Otherworldly

These are not the Aliens you're looking for.

Throbbing! The pain of folding my wings down was distracting.

Today is the first day of school, and I knew that soon they would go numb and the pain would stop. It was always hard the first day back from summer vacation. After months of walking around without restraints, going back to guarding myself heavily and hiding everything about who I am, it's actually quite depressing.

"Why don't we get to know each other." The under paid, ill educated, joke of a professor said far to cheerfully.

'Not one of these. I am here to study.'
The teacher had each student stand​ in the front of the class a spew frivolous facts about themselves. I took notes.

"How about you." she smiled far too brightly at me showing her dull, off white teeth at me.

I stood up at my seat, I would not walk to the territory of the grinning buffoon. I would stand my ground at this small metal table that I was assigned to, and let it be known that I disapproved of being shown in front of an audience like a common heifer.

"I'm Lyn." I started to sit.

"What do you like to do Lyn?" The pearly off-white flasher asked.

I straightened myself back up. "I like school. I don't like talking." With that I sat down and looked away from the not-so-smiling-teacher.

"Ok... How about you?" she finally moved on to someone else. The someone else she moved on to was Emily Wase, a perpetual thorn in my side.

"Don't mind her Mrs. Leigh, Lyn," she drew out my name like it was an insult in itself. "has 'mental issues'" she pretended to whisper to the teacher but the whole class easily heard her. One voice added an 'alien' comment in the back ground.
'Insults. Primitive. Little do they know just how alien I am. Mental issues though, how did the primates come up with that? Perhaps, simple to insult me? Like I would stoop so low.' I stared out the window instead of acknowledging or engaging.

Emily went on about herself and as she ended, an adolescent entered the classroom. He was immediately caught by Smile Bright, and made to talk about himself. I'm intrigued by the boy the moment he walks in.
A hood over his head and hands in the pockets of his hooded sweater. He faced the ground as he spoke but his voice was strong. I kept notes but my eyes never left him.

"I'm Nathaniel. I'm new to this school and this country. I'm from Liverpool." Nathaniel looked up at the teacher and for the first time I got a look at his face. Dark brow skin, brown eyes, a look of annoyance I knew my own face copied perfectly. I immediately felt a kinship with him.

"Oh England is just lovely-"

"Its cold and rainy but it's better than here" Nathaniel said to a very hurt looking serial smiler before marching off to his assigned seat. I followed him with my eyes as he put his head on his desk.

"D'awe! Lyn has a crush!" Emily said from behind me, she then grabbed my notebook. She gave it a puzzled look before recovering a moment later and declaring "Oh Nathaniel! How I love thee! Let me but kiss those lip and I'll finally feel complete." she acted as though she was reading my notes. Everyone was snickering, including Mrs. Smile Bright; it wasn't until i turned an upward brow at her that she intervened.

"Emily don't take someone else's things" she said snatching my notepad from Emily. "And Lyn you shouldn't write such personal-" she stopped taking the time to try and read my notes "what is this?"

"Icelandic" I responded having already stood and gathered my books. I then took my notebook and headed for the the door.

"Class isn't over yet!" and as Smile Bright said that the bell rang and I walked out the door.

"Hello my name is" "I like" "I don't like" it repeated itself in every class this way, until finally it was time for lunch. It took me a few minutes to finish my notes before I could actually go to lunch. The authority at the school mandated that we all eat in the cafeteria together, in order to keep a better track of all the students. I heard the cafeteria before I saw it. 'humans speak so loud.'

The tables were all full by the time I got to there, and the lunch lines were full, but I had no intention of joining in the socal ritual. I walked over to the windowed wall and looked out at the sky. I was lost in my thoughts until the bell signaled it was time to get back to the self centered statements of students and the teachers fresh from vacation.

The last class took ages to get to, as the hands of the clocks refused to move. Last class is my favorite class, Advanced Placement Calculus. One thing that doesn't change from world to world is figuring. As I entered the class I was pleased there were no bright yellow reminders or weird pictures of encouragement, only different equations built to structure and challenge the mind. A sheet of paper on the teachers desk would tell me where I was assigned to sit. There were many humans near the desk, all of them had a pained expression on their face.

'Something die?' As I approached the desk I see the source of the "pain". On the desk is a list with our names, next to each of them is an equation. I look up to the teacher for instruction but instead I find those instructions on the black board.

Find your name on the sheet. Solve your equation. Come to me, Mr. Andor, with your answer. I'll assign you your seat.

I glanced back at my equation, before heading to the teacher with my answer. The other students took notice of my quick figuring, and began to scoff. Mr. Andor was sitting in a student's desk in the very front row next to the door. The teacher looked at me with surprise when I told him the correct answer to my equation.

"You're the first to answer. I'm impressed that you solved it so fast. Back row next to the window." Mr. Andor directed before turning back to his laptop where he appeared to be doing work. I went to my seat, pulled out my homework and started taking notes over the different lengths of times it took each student to solve.

Just before the tardy bell rang Nathaniel steps in, hood over his head, hands in his sweater pockets. He walks up to the sheet, uses his own sheet of paper to figure, it takes him 309 seconds to solve, before walking over to the the teacher.

Nathaniel is the only person to solve other than myself. The teacher instructs him to sit in the seat next to me. Nathan rests his head on his desk.
Nathan is closely followed by others, who take their seats next to him. Only a few students were unable to solve their equations, they were placed at the very front of the class, so they would have better success. This irritated those in the front, little did I know that the back of the class was prime real estate for the more social beings.

Nathaniel kept his head down with his hood up for the normal first day "get to know you" games. When he was called on he answered the same as the begining of the day.

"I'm Nathaniel. I'm new to the school and the country. I'm from Liverpool." but this time he added " I don't have accent because, like most of you can do an English accent thanks the Harry Potter, I can do an American accent because I watched the Avengers." he sat down, but before he could lay his head down the teacher stopped him.
"No hoods, heads off the desks. School Rules." Nathaniel glared daggers at Mr. Andor, as he revealed a wealth of small brunette dreadlocks.

The next person began their narcissistic introduction. I took notes but my mind was on another subject entirely.

The bell rang and the school day ended. I rode the bus home, a loud and mind numbing experience.