[Original Novel] Pariah of the Little People, Part 9

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It was a relief when the assembly let out, mainly as I was in desperate need of fresh air. Tyler was there too, looking as invigorated by the display as the rest. I didn’t get as much out of it. But then I don’t think I’m the intended audience. “Wasn’t that cool? God hasn’t left us defenseless against sin but equipped us with armor!”

I shrugged, but he didn’t seem deterred. “It really gives me hope that I can change. You know? That I can learn to be the me that God wants me to be.” I furrowed my brow. “I like you how you are” I said. “If God wanted you to be different I’m sure you would’ve been born like that in the first place.”

He vigorously denied it. “The story of Job shows that sometimes God sends us troubles as an opportunity to show our devotion by overcoming them.” The way he said it sounded halfway logical, if you bought into a whole mess of strange axioms first. My heart sank a little as I listened. They’d really gotten to him long before I arrived. Got him believing that he’s the messed up one.

Another surprise awaited me after lunch. As I headed out for recess there was a white bus with the school’s logo on the side that sharply dressed faculty funneled us into. The excess rode in a similarly painted van that followed behind. As I searched for seating I spied an empty spot next to Heather, who grimaced as I approached. “Yeah I know, ew” I mumbled, and passed her by.

On my way towards the rear of the bus, something struck me in the back of the head. I turned and looked at my feet to find a wadded up banana peel from somebody’s lunch. There was faint snickering from various directions. I didn’t have the energy to be upset right then, so I sighed, turned around and resumed searching for seating.

I meant to sit next to Tyler but found that seat occupied by a faculty member in neatly ironed black slacks and a white button down shirt, glaring at me. So I wound up picking an empty seat at the very back, and was surprised when the albino girl in her matching white dress carefully deposited herself next to me, not so much as making eye contact.

For a split second, I saw a pair of piercing blue eyes framed by perfectly parted blonde hair staring over the edge of a seat near the front. They ducked out of sight the moment I noticed. I shrugged it off, then turned to the girl seated next to me. “I never got your name.” She turned to meet my gaze, then smiled and extended a delicate little hand. “Katerinka.”

I took her hand and shook it brusquely, just as my dad taught me to when making somebody’s acquaintance. She frowned and withdrew, apparently expecting something different. A high five or secret handshake, maybe. “Do you know where we’re going?” Still mildly peeved for whatever reason, she took her sweet time to answer.

“Da. Is planetarium. We sign little paper about it, do you not remember?” There’d been something they sent home with the God vs. Evolution DVD we were meant to sign and bring back so I did, but I’d never looked closely at it. Still, a planetarium! Finally I thought, we might actually learn something.

When we arrived, at once something seemed off. The planetarium itself was an unexpectedly small building in the distance, surrounded by carefully manicured gardens amidst a sparse but picturesque forest. As the faculty filed us off the bus I noticed various monuments along the pathway to the structure bearing reliefs of creation events from Genesis. Strange decorations for a planetarium.

Each was mounted within a frame of what were meant to look like naturally occurring stones, but which I discovered to be stagecraft style plexiglass when I touched one. “Look with your eyes”, the white shirted man scolded. Plastic vines draped over each monument giving them a sort of high fantasy aesthetic. Felt like a theme park attraction.

That feeling only intensified as we continued. The landscaping resembled a Disney forest, abundant grassy meadows sculpted to frame manmade ponds, electric pumps driving various small waterfalls. As we passed a sign with information for visitors, I heard a scratchy, drive-thru style electronic voice.

“As you explore the gardens, open your heart to sensing God’s presence in nature, and bear witness to the evidence of his craftsmanship in all living things.” It went on like that but we were soon too far past to make it out.

Up ahead there were various prop buildings, designed in the style of quaint old timey cottages and even a little schoolhouse. Quite like walking through a Thomas Kincaide painting. If you looked closely at the windows, the walls were bare plywood inside. Just what’s necessary to create a certain impression.

We passed another, grander waterfall which was really just an unusually large plexiglass fountain embedded in a hillside. It made me wonder how much of the landscape itself was real. Who’s the target audience for this sort of thing? It felt cheap, tacky and awkward to me. The whole grounds smelled mildly of styrofoam and glue.

I kept absentmindedly brushing my arms as if to wipe off the essence of it. A regular forest is beautiful enough, and would be an improvement over all this. The most spiritual I’ve ever felt was out in the old forest before it burnt down. To reject what they believe God made, instead reshaping it to conform to a childlike conception of how nature should look seemed unabashedly perverse.

Then came something genuinely beautiful. Until I looked closer, a pattern that would define my experience here. To one side of the path lay a rose garden more elaborate, over the top and colorful than I’ve ever seen. The old man misting the roses greeted the white shirted fellow leading us. Apparently they know one another.

“Charles. Keeping the roses red, I see.” The old man chuckled and sang a few bars from that Alice in Wonderland song before returning the greeting. “I spy some new youngsters! Training them up in Christ, as ever.” They shook hands warmly.

I chose then to compliment his roses. I was given a stern look by our handler for speaking without invitation but “Charles” waved him off, delighted by his new admirer. “The trick is in the preservatives.” He waved the spray bottle around a bit.

“When they are at the most beautiful stage in their bloom, I spray on a coating which keeps them that way as long as possible. Shortens the overall lifespan of the plant, but then, they are most pleasing this way.” He finished spraying the row of roses, the leaves of which I now noticed were browning slightly.

I felt an unexpected pang of pity for the blossom nearest me. The leaves subtly wilting, still alive but just barely. Of all the rotten luck to be planted in such a place, deliberately stunted to achieve a desired result.

I wished I could uproot it, smuggle it out, and plant it somewhere in the wild where it could thrive. No longer conformed to what man thinks a flower should be, instead free to be what nature decrees. I gave it a silently apologetic look over my shoulder as we were bustled along.

The entire time, Katerinka stuck to me slavishly. I dunno why, she didn’t seem to have anything to say. I asked her once why she was following me, she just stood there staring calmly back until I started walking again. Heather followed too, but at a distance. Any time I noticed, she’d look away and pretend to be minding her own business. Girls are inscrutable.

Finally, Katerinka spoke. She was silent long enough I’d begun to wonder if I dreamt what happened by the lake. “You and I. We need to talk.” I welcomed it, expecting to learn more about her. But she only wanted to talk about me. Really personal stuff I didn’t understand how she could know.

“You ask at the lake why the little ones do not hide from me, da?” I nodded, remembering the encounter. “Is simple. Something poison your heart. Not completely, but if left alone it will grow until it consume you. If you tell me what it was, this will go faster.” I blushed, and refused. “Is a girl, isn’t it” she guessed. Am I really that transparent?

I feel like there’s an additional layer of consciousness necessary for hiding my feelings that I lack. I was never able to conceal them from Jennifer either. Whatever it is I’m missing, girls have loads of it. What an ordeal it’s been to go through life emotionally naked.

“Fine. Yes, it was a girl. I know, you don’t have to tell me. It’s silly. I shouldn’t still be agonizing over it.” She rebuked me. “There, that is problem. Right there. Why? Why turn on yourself? Not enough attackings from outside? Is normal to feel this way. Let it happen, is chemical reaction. Takes time to burn out. The poison is because you hurry it, and injure yourself on top of wound already from girl. Such boy thing to do.”

I felt a lot of things at once. Slightly annoyed that she presumed to know me well enough to play armchair psychiatrist. But also intrigued. A lot of it resonated. She didn’t ask for permission to continue. “When bone breaks, can you hurry it to heal? Anything you do will just make it heal wrong or delay. Hands off, let to heal. So with your heart.”

I just kept walking, absorbing it. Envisioning her sitting at Lucy’s psychiatry booth, with the little can of nickels. “It isn’t only that, is it boy? Even so far, I see this place is no help. These people, I struggle to keep food inside stomach. Lumpenproles! A circus of baboons, an asylum run by the inmates.” I smirked. Somehow she could just openly say what she felt. “Yeah” I managed. “I’m...not cut out for this. For other people. I’ve tried, but I’m too weak.”

Again she rebuked me. “I think so too at first. Little fragile tryapka. I wonder why Babulya chose you. But then I watch you among the others, and I see. Outside is weak, yes. Needs much work. But inside is like iron kettle! You suffer in this world while they don’t because they have already let their insides grow ugly as everyone around them. You struggle to keep yours clean.”

My mouth hung open a little. I really did feel transparent to her just then. Some sort of spell? “Is plain to see if you look right” she explained, as if reading my mind. Maybe so. “That is why they let you see them”, she continued. “Clean heart. They can see into it. That you suffer much but do not grow ugly. So you will not hurt them.” She’d not yet explained how she knew, but it did line up with everything I could remember.

It only pained me worse to know that. Because I quickly worked out that it meant they’d been hiding from me out of fear. As if I could hurt them, even like this. As if I ever would. Then I remembered the battle in the field. When I raised my fists as if to flatten them. Could I really say with such certainty that they’re safe from me? Now, and for the rest of my life?

Must be what they’re wondering. I don’t fear disappointing anybody. Not any human. But I fear disappointing them. What if they’re right? Supposing they see something about me that I can’t. If so I may as well just sign that paper and slowly blend into this nightmare. Finally take my place with the rest, transformation complete. My heart recoiled.

“No. I’m not what they think. Not yet. I can still see them! Sometimes, anyway. None of the others can. They must still trust me a little bit, surely? It hurts that they would fear me. I’ve only ever protected them, how could they think I’d ever bring them harm? Help me. You know something about all this. How do I make them stop killing each other? How do I convince them I would never…”

I peered over my shoulder to see another student eavesdropping, looking equal parts disturbed and confused. Katerinka and I walked a bit faster. When we’d put some distance between ourselves and the other students, she answered.

“I came when I learned Babulya died. I find out from the little ones where you lived. Much work to find where you move to after that. But I have not come to join you back to them. If you love something, let it go, da?

They must make their own future. Much more important problem I have come to discuss. The Tyrants did not simply disappear because you win war. Some survive, then create more. If not stopped, they will spread across Earth and do what they were created for. To us all.”

I shuddered, my thoughts returning to the night one of the pale little creatures appeared at the foot of my bed. How close I’d come. And I know too well what they do with us! What they need to create new Tyrants.

I suppose I’ve always known it wasn’t over. I’d just not seen any for so long, it felt as if I could ignore the problem. Is it really selfish that I wanted to live a normal life for a while? But that was back when I had a very different notion of what this school would be like.

“So what do I do?” She began to answer, but we’d arrived at the planetarium. I zipped my own lips as well with no small degree of frustration, as now the Tyrants were all I could think about. We were directed to sit in the concentric rings of seating around the central projector, and to my surprise, Heather invited me to take the one next to her.

She was smiling, too. What to make of this? She’d never smiled at me before. “Hurry up and sit” she insisted, “the show’s gonna start soon.” My heart began to flutter, then pound as I eased into the seat and glanced over at her. Nothing seemed amiss. Why the sudden change? I then glanced to my right to find a grumpy looking Katerinka also studying Heather.

“Many places, but you still find worst seat” she whispered to me, voice dripping with scorn. I puzzled over what I’d done wrong, but soon forgot about it when the presentation began. The man who burst out onto the slightly elevated stage on the far side of the room looked to be in his forties but was dressed as if much younger, wearing neon green tennis shoes, flame print shorts and a backwards baseball cap. His shirt read “On fire for God”. I could tell I would soon wish he actually was on fire the moment he started speaking.

“Hey young people! Radical crowd today! My name’s Spanky, I run the youth group that sometimes meets here for Biblical astronomy.” I didn’t dare ask what made it Biblical but had some troubling suspicions. “I’m here to rap with you about space, our planet, and your role in God’s creation!”

To my dismay, he meant a literal rap. It was plodding, based on simple rhymes every verse and was set to an alternating drum and cymbal beat that he played over the sound system from a tape recorder. Sitting through it was grueling, and by the end I felt I’d lost years off my life.

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