Being Normal
The star football player scores the final point.
The crazed crowd creates a chaotic crush.
He receives nearly straight A’s. He can talk to everybody. Other guys, girls, teachers, parents, faculty, and all are happily smothered with his charm.
Everyone but two.
The musician prodigy can play on any instrument at any moment.
Personality placid and poised, but at the same time paramount, shows in his music whenever he plays.
He has no stage fright. Everyone is reassured by his easy-going personality and his relaxing words to be surprised when he plays.
Everyone but two.
The dancer floats down the stage after a breathtaking performance.
Her hair is always elegant and shining, never a hair out of place.
She never trips, never falls. Always one of the most graceful girls in the hall. She flows from class to class, her clique trailing after her. Everyone wishes they were in her clique.
Everyone but two.
Look closer, in the corner of the hall. There is a boy sitting there, carefully transcribing something, pen flying across the page.
Look closer.
He has a green and white plaid button-up shirt, stained around the bulging pocket protector. Others are frightened by the antique 1950’s glasses, and the thickness of the glass.
He scribbles more, and something dark catches your eyes. A black brace on his wrist.
Look closer, as something clatters on the ground.
An old calculator, dented and scratched, buttons old and cracking, paint peeling off of it.
The faded posters on the walls and the calculator have both lived long past the prime of their days.
The bell rings for the first class of the day.
The boy stands up to his short height, pushes up his glasses on his nose and watches the people in front of him.
Everyone avoids him.
They might be scared of his bowl haircut.
Scared of his hand stained with different colors of ink.
Scared of his face filled with pimples.
Scared of his stack of textbooks.
A boy with broad shoulders catches his eyes first.
It’s the star football player.
He bumps into our four-eyed friend purposely, withholding an unkind snicker as his glasses fly in the air, and his heavy books plummet to the ground with a bang.
The football player’s friends murmur, “He looks like a 80’s yearbook photo gone wrong.”
Look closer.
A name flutters on one of the papers.
James Robert Johnson, next to a proudly scribbled ‘IV’
His imperfect eyes search wildly for his glasses.
He finds them close by. With shaking hands, he picks up his papers.
His eyes find the football player in the distance.
The football player and his friends shove each other around, laughing and teasing each other.
His shoulders solemnly slump as he sadly wishes, ‘I wish I could be like them. With friends surrounding me, laughing all the time…’
He glances at his watch when he finally has all his papers arranged neatly in a stack.
He scurries down the hall to his class, just barely entering the classroom as the bell rings.
Look closer, down the hall.
A girl dressed in black, carrying a stack of worn thick notebooks slowly walks down the hall. Her black hoodie is enveloping her barely showing face, hiding her from others.
The hood is pulled down low, her hair covering most of her face.
The unnatural, almost unpleasant hair is the only thing you can see, eyes being drawn to it.
She looks like a Yin-Yang symbol, with white and black mingling together.
Look closer.
Her pale face is covered with small scars, making her pasty face even whiter.
She has on dark, depressing, thick makeup.
She looks like she came from an old black and white photo.
She slowly walks into a class.
“Eleanor Nez,” the teacher says, “take off your hood.”
Meekly, Eleanor obeys.
As she grasps the hem of the hood, her sleeve falls down partially.
On her arm are long white scars, surrounded with hate-filled words. It falls back down as she sits down.
In class she is quiet. Never saying a word.
Her classmates tease taunting words to her terrified face, tormenting her terrific drawings.
She walks in the halls alone, watching the musician and his friends. Watching the dancer and her clique.
Look closer.
Eleanor wants to be like them, but knows she won’t be accepted.
She is only accepted at home, with her younger baby brother and her older sister.
She looks forward to be at home, without any ruthless torment.
Her little brother squeals as she walks into her small living room after school.
As only infants can do and look adorable, he impatiently reaches his chubby hands in the air for Eleanor, and her face lights up as she sees him.
Slipping off her backpack, she picks him up, talking to him about her ideas no one else will listen to. Paitently, he listens.
At dinner, Eleanor quietly talks to her older sister.
She asks, “Am I normal?”
Her sister kindly replies, “What’s normal?
Eleanor, it doesn’t matter if you seem weird or not.
It matters if you are a good person.”
Eleanor ponders these kind words.
Look closer.
James Robert Johnson IV is at home with his mother and father.
“Father,” he asks, “am I odd?”
His parents are paralyzed with pondering precariousness.
His father turns towards him.
“You are a good person, James. And that’s all that matters.”
Eleanor knows that each person has the ability to be a good person, even though they may make unwise decisions.
She does not envy the dancer, nor the musician.
She knows that everybody envies them.
Everybody but two.
They look closer.