Halo Of Fire: An Angel In Trouble

Lunch is Served

As I distracted myself with the binder the principal had handed me, someone walked into the office. I didn't take much notice of them because I was trying to read one of the rules and I didn't want to be rude, but my head snapped up when I heard the person say, "Hi Tara, I'm here for the new kid."

Looking at the back of the person I noticed that though they were wearing the same burgundy pleated skirt I had just gotten that morning from the delivery guy, they were not wearing the "school appropriate" shoes detailed in the manual. They were wearing a pair of black shoes that would have looked very similar to mine if it wasn't for the three-inch high platform and the laces that made them look like a short boot.

I stood up, "That's me." I said with a small voice.

The redhead behind the desk stood and smiled, pointing with her hand at me, "Jordan, this is Angel Grigori, she's the new transferee."

Jordan turned around to give me a good look. "I see you took advantage of the 'girls can wear pants' policy. Hi, I'm Jordan, my pronouns are they/them. You can call me Jordan or Jay." The aura they emanated was curious and interested shining with deep purples.

They had coal-black hair and hazel eyes, with a delineated but strong facial structure. They were tall and had delicate features but at the same time, they didn't look delicate at all. I was both strangely put off by their uncommon appearance and attracted to them at the same time. As I was experiencing this cognitive dissonance, I found myself inadvertently trying to identify whether or not they were a girl or a boy. When I finally noticed what I was doing I recognized my mistake and scolded myself. 

Though I knew it wasn't right to excuse it, I mentally did with the excuse that it was because I'd never met someone like them before in my small hometown but vowed to be more mindful. Then I tried my best to concentrate on the conversation at hand, "It's nice to meet you. I apologize in advance if I ever mess up your pronouns."

They gave me a big toothy grin, "I appreciate you for doing the best you can. Shall we go to lunch?" I nodded my head and followed them out of the office. "So, tell me about yourself."

"Um, well. I'm from a small town in Pennsylvania and I have no idea what I want to do when I graduate."

"That doesn't really tell me much about yourself. Does it? What do your parents do?"

I was silent for a moment, attempting to ponder how to answer that question without outing myself as an orphan, "I actually live with my aunt. She works for some fancy company running the IT department. I don't actually understand it to be honest."

"Oh, that's cool. My parents are doctors, but I want to be a lawyer." Jordan winked at me.

"That's cool, are they proud of you?"

They shrugged, "I guess they'd be happier if I'd follow in their footsteps but yea. Oh here we are." Jordan pushed a set of double doors that opened to a big lunch hall. Students were starting to trickle into the room.

"I didn't hear the bell go off or see any students in the hall..."

"Oh, there are different ways to get to the hall. I'll show you at some point."

"M'kay."

We got in line to get our food, then Jay directed us towards a table. There were two guys and a girl sitting at the table and they were chatting affably. "Everyone, this is Angel, the new transfer student. She's my problem for the day." Jay winked at me in a teasing manner and I smiled at the group.

"Hello."

Everyone turned to look at me and I felt like I was being seized up. "Hi." They said in unison, like robots. Their auras seemed lifeless and emanated dull gray colors. I wondered if they were ok, but I smiled like nothing was wrong and sat with them.

"I'm Ophelia." She was shorter than everyone sitting at the table. She had long dark hair and tan skin that highlighted her doe-like brown eyes and wide nose. She was really pretty.

"Hi, I'm Bastien." The guy to the right of Ophelia said with a smile that made his strong jawline more prominent. The crow's feet appearing at the side of his wide-set eyes made me believe he was being genuine which put me at ease. His pale complexion contrasted with his short black hair and the burgundy football jersey he was wearing. Everything was burgundy, white, and gold here.

The third guy had green eyes and bright purple hair-which was all I could fixate on after noticing it. "Edward." He said, somewhat uninterested.

"It's nice to meet you," I said. "Uhm, I like your hair."

"Thanks. I have an appointment with detention later. Turns out it's against school policy." He rolled his eyes. "But I was feeling kind of blah, so I thought it would look cool."

I nodded, "It does."

The conversation that occurred after the initial introductions had something to do with a certain Mr. O'Connor's literature class. I was grateful they didn't ask me about myself because I wasn't feeling in the mood of sharing. My interaction meter was already on low. 

"I'm having a terribly hard time paying attention to what he says, he's too yummy," Ophelia said while stuffing a forkful of lettuce in her mouth.

"They really shouldn't be hiring such young professors. It makes it hard to pay attention with all those hormones flying in the air." Edward replied cutting into his slice of pizza.

"Can you share your notes?" Ophelia asked Bastien.

Bastien shrugged, "It depends, will you pay me?"

"Your parents literally run half of the banks in Manhattan." She replied with a frustrated roll of the eyes.

Bastien shrugged and chewed his pizza. "Don't know how to help you then." He drawled in a teasing manner. She rolled her eyes, her aura adding to its dull gray streaks of black. 

After lunch, Jordan walked me to my next class and wished me a good day. They offered to meet with me in the afternoon to take me to the counseling office for my extracurricular activities, and then I watched as they walked away in their skirt that definitely looked better on them than it would ever look on me.

Hello reader! I've been doing some research on how to write Non-binary individuals and I'm definitely nowhere near being as educated as I probably could be. So I'd love some thoughts on my description of Jordan. Do you think I did a good enough job at it? Where could I improve?

I reckon that as a small-town girl, who grew up in Italy, the first time I met a non-binary person in the flesh in my early 20's I was a little taken aback by how I felt about them, so I tried to explain the "I think I'm into you, but I'm also not" feeling as best I could without being offensive. I hope I did an ok job at it and please advise if I didn't. I'd greatly appreciate any input. Again, no offense is intended in my descriptions at all.

Thank you! Veronique