Behind My Mask

So far I have been to 6 different schools, yet each time I was anxious whenever I had to enter a new building. I always put up a mask and pretend to be someone who I am not; I have been told countless times to be myself and that people will like me for who I am, but that is just bullshit from my perspective. I tried this way of thinking once, but all it did was make my mental condition worse and destroy whatever I had of a social life; I am not prepared to go through this kind of tragedy twice. As they say ‘’Learn from your mistakes’’.

I was always lucky enough to get another chance; whenever I fucked up it was already time for me to switch schools and start anew, but I never got a good outcome; I always ended up being the outcast, the freak, and the one kid that no one wants to talk to. The only thing that I didn’t understand was why; I don’t remember doing anything out of the ordinary; maybe it was just the way I dressed, or they sensed my gaydar.

Here I am again, going through an empty hallway of yet another new school. I was ‘fashionably’ late, as some might say. Each new school that I went to the layout was different, yet the reception strangely always seemed to be in a similar place. I don’t really know if that is just a coincidence or if it is like that in every school, but at least it saved me the trouble of searching the whole school.
While stalking through the hallways I had managed a few glances in some of the class rooms; the layout of each classroom seemed almost identical, which didn’t surprise me. It was always the same no matter where I went.
I was starting to get slightly more anxious as I approached the reception, but at the same time I was bored; every scenario was the same and nothing ever changed in my life, despite the fact that I was moving my location every few months due to my dad’s work. There wasn’t anything that intrigued me anymore, and I like to keep it that way.

The reception lady glanced at me from her computer as I approached. Her narrow eyes were looking me up and down, already judging me without me speaking a word. She seemed to be expecting me to say something as she was only staring at me.
“Kellin Quinn” I said in a monotone, but she didn’t move as much of an inch, she just kept staring at me, expecting me to explain why I was in her presence.
‘God, was she dropped on her head as a baby?’ I thought to myself.
‘’The new kid’’ I added. This finally seemed to make her stop staring and start shuffling through papers
“Ah yes” every action she did just seemed to make me more irritated, it was instant hate from first sight.
“Here is your time table and a map in case you will be needing one”
‘Of course I will need one, do you think I will fucking miraculously guess where all of my classes are’ I thought to myself, while at the same time inwardly grimacing at her annoying voice. I badly wanted to say those words, but being the indifferent bastard that I am I merely said “thanks” and left her office as soon as I had a hold of the pieces of paper.
I scanned through all of my lessons for today; 1st was English, 2nd was History, 3rd was Maths and 4th was Music. I loathed maths and history, it wasn’t that I was bad at the subjects; it was just that they bored me out of my mind.
I checked the room I was supposed to be in now and checked the map, quickly finding my way to the classroom; entering as casually as I always did.
All eyes were instantly on me, and I couldn’t say that I enjoyed or hated it; I simply didn’t give a shit.
“And you are?” the teacher asked me in a suspicious way. There was instant mutual hate and it was very obvious to both me and the teacher; I never really had good relationships with my teachers, except for some that shared similar interest with me, such as music or art.
“New student” I said, thinking that every teacher in this school must be morons.
“Kellin Quinn, am I right?” he asked in a snobbish tone, it was obvious he thought himself higher than everyone else, and that was one of the things that I hated about people.
Many sarcastic comments were running through my head, but I didn’t care enough to say any of them which would only get me in trouble.
I nodded my head and just hoped he wouldn’t ask me to introduce myself, but of course he did, just the same as everywhere else.
“I’m Kellin, I’m from Michigan and I’m 15” I said simply, not willing to give out more than the basic information about myself to people who I will probably never speak to.
The teacher then motioned for me to go and sit down to the only available seat, which I thanked the lord was at the back corner.

The kid I was sitting next to didn’t look too shabby; He had dark brown, almost black, hair that stopped just a few centimeters past his shoulders and dark brown eyes to go with it. I could see some tattoos peeking out from underneath his hoodie and he had a lip ring.
I felt that we would get along just fine.
He didn’t say anything to me while I sat down, just as I expected; he didn’t look like a person who liked to engage much in conversations with strangers.
A few minutes in to the lesson I felt as if I was going to fall asleep if I didn’t start doing something a bit more exciting than listening to my new English teacher ramble on about the importance of punctuation, were weren’t in pre-school god dammit, so I decided to make some small talk with the kid next to me.
“Is it always this fucking boring?” I asked him as I turned my head in his direction, making it obvious that I was directing the question towards him and not just talking to myself out loud, which I occasionally did, mind you.
“You could say that” he said shrugging, though he did look slightly amused by me. I couldn’t think of any reason why, but at least I was relieved he didn’t feel repulsed by me.
“So, what’s your name?” I asked after a few more minutes of silence. I would tell him my name, but I had already done so in front of the whole class, and I didn’t feel it was necessary for me to repeat it.
“Mike” he responded bluntly without hesitation, so I thought I might as well interrogate him a little.
“Age?”
“15”
“From?”
“San Diego” he said looking at me with the ‘are-you-serious’ look, since we were in San Diego, it was only logical to think that he was from here, you could tell just by his appearance.

“What’s with all the questions?” He finally asked before I could say anything more.
“To pass the time?” I asked back, there really was no other reason for that. I know that I am bisexual and all, and that he wasn’t bad looking or anything, he just didn’t interest me in that sort of way, and he was most likely straight anyway, so the only reason I did interrogate him was to pass time.
I gave up caring about getting friends a long time ago, so that didn’t even cross my mind.
We carried on talking through the lesson until it was only 5 minutes until the end of the lesson. He asked me if I wanted to hang out with him at lunch, to which I accepted. I had no reason to either accept or decline, but I thought that I might as well go along and see what happens. My social life might just improve a little, or I might just gain some of it.

In History I didn’t even bother listening to what the teacher had to say. I was going to talk to someone but the person who was supposed to sit next to me wasn’t there; My guess was that the kid was either off sick or just bunking, I couldn't blame them either way.

The lesson was slow and torturous, but somehow I had managed to pass time while doodling at the back of my notebook. I was grateful that my history teacher couldn't give two shits about what we were doing.

I had put away my stuff in my bag in advance and practically jumped out of my seat as the bell rung. I had no reason to rush, but I just felt that if I stayed in that classroom for much longer I might just go insane, as if I wasn’t already.
I put away the stuff I didn’t need for today anymore in my new found locker and made my way to the lunch hall. I had studied the school’s map in history so many times that I basically knew it off by heart.
On the way there I was greeted by Mike who was now walking along side me. The lunch hall was much bigger than I expected since in my previous schools they were 2 times smaller, but then again this school by itself can be considered massive.
A few steps into the hall I could already see to which table he was leading me; the people sitting around the table didn’t look too bad either, they seemed to have similar style of appearance to each other.
I was seated between him, and who I soon learned was named Tony; his arms were covered in tattoos and he also had dark brown, almost black hair. On one part of his head his hair was shaved off, and he had one thin braid. He also had fairly big plugs which I could only amaze about, but I wouldn't let that show on my face, oh no, I was as emotionless as it could get, my face almost looked as if it was engraved in a stone, or made out of porcelain, or whatever the fuck you want to call it.

There was also Jaime, who had spiky dark brown hair, and just like the other two he had a nicely tanned skin, and there was Matty who was ginger and had thick rimmed glasses. He, much like the other three and also including me, had tattoos covering his arms.
There was a vacant seat in front of me which only made me guess that someone had yet to arrive, and my suspicions were soon confirmed when another Mexican was approaching us. He sat down in the vacant seat and glanced at me and then at Mike questioningly.
“This is Kellin” Mike said introducing me to him, he didn’t say anything though, he only nodded in acknowledgment.
“Kellin, this is Vic” I could describe him as good looking, with his shoulder length dark brown hair, his dreamy brown eyes and slim yet mildly muscular figure, but everyone, with the exception of me, on this table were good looking.
There was some small talk going on the table with 3 different conversations going on at the same time. I wasn’t really participating in any of them, only when a question was directed at me.
I was mainly observing everyone, keeping a closer eye on Vic than I probably should.
So far everything seemed to be going well for me, as long as I kept information about myself to myself it will continue to be fine; no one needs to know or will ever want to know the true me anyway.