From the time T was young, they never quite seemed to fit in, despite their best efforts. All through T’s childhood they would escape the strange stares and cruel jokes by wandering into the woods near their house for hours and hours on end, but when it was time to come back to reality, T had a hard time adjusting. T’s personality grew more and more distant. School got worse as the tormenting increased. The children at school who mocked T, turned into teenagers, and then adults, but the mocking and the stares never stopped.
T tired their best to live a normal life, graduate school, get a job, meet someone and have a family. But T only got so far as to graduate school and get a job tucked away in an office where they didn’t have to communicate too much with anyone else. T liked this, but missed the fresh air and saw no other solution but to just keep going on.
Every day T came in early before the others who worked in the office arrived, and would leave after they all left–making sure T wouldn’t have to talk to anyone. But one day while T was sitting at their desk, a man came in, set up a desk of his own, and sat down to work. All day the man looked up at T, his stares turned from curious to cold as hours passed on. In the days following, the man began to talk at T that reminded T of the way the school children from their childhood used to talk at T. Mocking and jokes at T’s expense began and suddenly T found themself as the center of attention in an office where no one knew their name. The type of attention that T never wanted to have again and so T quit, left the office and drove north.
T arrived at a mountain 97 miles north of the people that ridiculed them. Finally, T was able to breathe. No one would find them and no one would try. T set up a home and lived alone for years and years.
Today, T still sits alone, content.
