done it plenty of times, and not once had anyone tried anything. This false sense of security left me quite surprised to find something out of the ordinary when I returned.
A girl I had never seen had taken a seat next to my backpack and begun eating lunch. Putting aside the fact that it was twenty minutes into the lunch period and she was just getting started, I was dumbfounded how I had never seen a girl as pretty as her around, with her smooth skin and long, black hair. I didn’t really know many of my classmates, but I had a pretty good memory, and I was confident I didn’t know her at all. Still, she felt the necessity to sit in this quiet corner of campus for lunch, and if she was anything like me then she had a good reason to be here. As a result, I opted not to say anything, simply picking up my backpack and sitting down next to her.
Of course, I was at least well versed in common courtesy, and I didn’t want to creep her out any more than I already did.
“Do you mind if I sit down too?” I asked.
I didn’t intend to leave if she said no, but I figured I didn’t want to dig any more of a hole with her than I needed to. Thankfully, she simply shook her head at my question, not saying anything but clearly indicating she didn’t care all that much. With my query answered, I figured it wouldn’t be good etiquette to just space out like I normally did, so I pulled out a book I was mildly interested in and began reading it. At that point, I was just glad that so far, it didn’t seem like she was trying to pull one over on me. At worst, she simply didn’t know that this was my spot. Once she saw my eyes, I doubted she would be back anyway, with my reputation.
As lunch drew near its end, I closed my book and returned it to my bag, before standing up and walking back to my class. The rest of the day was uneventful by my standards, which meant I had to deal with the usual pranks from some of the class’ more obnoxious members. And, as usual, the day ended with the same scene it normally did.
“Hey, Retter, wait up!” An unfortunately familiar voice called to me as I exited the classroom.
Inwardly sighing, I turned to the culprit.
“Cap, what do you want?” I asked, eyes narrowed.
As usual, my discomfort failed to get across.
“I wanted to talk for a bit. Do you have time?” he replied.
I rolled my eyes. This young man was Calvin Johnson, or ‘Cap’ to his peers. For whatever reason, he had decided this year that he wanted to be my ‘friend’, after years of being the complete opposite. Of course, I wanted nothing to do with him, as my life’s experience had taught me what suck-ups like him were capable of. Thankfully, I had already perfected my response to this daily question.
“Sorry, I have homework to do tonight,” I answered in monotone, as always.
“Oh, come on!” he complained, “There wasn’t even any math assigned tonight!”
I shook my head, expecting a response like this after the once-in-a-lifetime event earlier in the day.
“I’m not as smart as Judge,” I smoothly retort, “I actually need time to complete my homework. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be going.”
With no more to say, I walked toward the entrance. It was certainly possible that Cap said something after that, but I didn’t hear it. I was too busy attempting to retreat back into my own world.
The ride home, thankfully, didn’t have any similar interruptions. As always, I was greeted by my mother when I arrived home.
“How was school, Retter?” she immediately asked me.
With nothing to say, I shrugged. This, of course, elicited the same sigh as always.
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“I guess I shouldn’t even be surprised anymore,” she murmured, before switching topics, “Christmas is coming up, by the way. Do you know what you want?”
“I want you and Dad to grow goddamn spines,” I say, obviously grumpy.
While I felt a little bad after seeing the look that appeared in her eyes following the harsh request, I believed every word of what I said. While my words were definitely tough to swallow, I felt the need to repeat them as often as I realistically could, or they definitely wouldn’t improve.
At the time, I didn’t realize that my life was about to change. It was simply another day, with a handful of anomalies that I didn’t need to worry about in the long term. But that illusion didn’t last long.
The next day, I performed my morning routine down to the smallest detail. This included taking time to awaken, perform my usual hygienic practices, and making sure to reach the bus stop at least thirty minutes in advance. In my hometown, buses tended to arrive around ten minutes before their scheduled departure, and I learned the hard way that people like me aren’t typically going to land a seat when a crowd has gathered out front.
While my expectations were for a normal day after the minor deviations of the previous one, I was instead greeted with a second straight unusual afternoon. Right before lunch hour was supposed to begin, I got myself caught up in a class controversy by complete accident. Or, more specifically, Cap unwittingly drew me into the conversation.
The teacher had already finished the lesson, and by this point was just allowing the minutes to count down before we could all be released for lunch. I was simply pretending to be occupied, as I often did when I had nothing to do. After all, for whatever reason, other students were less likely to pick on me when I had my nose in a book. However, at the same time, my classmates were in the middle of an intensive conversation, not bothering to quiet down enough so I wouldn’t be distracted.
“You know,” a girl in my class droned, “It’s tough when your little brother hits puberty.”
I recognized that voice as Alicia Alcantra, a fellow junior. I wasn’t at all surprised that she was in the center of such a broad discussion. She was, unlike me, quite popular with everybody, and often attempted to hold discussions with people she wasn’t familiar with in order to add them to her list of friends. While others my age saw her as mature and kind, the impression I got was that she was simply shallow. She seemed to use her large list of friends for clout, rather than actually being a good friend to anyone. It was the kind of thing that made me shudder, as a friendless individual. The mere thought of being no more than a name on her list of friends was worse than any isolation I could imagine.
“Oh? Why is that?” a male student replied, somewhat aggressively.
It was obvious he had taken offense to something Alicia had said, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“I don’t know,” she tried to explain, “There’s something cool about having a ‘baby brother’, you know? He isn’t a baby anymore, and I hate it.”
“I, for one,” another boy chipped in, “Prefer my sister now that she’s hit puberty.”
“Oh great,” I heard Cap reply, “Everyone hit the deck! We have a siscon in the room!”
A round of boisterous laughter followed, and I envisioned the student in question with quite the red face in response to Cap’s joking accusation.
“I do not!” he retorted, clearly embarrassed, “But before, she would always get up in my face and ask me to do things for her! She just kept bugging me! Now she ignores me, and I don’t need to worry about ditching the house to go party with friends.”
“I wish he just ignored me,” Alicia replied, “But he’s gotten all defensive whenever he talks to me, too. It’s as if he doesn’t want me around.”
“Sounds like a certain classmate I know,” Cap murmured.
I felt his eyes on me, and some kind of shuffling sounded from the rest of the room. I looked up to see what was going on, and saw everyone, including Cap, looking at me.
“Need something?” I asked evenly, holding a poker face.
“You ignoring Cap, Red-Eyes?” one of the students from earlier aggressively questioned.
I look away, keeping my poker face.
“Who knows?” I respond, putting on an air of thoughtfulness, “It’s certainly possible I’ve done it before, but no time comes to mind.”
I look back at Cap, seeing a pained expression on his face. His friend, on the other hand, marched up to me, slammed my desk, and looked me right in the eye.
“I can’t have you disrespecting my man like that, Red-Eyes,” he threatened, “Let’s take this outside, you and me.”
“Miles, that’s enough,” Cap begged, “Hasn’t Retter suffered enough?”
The boy, Miles, clicked his tongue at Cap.
“What, you’re calling him by his name now?”
Cap shrugged.
“He doesn’t seem like a bad person,” he attempted to reason.
After a moment, Miles just sighed.
“Whatever,” he relented, before turning to me, “You got lucky. Next time, respect my friend, okay?”
I didn’t respond, but it was clear I was safe from his rage for now. However, I had read enough novels to know that on occasion, these were simply brief respites. I would have to be more careful moving forward. At that point, the lunch bell had already rung, and I was free to leave. As I exited the classroom, I stopped in the doorway and turned back to the students still in the room.
“If you’ll excuse me,” I snapped, leaving the room before anyone could respond.
With that farce behind me, I made my way to the bench I normally ate at, prepared for some peace and quiet after the ruckus. As I approached, however, something seemed out of place, and it didn’t take me long to realize what it was.
The girl from yesterday was back.
At this point, I was already tempted to ditch my spot and find a new one, as I was certain staying around her would only cause trouble. However, before I could turn around and make my way to another secluded corner of campus, she looked up and noticed me.
“I’m sorry,” she immediately apologized, “If you want to sit down too, I don’t mind.”
I blinked, taking in her voice for the first time. It was soft, and somewhat melodic, reminding me of audiobooks I had read in the past for some reason. It was certainly a strange comparison to make, even for me, but for some reason it fit.
“It’s alright,” I murmured, “I’m not the best around people.”
A light chuckle escaped her lips, unconsciously relaxing my shoulders. I barely knew this girl, and she was already having such a strange effect on me.
“Don’t worry, I won’t bite,” she reassured me, “I don’t consider myself much of a social butterfly either.”
Despite my better judgement, perhaps out of a sense of obligation or gratitude, I sat down next to her, and got my lunch out.
Over the next several minutes, neither of us said a word. I was beginning to see what she was downplaying with that last sentence. She certainly seemed a tad soft-spoken, and the fact she was eating over here meant she likely didn’t have any good friends at school. I didn’t want to admit it, but the idea that she didn’t speak to others made me secretly hopeful. It wasn’t out of some strange attraction to her, to be clear, but the less interaction she had with others, the less likely she was aware of my reputation. Even if I had no plans to befriend her, it would be nice if the one other person who wanted to populate my lunch bench was someone who didn’t care who I was. However, that made me curious as to why she picked this spot to begin with.
“Say,” I spoke up, feeling her startled response, “Why did you decide to sit over here? There are many more areas on campus that would make better seats.”
After a moment to calm down, she began to explain.
“You seem pretty quiet.”
“Excuse me?”
“I don’t like loud noise,” she elaborated, “If I come over here, there isn’t much in the way of ambient noise, and you don’t seem like someone who would talk too much to me.”
“Would you prefer I didn’t?” I clarified.
She shook her head in response.
“It’s not that I mind if we talk for a bit, here and there,” she explained, “But you’re not going to talk my ear off for the entire lunch session.”
“Damn right,” I murmured.
Once again, all conversation ceased there. Strangely, I had an active desire to avoid upsetting her too much by talking, even though I didn’t really have any reason for it.
It wasn’t until a few minutes before the end of the lunch period that she continued our conversation from earlier.
“I don’t think we’ve been introduced yet,” she brought up.
She turned to me and looked me directly in the eyes, before sticking out her hand.
“I’m Iris Etheran.”
Eyebrows raised slightly in surprise, I took her hand.
“Retter Hanson,” I said in kind.
After a quick shake, we let go and began to pack our bags.
“Do you mind if I come back tomorrow?” she asked me.
“No, not particularly,” I responded without thinking, “But aren’t you scared of me?”
She tilted her head in confusion.
“Why would I be?”
I didn’t say anything, but pointed at my eyes. When she looked at them, I became extremely aware of how nice her eyes looked. In contrast to the scarlet I was born with, she was endowed with a soft blue that betrayed her shy nature. They were unlike any I had ever seen.
“Don’t worry,” she reassured me, “They’re definitely unusual, but you don’t seem like a bad person.”
I felt a needle in my chest at those words. I had heard that phrase spoken almost verbatim by Cap earlier. However, unlike Cap, I immediately trusted them coming from her. It could have been because of my past with Cap, or simply that a pretty girl was the one telling me, but I had no reason to doubt her.
“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then,” I commented, beginning to depart.
She nodded, also ready to head to her class. As I walked back, I began to wonder why I had opened up so much to her, but before that train of thought could go anywhere I had reached my classroom.
All I knew was that it was beginning to seem like she was going to be the second person to find a place in my world.