Mitzi & Oz

Chapter 4: People Are Strange

Side A: Mitzi

When I walk into the lunchroom, there are no empty tables.

Yesterday, sitting at an empty table had felt horrible. Now, forced to have to ask a total stranger if I can sit with them, an empty table would be a blessing. At least an empty table is a blank slate. If I pick the wrong person to sit with, it would be social suicide.

I've been standing in the entry to the cafeteria for long enough that people are going to start noticing, so I take a few tentative steps inside while scanning the tables. Other options try to lure me away. I could go and eat in the bathroom, like I did that at the school where everyone called me "Ditzi Mitzi." There was one school where I ate lunch in the library, but there's a huge sign on the library door that says NO FOOD OR DRINKS (except water bottles with a cap!!!) so that's out.

Somehow Oz found a bunch of kids to sit with on that very first day. I wish I hadn't told him I wouldn't sit with him. Mostly it was because I was still reeling about him stealing my intro, but I had also judged him as a loser, the kind of person who my mom would say was "going nowhere." Little did I know - no, I actually did know, deep down - I'm the real loser.

Finally, I see an expanse of unoccupied orange table top and make a beeline for it, only to find someone sitting there. Just one someone. I slow down, giving myself time to make a judgment call. He looks normal, in his black hooded sweatshirt and expensive-looking headphones. A little closer and I recognize the ink-black hair and pale skin as the emo kid in my homeroom, the one who made fun of Oz's name yesterday. The enemy of your enemy is your friend, or something like that.

I weave through seats to the almost empty table. "Hi," I say to him, then wave until he slides his headphones off. I clear my throat when he glares up at me. "Can I sit here?"

After a moment, he unnarrows his eyes. "Oh. You're that new girl."

"Yeah. I'm Mitzi." I wave again, like a moron.

"Reece."

It takes me a second to realize that's his name. "Oh! Like the candy."

"Yeah, I have a weird name too," he mutters. "Join the club."

"Cool." I sit down, that word echoing in my head. Cool. Cool. Cool cool cool. Why am I like this?

I open my lunch bag slowly, pulling out the bento box Mom prepared for me. When I was younger, other kids at school were impressed by my neatly ordered lunch, at the sandwich rolls and the fruit cut into stars and the hotdog octopi. In high school it's the total opposite. I can feel Reece watching me. Looking at the box, watching me pull out my chopsticks. He wants to ask a question. He wants to ask if I'm part Asian or if my mom is Asian or if I'm so rich we have a personal chef who is Asian or if I'm one of those weird anime kids. I wonder if Reece is one of those weird anime kids.