[Original Novel] Pariah of the Little People, Part 3

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A sort of mania took hold. Maximum possible humiliation, the likes of which I thought I’d finally escaped by coming here. The frail shadow of confidence I’d painstakingly rebuilt until now burst into a cloud of splinters and dust, as though struck by the shockwave from a nuclear blast. Unable to endure any more of it, I ran from the room, their chant growing fainter behind me with every frantic stride.

Why run? There’s no escape. I should know that by now. Where could I go? I’d eventually grow hungry and have to return home. Mom and Dad would then make me return to school. Anywhere else and the police would be sent to find me, with the same result. My instincts now firmly in the driver’s seat, I went someplace familiar and comfortable.

The woods proved denser and more vast than they appeared from the classroom earlier. Easy enough to get lost in, but that’s exactly what I meant to do. I nearly missed the little hole in the stone wall as I began to climb it. But even in that state, my eye for detail demanded that I look more closely. So, wiping tears away I knelt before the wall and scrutinized what I discovered to be a tiny doorway.

The door was of superb craftsmanship that I’d recognize anywhere. And as I looked, I caught a brief glimpse of a worried, suspicious face peering back at me through the inset window. Anybody else would overlook it. Indeed they must’ve, but the question remained how any little people wound up here.

Behind me I saw stirring near the front office, adults talking to one another excitedly and gesturing towards the woods. I could guess what it was about, and wasn’t in the least bit ready to return to that room. To their piercing laughter and chants. So I vaulted over the wall, and was soon deep enough in the woods that I could no longer see the school or the field.

The terror gripping me until then began to subside, replaced by a feeling of relief and momentary safety. I knew anxiety would eventually set in as I contemplated the punishment awaiting me, but just then I felt enveloped by a temporary pocket of protection and calm.

I took the opportunity to survey the damage inside, rifling through the shattered pieces, overwhelmed by the task of fitting them back together. I would never be ready to return, I decided. But I knew I’d have to.

That’s when I saw it dangling between the treetops. An odd little multi-story birdhouse, or something like it, suspended by fishing line strung between the trees. As I searched for more signs of their presence I also noticed finely crafted little doors in the bases of the trees, tucked in among their roots. Falling back on the places they knew to be relatively safe, either above or below the human eyeline.

“I knew you’d come here.” I whirled around ready to fight. But it was only Tyler, so I reluctantly lowered my fists. “Wanna know how?” He didn’t wait for me to guess. “This is also where I used to come to cry, until they figured it out. They don’t let you get away. That’s rebellion. They’re not far. If you don’t want to be found yet, follow me.”

I reflected soberly on the fact that I’d just met Tyler that morning. I had very little reason to trust him. But I did hear adult voices approaching and as he extended his hand, smiling warmly, something in his eyes disarmed me. So I took a chance. Scolding myself for it even as we ran through the trees towards the field, wondering at what point he’d suddenly turn on me. But he never did.

The tall grass, which I discovered on the way is replete with praying mantises, concealed our passage into the field where we soon came upon a weeping willow. Its dangling branches proved thick enough to obscure the hollow space behind them, and the tall grass around it compounded this effect such that it made a serviceable hideout.

We parted the willow branches, ducked inside, then shot one another a conspiratorial grin as we listened to the distant sound of adults searching fruitlessly in the woods. I thanked him. “It’s okay. I thought this might happen after the stuff you said at breakfast. But you’ve really gotta be stronger than that if you’re gonna make it here.”

I told him I’d been led to believe this place would be different. He seemed astonished. “Isn’t it much worse at secular schools?” I shook my head. “About the same. This is exactly the sort of thing I used to deal with every day.”

He gave me a knowing look, then took my hand in his as if to comfort me. “It was pretty awful for me early on, until I learned to say what they want and act how I’m supposed to.” The two of us sat there for a while in silent contemplation.

“Hey, I’m gonna duck out for a second.” He advised against it, but I insisted. “Don’t worry, I won’t let them see me. There’s something I have to check.” With that I emerged from the willow tree, surveyed the field and chose the route with the tallest grass. It was circuitous and I had to sweep clinging mantises off my pant legs a few times, but I eventually arrived at the strange wreckage I spotted earlier.

I won’t say I suspected it. But I hoped. And there it lay, the busted up remains of a sky house. Very much like the ones I saw the little folk escape the forest fire with, but with noticeable improvements. For one thing it had a set of four small, flexible solar panels of the sort campers sometimes use radiating from the main body on long, spindly wooden arms.

Now hopelessly broken of course. As I picked through the wreckage I found that they at least salvaged the batteries. The immense deflated remains of the balloon which once held it aloft lay crumpled up to one side. Fire damage to the house itself suggested it was an emergency landing, they must’ve headed for the wall and the woods from here.

That explained why they didn’t bother to bring the surviving solar panels as they’re of no use in a forest anyway. I wished I knew more but didn’t have the time to pick through the remains more thoroughly, so I dragged as much of it as I could carry back to the willow tree.

“Woah! Where’d you find that?” I told him I found it in the middle of the field. While he inspected it and muttered something about craftsmanship, I peered out through the branches to check on the progress of our pursuers. Instead it seemed recess had begun. The other students were playing football in the parking lot, swinging on the swingset, gossiping by the water fountain and so forth.

Surely the adults wouldn’t just give up? Maybe they figured we’d show ourselves eventually if it seemed safe. At any rate, we could hardly live out the rest of our lives under that tree, so after some negotiation we settled on trying to mix in with the other students. At least that way we’d elude punishment until the end of recess.

However, a different sort of punishment awaited us. The chant started back up even before I arrived on the playground, growing louder as I drew near and more of them joined in. “Look who he’s with!” a tall, thin boy with curly red hair called out. “What were you two doing out in the field?” Heather grinned. “I bet I know what they were doing. Tyler, you perv.” Baffling. What could she mean?

“They were doing it in the tree, like monkeys! Monkey boy and Tyler, monkey boy and Tyler, monkey boy and Tyler!” The redheaded boy chimed in. “That’s why they call it faggot-tree.” The playground erupted in raucous laughter and my legs began to weaken. It never takes much. My first day and I’d already ruined things somehow. Through hot, bitter tears I struggled to pinpoint where I’d taken the first wrong turn.

Then, something strange happened. Something new. Tyler boldly stood between me and the rest of them, like the lone telephone pole which is not toppled by a hurricane. “Look at yourselves. Are you Christlike? Isn’t it the meek who will inherit the Earth? You’re casting many stones, but are any of you without sin?”

Heather asked how Tyler could lecture them about sin when he likes boys. That’s when I put it together for the first time. Nobody ever explained what fag meant, I’d always taken it for a general purpose insult.

I’m ashamed to say that it sent my mind back to when he held my hand under the willow tree, and I felt mildly uncomfortable. The unfamiliar tends to. But to see Tyler throw himself to the lions for my sake quickly banished that feeling, replaced by tearful gratitude.

“You should let him speak” Heather suggested. “Don’t let a homo fight all his battles. I wanna hear him explain how human beings can come from rocks.” That got my attention, as I’m sure she knew it would. I could never leave that sort of thing alone.

“Nobody ever said we come from rocks. He might be talking about the hypothesis that precursors to organic molecules originated by mineral chemistry. But abiogenesis isn’t the same thing as evolution in the first place.”

Heather looked mildly impressed but the rest just became irritated. “That’s a lot of five dollar words. You think you know everything, don’t you. You think you’re better than everybody else.” I protested that it wasn’t rare knowledge but something anybody could look up on the internet, and advised them to do it when they got home.

“That teacher was lying to you” I insisted. “Saying crazy things and calling it evolution. I don’t know why. There’s a lot I don’t understand about this place. They told me everyone would be kinder here. So far the only one like that is Tyler. I don’t care if he likes boys. I’d trade a thousand of you for one of him.”

Not the right words, it turned out. They closed in around us. Tyler put up his fists, likely for the millionth time since he started here. I wonder if that’s how his nose got crooked. Before it could get any worse, the adults found us. I was seized by the neck and frog marched to the principal’s office, where I had a feeling I’d be spending a lot of time from now on. I didn’t see where they took Tyler.

“Twice in one day. Not promising.” Once again I sank into the swiveling leather chair as the balding, bespectacled principal stared me down with that unflinching smile of his. “I’m told that you defended evolutionism to the other students, and claimed that our faculty is a pack of liars. That’s quite serious, you realize.” I didn’t actually. Searching my memory, I couldn’t see how I’d been in the wrong, so I said as much.

The principal sighed deeply and bridged his fingers. “I’m not too upset about the evolutionism business. You’ve been brainwashed by the secular media. It’s only your first day. In time, you’ll learn better. But I’ve also heard you went out in the field for some time with Tyler. May I ask what you were doing there?” I recounted how we’d fled the woods and waited out the search under the willow tree.

“Did Tyler try to kiss or touch you at any point?” I told him we briefly held hands. Not wanting to incriminate Tyler but also not wanting to lie. I asked why that was a problem. “Son, there’s a lot you don’t understand. I still think you came to the right place, now more than ever. But you’ll have to accept that you are not in charge here. You don’t decide what’s a problem. We’ll tell you.

In Tyler’s case, it’s a sickness. But you cannot see it, because it’s a sickness of the mind. Someone with the same sickness undoubtedly came and abused him sexually when he was little, passing the condition on to him. That’s how it spreads. They get to you when you’re young and impressionable, and put wrong ideas into your head about who you should be attracted to. That’s how they increase their numbers.

In order to correct it, we need everyone around him to be unanimous in their rejection of his sin. A united front. Do you understand? If there’s anybody who tolerates it, he’ll take that as validation. It only works if he is alone in his sin and the community of his peers condemns it”

It seemed to me that in fact this school existed primarily to put wrong ideas into the heads of impressionable young people in order to increase the membership of their religion. Somebody like that teacher got to them when they were little and told them things they shouldn’t have, conditioning them to be this way. But I knew better than to say so just then.

“I don’t want to hear about any more outbursts like the one today. I also can’t let you leave here with a slap on the wrist. We recently brought someone new onboard, a child psychologist. I’d like to have you spend some time after school with him each day. You can say no, but I guarantee you won’t like the alternative.”

When he put it that way, it was a no brainer. I didn’t relish being detained after school as it cut into my alone time, which I now craved more desperately than ever. But I also had no interest in discovering what sort of creative punishments these people might devise for a troublesome naysayer.

As he droned on, I imagined the little fellows flooding into the room under the crack in the door. Standing on each others’ shoulders, climbing over one another to reach the top of the desk. Then building a protective wall around me, and swarming the principal. Biting, clawing, crawling into his ears and nostrils. “Do we have a deal?” I snapped out of it. The little ones vanished, and with them my will to resist. “Alright” I whispered, staring somberly into my lap. “I’ll do it.”

The rest of the day was less painful than I expected. There was a whispered “monkey boy” here and there, but discipline seemed better than I was used to such that they didn’t try to get away with chanting aloud in class. The first substantial improvement I’d so far noticed, perhaps the intended result of those weird comics in the textbooks.

I missed lunch, so my stomach was growling. It didn’t go unnoticed. When I returned from a trip to the bathroom, I discovered someone snuck a banana into my desk while I was gone. Tyler was there, but the look of resolute defiance I’d so admired earlier was nowhere to be seen. Instead he looked troubled and hollow. I wanted to ask him what happened by note, but as I was already teetering on the edge of suspension I elected not to.

I returned to the main office with no small degree of apprehension. While I waited, something caught my eye. A hint of color at the bottom of a nearby trashcan...in the shape of a butterfly. Peering over the rim, I confirmed it. Tyler’s Barrette! The principal must’ve dumped it here after breakfast. I pocketed the little pink bit of plastic for the time being.

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^{Stay Tuned for Part 4!}