Death, Beauty and Other Distractions. [Part One,]

Being the kind of person I am, I had always associated death with beauty. Telling people this usually resulted in them casting aspersions upon the state of my sanity. But to my mind, it was true. Beauty was subjective, and would differentiate depending on who was looking at it. Death was the same, as it was presumably different depending on who it was experiencing it. It could be peaceful and natural, or it could be harsh and painful. 1

Life, however, I had always associated with pain; persistent, stinging, seemingly unceasing, and never the same every time you were forced to go out and tolerate it.2

My life was painful, and I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t like the world I lived in- it was much too bitter and distorted for me- and I didn’t like the people I lived in it with, who were presumably the cause of the aforementioned bitterness and distortion. I was an irreligious, unapproachable, generally unpleasant person, and the fact that I all too readily acknowledged that only made it all the worse. I resentfully watched the world turn and change around me. I didn’t like change, and I made no effort to contribute whatsoever to the changing world I didn’t approve of. School, I endured everyday without complaint, as the time I spent there I used to make observations about the people that surrounded me. I noticed the way each separate person in my class related to every other, although it would be as easy for me to tell you their names as it would for me to tell you how to speak Afrikaans. It was particularly interesting to watch friendships grow and wane. I would watch, entertained, as one person would slowly grow more and more affectionate towards another, until they eventually declared themselves “best friends.” It was a peculiar phenomenon, and I observed with interest how it worked, but I had no interest in having one of my own; having watched this particular kind of relationship at work- the ties made by them were easily broken.3

As I observed people, over time I became so incredibly attuned to human nature that just by watching someone for thirty seconds, I knew their personality. Every movement they made, I could read the emotions and the motivation behind it. It was like I could read people’s minds. 4

Occasionally, people would see me watching them. Rather than doing what most people did when they were caught staring at someone- blush, look away and pretend to be looking at something else – I would merely blink and keep looking at them until they looked away from me, embarrassed. 5

I had no friends whatsoever at school, being so weird and so different to other girls my age. Occasionally, some overly helpful teacher would try to make some heinously unlucky person in my class make a pitiful and doomed attempt to be my friend. I noticed with mild amusement their expression when they found out the unfavourable task they’d been saddled with; fear, annoyance, occasionally contempt or superiority. They would fearfully walk over and say hello, and I would regretfully say hello back and then studiously ignore them until they gave up and left me alone. I didn’t say a lot, seeing as I spent so much time reading faces and body language instead of words, although what people said occasionally interested me. The kids at my school lied a lot, and it was entertaining to watch, especially when the person that was being lied to fell for it. 6

My home life was a little different. I lived entirely by myself, because my parents had left me alone when I was only young, with no siblings or family, but instead a big pile of money in a bank account, this house, and an enrolment at the private school a few streets away. I took care of myself very well, eating when I was hungry, paying the bills that came, cleaning the house when the mess began to make me feel uneasy, watching movies (the good ones were the ones where the actors portrayed their characters emotions and feelings convincingly, as opposed to generically, and there was no better judge of that sort of thing than me)and walking to the park near my house and sitting down for hours and people-watching.7

People-watching was interesting, and I found about the same amount of entertainment in it as another, more normal person would in watching a particularly good movie or TV show. I saw so many different emotions, so many different personalities, and it was like a feast for me. Sometimes I wondered how people were so complex, and yet I could still read every one of them like a book. I'd always known I was different- I'd assumed that was why my parents left me, because they could see the irregular nature of my personality and they shuddered away from it. Visually, I was average, nothing particularly beautiful or ugly about my features at all. But in my thoughts (and there were a lot of them) I was unique. I had the sort of abilities I knew my classmates would be terrified of.8

My life went past like normal for fifteen years- wake up, shower, sometimes have breakfast, get dressed for school, walk to school, stay there for a few hours, walk home, watch movies, people-watch, eat, sleep. Homework was not important to me, and my teachers had long given up on hassling me about it. 9

Then one day at school, everything changed.10

New students were forever coming to our school, and I made a habit of studiously ignoring them until I could see they'd given up on me, at which point I would treat them the same as any other person around here; guinea pigs, pointless, and free to be examined at will. 11

But then in Term 2, two new people came- friends already, as I could tell instantly by the way they interacted with each other- and they were different. Every thing they did, every way they interacted with the other people around here, showed that they were genuinely good, kind people. This was foreign to me, as I was constantly surrounded by the petty, shallow human beings that made up the very large majority (as in, about 98 percent) of the school's populace- an occupational hazard of going to a private school, I'd always assumed. 12

Of course, they were not completely different to the others. After about three days, the girl came and stood next to my locker and said, "Hello." Instinctively, I stiffened, and ignored the attempting at socialising with me. 13

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the surprise and embarrassment flash across her face, and I felt an extremely unfamiliar sense of shame assault me unexpectedly. It caught me off guard. But instead of just shrugging and walking away like all the others always did, she stood there determinedly and waited. 14

I decided she deserved some kind of reward for her persistence, particularly because she was different to all the others in her devout goodness. "Hi," I replied sharply, acid filling my tone, twisting it, making it harsh and angry. I saw her wince. Then I slammed my locker door shut and walked away from her quickly.15

What I didn't count on was her keeping stride with me and following me. "Who do you sit with at recess and lunch?" she asked, unfalteringly at my side. 16

I turned to her, creating a mask of what I hoped was irritation with a little bit of confidence on my face. "I sit by myself." I tried to keep my answers as short and succinct as possible.17

She frowned at me. "Well, that's gotta suck. Come sit with me and Andrew. Just sit with us. You don't have to say anything if you don't want to."18

Obviously very perceptive- it surprised me. 19

I shrugged and followed her to where the boy, Andrew, sat. 20

Placidly, he looked up at me. I surveyed him, but I was unable to see past his unusually beautiful features. This upset and appalled me, that I had allowed the way somebody LOOKED to keep me from seeing through their pretenses! I felt anger swell through me, but easily managed to keep it from showing on my face- I was a master at controlling my facial expressions. I forced myself to look past his beauty and found that his face conveyed nothing but peace, a complete and utter calm that created an atmosphere around him that was impossible to resist. I found myself relaxing automatically, and silently reprimanded myself- it was dangerous to let my guard down. But what annoyed me the most was that because of the calm and the peace on his face, there was nothing to read, nothing to see. He was like a blank slate, or something written in a foreign language. I didn't understand. Andrew had dark hair and olive-coloured eyes- his features were vaguely French, mixed with something else I didn't recognize. "Hello," he said, smiling at me. "What's your name?"21

"Lily," I replied, trying to make my voice non-committal and blank. The sound of it shocked me- I surely hadn't said this much in one day in months, maybe even years. 22

Andrew and the girl, whose name I now remembered was Sophie, exchanged surprised looks. I wondered what I had said wrong, or if I had communicated something with my face I hadn't meant to. 23

Sophie looked me in the eyes, and the directness of her gaze surprised me- I couldn't remember the last time I'd been looked in the eyes. It had been a very long time. "You have a very beautiful voice, Lily. You should use it more." I admired the perfect articulation of her speech, something so rarely heard these days.24

I didn't allow my embarrassment from her compliment show on my face. "Thankyou," I mumbled. I had never really listened to my voice properly before- it was melodic, flute-like and really was beautiful in its own way. I marvelled at the idea that a mere normal human being with no tangible talent could notice something I had failed to. 25

As Sophie had said, there really was no pressure to say anything when I was sitting with her and Andrew. I simply sat, listened to them speak and watched carefully. It seemed they were very very good friends,very close, completely at ease with each other, even with me around, and, fascinatingly, not the slightest bit put off by me watching them so intently.26

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