Light draped across me as I re-entered the small house
on the ground floor of one of these endlessly identical
buildings across the city. I had only spent a small span
of minutes outside after excusing myself. Coming back, it was
the duplicate image seen as I departed and glimpsed over my
shoulder to check if anyone was watching me. No one noticed
as I joined the party once again. That was a relief.
The first group of fresh citizens was a cluster of two
girls and two boys in their upper teens. As before, they stood
silently and stared at each other. It was always like this for
many: there wasn’t much to say. I slowly slinked around them
as I observed their mildly embarrassed and terrified expressions
while they were attempting to think of something to say.
Beyond those was another group of six. That bunch
was more lively and with plenty to say.
“I’m learning to exchange conductivity squares,” one
of the three boys said to the group.
“There’s a good walkway on 4th Street and 20th
Avenue,” a chipper girl added.
“Our sky was so beautiful today,” another lad stated.
“Try some new shoes,” a girl demanded of the group,
“it helps you walk more.”
“I feel good today,” another guy said.
“Yes!! Yes-yes!” the last young woman in the small
group exclaimed, “That’s interesting!”
It made me sick to hear them. None of them were
listening, all were talking in hopes of making an impression.
Their stagnation of mind boiled black hatred from deep inside
my heart until I wanted to vomit; for all our sakes, I moved on.
Always the same, these staid and uncomfortable pairing
gatherings. No one really understood what they were doing
there. However, like all facets of society, it was expected and
normal and everyone did it because it was what everyone had
always done forever and ever.
Once a new person had become a certain age, he or she
was encouraged to pair-bond with another of the opposite sex.
Life would then be lived in communal bliss forever afterward.
There was a promise of sex. Naturally, there was sex within
bonding, but it didn’t make much sense. The act of conjoining
was just something people did, while birthing was a rare and
strange event that was miraculously bestowed on few active
pairs.
It didn’t take long for everyone to find someone they
could be with continually. Kids would begin searching through
these parties around age sixteen or seventeen and by twentytwo
there was never anyone left unpaired. Except for me. I’m
now thirty-seven and had never found a pairing partner. It’s
been decades, but I am now someone that fell through the
cracks of this world.
The promise of God--to have someone for everyone--
was dashed and destroyed by my existence in his universe. All
girls were either too bored with me, found me too strange, or
just didn’t take to my entire image before them. Now I was
twice the age of the average pairing-pool member. Even the
casual connections some find in life were not gifted on me.
Around me was a farce of a system. I was the killing joke at
the height of all events within the city, and they all laughed at
me behind my back.
This pathetic gathering had an even twenty kids. Now,
it has nineteen, including myself, since I am on the same
pairing level as these new people. Ten of each sex tried their
best to find a mate while a couple of chaperones, sagacious
folks well above one-hundred-years of age, silently looked over
the crowd inside that house.
“Red eyes! Red eyes!!” a squeaky, feminine voice
clapped into my left ear as I wandered around another group of
four, “You have red eyes!”
It was a willowy blonde girl with ample height in her
bones. She had somehow decided to glom onto me and make
me the center of her attention. It dragged me into discussion
with the small huddle.
“Obviously,” I told her, aware of my unusual feature,
“We have mirrors everywhere. It isn’t anything I don’t know.”
She had instantly annoyed me with her simple
statement of my grotesque eyes. In every way, every
dimension and detail, I was completely and blandly
unspectacular. Regardless, my irises had always been oddly
tinted since I was able to recognize their difference to all other
eyes in the city. That abnormality didn’t help me. I think it
began my slide into ambiguity, disgust, and contrarianess.
“You have red eyes!” she continued, undaunted and
pointing to my face, “You are a bad boy!”
At first I was paranoid. Perhaps she knew something
about what just happened outside the party.
“We were talking about good boys and bad boys,” the
woman continued, her body swaying and waggling flirtatiously,
“Tell me how you wear your hat!”
Her demand was niggling. I said nothing, just stared
expressionless at her and her energetic stupidity.
“Look!” she continued, donning her flat cap.
Everyone had the same hat; it was regulation clothing
for us. The front brim was short, the crown just a cylinder with
a flat top. No insignia or special markings were ever involved
in hat design. I felt it was a useless and boring article, though
I always kept it shoved in my back pocket every moment I left
the house. That hat was another appendix in this world which
declared normality and stability of emotional state--I had to
keep it with me as a precaution.
Once she put her cap on, I could only stare at her face.
Whatever point she was trying to make, it seemed pointless and
stupid to me--she merely had her hat on her head--as she stared
into my eyes with some triumphant air to her body language.
After a few seconds I realized she was a stunningly beautiful
girl with healthy and strong physique and character. My body
felt for her, desired her, but my mind wanted to punch her face
in for being a self-obsessed fool.
“Good boy!” she declared.
The girl then slowly turned her hat all the way around
until the brim faced backwards.
“Bad boy!” she told me.
I stared into her penetrating eyes. She was extremely
beautiful. All the others in our group donned their hats: the
other girl was a “good girl” while the boys, kissing up to the
girl before me, wore their hats as if they were “bad boys”.
“Show me how you wear your hat!” the girl demanded.
That inky emotional bile overflowed within my chest.
I choked back the urge to smash her nose with a forehead butt.
My anger was caged as I took my hat from my back pocket and
put it on normally.
“Aw,” she deflated, “good boy!!! I was sure--”
She cut herself short as I slowly turned the hat’s brim
toward the back. It re-inflated her with happiness.
“Bad boy! Bad boy!” she cheered me as the brim
turned, “I knew it!! Bad boy!”
Then my hand came down. On my head was a hat
turned only half-way, the brim sticking out sideways over my
right ear. I continued to stare at her, taunting her.
“w-w-WH-What are--,” she choked off words.
Everyone around stared at me. All eyes contained
a fear I loved to witness. It was the kind of reaction which
I dared not coax from people, but tonight I would indulge
myself.
“Stop it!” the pretty woman screamed at me.
I continued to stare into her eyes, a spry smile curling
the very ends of my lips.
“STOP IIIIIIIIITTTTTT!!” she screeched.
The chaperones turned their attentions to us.
Tears were rolling from the contorted faces of everyone
around me. They were so sensitive to these things.
“Help meeee!” screamed the comely girl as she
grabbed her head and staggered away from me. In her eyes
was a primal insanity I loved to see. My torment was now her
own. “Someone stop hiiiimmmmm!!!”
I merely stood straight and followed her with
unflinching expression.
Voices about the room rose in pitch as they demanded
to understand what I was doing and what was creating the
unusual row. It seemed the turbulent sensation of confusion
and fear would explode and rip the edifice to pieces.
Unfortunately for me, the girl swiftly turned once she had
reached a wall where a bowl of pills sat on top of a simple,
glass table.
Those warm lights cascading from the ornate
chandeliers inside the home seemed to me to turn grey and
cold. Everything was a disappointment. She was coping.
I slowly tucked away my hat while the girl hungrily ate
one of the many Still-Pills in that huge bowl. Several seconds
later, that unbalanced female was coming back to their version
of reality. All signs of distress faded.
“You challenged her,” a chaperone told me, her face
putting her in the upper 190s by my guess, “Tell us why you
challenged her.”
“I did not challenge her,” I lied, “I was showing her
how I wear my hat.”
The excuse didn’t work.
“Your manner was a challenge. Never challenge
people.”
I stayed quiet.
“Take a pill,” the chaperon commanded me.
I did nothing.
“We will call the stewards if you do not conform,” she
threatened.
I walked over to the table and took a pill. It was
tasteless and useless. Well, honestly, it was useless to me,
but the rest of the room relaxed at sight of me swallowing
the medicinal bon-bon. Their ridiculous assurance made that
blackness boil up within me again.
“SHE’S DEAD!” a distant voice cut through the room,
emanating from the front door.
All heads turned. It was the exasperated exclamation
of the other chaperone. While my drama was going on, he
obviously counted heads and found one missing. Seems the
overseer had found her. No one in the room expressed fear or
concern, merely waiting for further word from the older man
assigned to maintain fading dignity within the gathering.
“Purple 24-321 is dead!” he shouted to everyone,
“Outside!”
No reactions.
“She went into the nearby maintenance shed,” the
chaperone explained, “and was knocked dead by a falling box
of metal parts.”
No one reacted. I did, though.
With a curled hard raised back to my mouth, I
recoiled in horror. My acting was unnecessary, but it seemed
appropriate to me.
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