Illusion

2 | Catalysis

2 | Catalysis

NO EYES SEEMED to meet her. Nobody even seemed to notice her enter the room. She shuffled to her seat, making sure to keep her head down and her limp as discreet as possible so nobody would ask. She kept to herself and sat down, waiting the assumed 2 or so minutes until Mr Greenwald, the Economics teacher would enter and start the class.

Unexpectedly, Mr Greenwald wasn't the one to walk into the room a couple of minutes later. Instead, a small, skinny man walked in. A wiry pair of glasses sat ungraciously upon his crooked nose and his straw-like hairs made Iris wince and scrunch her nose in pity. She didn't know this man, but she knew what he signified. Mr Greenwald wasn't going to be attending this class today. She knew of this temporary teacher's impending doom. He would get absolute torture from the students. She watched silently, observing him as he dawdled pitifully into the room, placing his brown briefcase on the desk.

"Good morning, students!" He called but his feeble voice couldn't be heard over the chatter bubbling around the room.

"Settle down now!" He tried once again to subdue the class.

Iris watched him sigh in defeat. She wished she could do something to help but the most she could do to help calm a crowd of rowdy teenagers was whisper 'please, be quiet' softly into their ears.

She looked into the solemn eyes of the supply teacher, her gaze penetrating deeper than the surface. Her vision began to fade and she was immediately hit with a wave of hopelessness and depression. She was sitting at a desk in a bank, and a strange man was sitting opposite. He looked important, almost regal. His face was mildly sad and somewhat uncomfortable. Like he knew of the unfortunate event but was secretly unsympathetic.

"I'm sorry, Johnathan," the man said, "but I'm going to have to let you go."

"What? No, I... I need this job, Peter. You can't just let me go... I have a family, kids! How will I look after them?" The supply, Johnathan, stuttered. He leaned forward desperately hoping his pleas would grant him second chance.

"Again, I don't know what else I can say. I can refer you to a job center; maybe I can see if any of my connections have a free placement?"

"You know what? Shove it where the sun doesn't shine. I don't want your pity," Johnathan stood up and stormed out of the office, scrambling around, maybe he could at least leave with some final shreds of dignity.

Iris was back in the classroom again. Even though the man didn't want pity, she couldn't help but feel perpetually sorry for him. She wanted to help, she really did. She knew what she could do: nothing at all. To the rest of her classmates, Iris was fairly insignificant and for the most part, this was perfectly fine by her. Now, though, she wished she had a voice.

She was slowly getting annoyed by the fact that everybody around her was being so openly rude and not really caring. Johnathan really didn't need this. He could be in bigger and better places than in a room full of rowdy teens at this lousy high school.

She wished they would just all be quiet. She was tired of just sitting and watching people patronise and take advantage of others who really shouldn't have to take their nonsense.

Even the cops that turned up at the apartment; she really didn't need to worry about them at the moment. Would they even have sympathy for her? What would they have done had they found her - a seventeen-year-old girl in an abandoned apartment with hardly any food or clothes? No matter how hard she wished it wasn't, it was their job to go to social services. With that thought, another wave of panic and hopelessness washed through her. Her head began to throb steadily as if it was readily preparing to burst at the seams - threatening to scatter all her worries and fears on the desk in front of her.