The Butterfly Effect

The bell rings for lunch, faces and eyes smile with happiness, but on the contrary, I am the exact opposite. Never have I been much of a people person because of my lack of social skills. The outcast, it’s more of an understatement when it comes to me. I’m much too small for my grade, shy, and my uncontrollable emotions lead me further into a labyrinth of being a social butterfly. I’ve had friends, but they don’t last quite long; we’re always much too different. Lunch, an hour where I'm mocked with the only thing I want but can’t have, as if class isn’t more than enough. It would be nice, I mean to finally find someone who I could relate to, but that’s a vague and stupid hope. Much of my middle school years were spent on the constant hope and wishing on a star at night that I’d find someone who’d accept me without trying to rearrange me. I’ve gotten nowhere.

“Autumn?”

I turn, “You’re Autumn right?”

I nodded.

“I'm the chick from the morning, the office, you know? Well my name’s Izzy, want to come sit with me for lunch? I know what it’s like being the new kid.”

I'm not so sure why she added the last part, did she think by adding the “new kid” thing would make her more relatable? It didn’t. But still I nodded, meeting new people couldn’t kill me, right?

We walked over to a lunch table with five or so others. She smiled but their eyes hit me first, some with curiosity, and one with envy? Well, talk about feeling the love at first sight.

“Hey guys, this is Autumn. This is Tony, Chloe, Grace, Joey, and Xavier.” They all waved, all except Grace, what irony. Xavier, that name ran circles in my head, pictures of a little boy in
blue overalls and dirt on his face popped into my head. I frowned.

“So where’d you move from?”

“Oregon.”

Xavier’s ears just but twisted in our direction; however, he refused to look in our direction. I blinked it away.

“I heard it’s really pretty over there.”

I nodded and stared at what I assumed would be classified as lunch food where I saw it as goo aliens trying to resurrect, trying. “Yeah, it’s really foresty up there but I like it here better.” It wasn’t a complete lie, I do like it here better…but it’s too early for me to say anything for sure…

Much of lunch was everyone interrogating me; Grace was the same as Xavier, treating me as if I carried the black plague on my back. I made sure it wouldn’t bother me, well tried. My hardest task: amending my mentality to ignore their stares, Grace’s was of anger, and maybe even envy. As for Xavier, his stare is so icy cold; us being in the same building makes a chill rape my spine. I’ve done nothing, not even made eye contact long enough to injure them in any way possible, which is what boggles my mind most. I will not lie, but in an additional sense, a part of me aches internally from it. I’m used to being blamed for something I can take no credit to, regardless of that, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t hurt.

I walked over with Izzy, Grace, Joey, and Xavier. They talked about something that happened Saturday; a party of some sort, I wouldn’t know, I couldn’t pay much attention. They walked in pairs, or sometimes shifted into lines of all four, but I stayed in the back, always. Going unnoticed, whether it make no sense, was my greatest defense.

Never have I been the girl to cause a scene or step into a fight to defend myself or what was right, it simply
wasn’t who I am. It never had been.

I ignored where everyone else sat and traveled all the way to the back. Staring at the board; the class was reading The Invisible Man, I read that book back in the eighth grade. They all came to sit around me, which shocked me; I wouldn’t have expected them to even notice that I was in the same building as them. They were too busy living in their own worlds, and I can’t blame them. A girl stood in front of our desks and I looked up at her with a dead expression. Let the fun begin.

“Get out of our seats.”

“Oh drop dead Valerie.”

“Shove it Izzy-smells.”

The girl looked back at me, “so move it new girl.”

I sat there as quiet as could be, I couldn’t even hear my own heartbeat despite the fact that it was thumping in my throat and fingertips. I got ready to stand up and grab my thing when Xavier put his arm across my body, “back the hell off Valerie,” he said in a tone that scared even me.

She snickered and walked away. I looked to Xavier wide-eyed and whispered a simple “thanks”.
He turned around quickly and made no acknowledgement of my gratitude towards him, but come to think of it, he probably didn’t even hear me. I pulled out a notebook and watched my hand scribble down every note freshly written on the board while my mind flew away.

Everything came back to me at once; I had my best attempt to push it away, a stupid attempt at that. I never win against my memory. Especially not memories of someone I cared of very much.

“Do it again Raine.”

I smiled at him and faced my scooped palm upwards, a ball of fire emerging in my hand and I’d throw it into the
sandbox, making little dancers of smoke rise up. He clapped with bewilderment.

“How do you do that?”

“Can’t you?”

He shook his head, a few leaves falling out from the earlier jumping into heaps of leaves.

“Oh,” I thought everyone else could do what I can… “It’s cause girls are better.”

“Nu-uh, girls have cooties!” He started to run away.

“Boys have cooties, ewww!” I tried to retaliate but he continued to run away. I ran the opposite direction and hid behind a tree. Girls did not have cooties! My blood boiled and I started to notice the smoke coming from between my palms hugging the bark. I pulled back quickly, staring at the little hands engraved into the wood. My little hands…

I lean back against the chair, fighting away the images of my best friend, the only one I’d ever been close enough to show them my secret. One of the only people that ever meant anything to me, and I’d lost them. I’d never done anything to them, but he abandoned me.

I pulled out the little black sketchbook from my backpack with a charcoal pencil and started to outline the memory. When I finished the shading, I see the figures come to life on the paper. I almost want them to speak to me. I saw Xavier’s eyes glance to my drawing a few times but shrug him off.

“What a nice drawing Ms. Winchester, perhaps you’re much too advanced to even pay attention.”

I made no comment.

“Ms. Winchester, have you ever read The Invisible Man?”

“Yes, in the eighth grade.” My voice was barely audible.

“And if I were to quiz you right now you’d pass it with flying colours?”

“I’d make no promises, but yes.”

He handed me three pieces of paper stapled together. “This is the test on the whole book, the test everyone else her would be taking in the end of November.”

I stared at the test, the first questions are on the moral and order; it couldn’t be that hard. He walked back to his desk and I took on his dare.

At the end of class, I walked up to his desk and placed the papers in his hand. I saw his eyes open more as the flipped the pages over from the edges of my black-rimmed glasses.

They all waited for me outside, “Did you really read that book in eighth grade?” I ready myself for the same questions. Once again, I’m the only one who skipped into a grade far enough to leave many jaw-dropped. And despite my situation, it’s not always the best of things. I don’t expect them to believe me, even though it’d be nice, I don’t necessarily fit the “genius” or “prodigy” profile. I keep my eyes low; meeting their gazes would push me further away into the little crawl space of my comfort zone

I nodded and walked over to my locker as if it was nothing.

“And how old are you now?”

“Fifteen going on sixteen,” I said quietly, hoping they wouldn’t hear, but by the looks on their faces, they surely
did.

“You’re just like Xavier, except he just turned seventeen.”

“And how old are you guys?”

“Eighteen almost nineteen,” they said in unison.

Oh. I walked over to my locker and shoved in my books. One last class to go. I looked at the amulet on my
neck, a purple cylindrical stone with a pointed edge at the bottom and a silver head to keep it together; my mother’s gift from my thirteenth birthday, along with a black hooded cape.

I clutch another notebook and shove it into my purple and black messenger bag, I turn around and they still stared at me wide-eyed. “Is it so hard to believe I'm only fifteen?”

Izzy leans against Joey and speaks softly, “You’re fifteen and you’re a senior, you should be a sophomore or a freshman.”

“I’d be a sophomore, but no, I skipped two grades.” I looked down at the ground, four pairs of eyes stared at my little mini figure, not to mention the stares of those who passed on by. Too many eyes all at once—I clench my hands and I could feel them grow warm, no warm is an understatement, they grew sneeringly hot.

“Come on guys, or you’ll be late again, I’ll walk to you class Autumn.” The sound of his voice immediately cooled down my hands. I stare at him, hiding it, where had this come from? There’d only been one person that could do that, and it surely wasn’t him.

Right?

Nevertheless, my hands were still hot to the touch, compared to anyone else’s body heat, so I cram them into the front pocket of my hoodie. He walks beside me; I dare enough to look up at him. His features are godly. He looks at me from the corners of his eyes and I fire my gaze to the floor, insisting I watch my feet move. I feel my cheeks burn up quickly, pulling my hands from my pocket, confirming they were cool once again when my cheeks were warmer.

Regardless of how overjoyed I am that I don’t need to hide my hands for another half an hour until I can get to water, my hands never cool down, not this quick, especially not without something cold to quench them. And usually when I'm not alone in this situation, my hands grow hotter, exceeding to the point where I must flee the class to the nearest bathroom.

But not this time…