Abused and Bullied (A One Direction Fanfiction)

Chapter 12

"Have any of you got a computer I can use for a little bit?" I ask, perking up a little bit and leaning off of Liam, sitting up straight. 

"Mine is in the best condition, so mine would be best. Why do you need a computer?" Niall asks, sitting up from his place on the other couch next to Louis. 

"I'm dual enrolled with the local community college, so I'm taking college courses for free. I have an assignment in Sociology due tonight that I need to complete."

Niall stands up, walking around the couch towards the stairs. 

"I'll go and grab it; be right back." 

I nod my head, leaning back on the couch cushion.

Under a minute later, Niall jogs back down the stairs, a MacBook Pro laptop in his arms. He hands it to me and I thank him, placing it on my lap and leaning back against the cushions.

I go onto Safari and to the college website, quickly typing in my username and password, a family quote my mom used to say to me all the time before she passed. I look at our assignment page, seeing that we had to read a passage and answer some questions on it. The passage is called Body Ritual Among the Nacirema, and it's by the American Anthropologist Horace Miner.

In my daze of overanalyzing everything, I noticed something. The title is just American spelled backwards. Further going off of that viewpoint, I further continued to re-read the essay, finding that most of it completely circles back to American life. 

The shrine is the bathroom, the chest or box is a medicine cabinet, the medicine man is a doctor, the holy-mouth-men are dentists, and the mouth-rite is brushing your teeth.

"Oh!" I say out loud to myself, finally understanding everything. 

At first, I thought that we were reading this essay to understand a different culture. Now that I know that it is about Americans, all of the pieces are finally laying together. Now the location given at the beginning of the passage makes sense.

'They are a North American group living in the territory between the Canadian Cree, The Yaqui and Tarahumare of Mexico, and the Carib and Arawak of the Antilles. Little is known of their origin, although tradition states that they came from the east.'

America is located between Canada and Mexico; as for Antilles, Lesser and Greater Antilles are Cuba, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and the Cayman Islands.

I begin typing away on the computer, easily answering the questions now that I have the pivotal information that I need to understand the passage. After about thirty-or-so minutes of typing, I finally have the answers completely typed up and ready to be turned in. 

I hit 'submit' and let out a breath of relief. I click a link to look at the syllabus, seeing that we don't have any more assignments until next week. 

"Thanks, Niall," I say, leaning forwards and handing him his laptop. 

He nods his head, placing the laptop on the end-table to his right, not bothering bring it right back upstairs.

(Author's Note: You should actually read this passage. If you are in any way interested in the study of societies and might take Sociology as an elective or extra class while in college, it's worth a read, and is actually very interesting.)