The School of Shame

That's what they call it. To be honest with you, it's pretty truthful. And not to mention it has a nice/nasty ring to it. See, this 'nickname' is one of those that will be with you for years. You might forget about it, but if someone mentions it you immediately recognise its significance. Memories come flooding back and you go on to discuss it with whoever said the name. It's a special name.

A name that will be in the back of your mind, ready to lurk out from the shadows whenever it feels you will remember it. It's a truthful, dangerous name that will be engraved into your very existence.

No, probably not. But sure as hell might as well.

The School of Shame

Its name echoed throughout my mind as the wheels of the car carried me down the road. Bits of rocks flew up and pounded against my window. They then would be carried away by the wind, and find it's new home before the weather turned nasty and travelled it to another environment.

Drops of rain blurred my vision from the world outside the moving vehicle. I could make out the looming trees on the sidelines of the roads, like flags on the lines of a soccer field. They blew in the rhythm of the wind, and tried to cover themselves from the lasting effect of the four-hour rain.

The soil beneath its feet tumbled and turned and dashed away from the water coming from the sky. They were confused, why were these weird creatures trying to destroy them? What kind of agenda would someone have to wipe out soil? And, what were they? Questions floated above the soil, as their scattered brains attempted to focus on dodging the spit.

The rain itself was produced from gigantic oval-shaped fluffy smoothies from the shadow-like sky. They blocked the sky from shining its natural baby-blue colour, so that the rain could stop and the sun could light up the features in nature, instead of making them victims of the spit. I could hear it.

Pit-pat-pit-pat-pit-pat as it hit the metal of the car.

There were very few cars that passed us that trip. All I saw was silver Mazda with a stern-looking woman as the driver and a carriage being carried by nut-brown horses. There had been four little children inside of it. One had glanced at me, with his strawberry-coloured eyes, and had smiled broadly.

Strawberry-coloured eyes.

A prey of the shame. He was going to live a hard life, that one. A cruel, tortuous life that would haunt his dreams and make him a servant of the shame. He would be labelled as 'Shame' for the rest of his life, just because he was naturally born with strawberry-coloured eyes.

And yet as he had looked at me, he had still smiled. I had a feeling he already knew his fate, even though he was no more than seven. The 'Shame' grew up fast, as soon as they were born; they were treated like scavenges.

He had probably been coming from the School of Shame. As soon as we were born, we were forced to work as servants of the Unshame. As an infant we were put in separate playrooms as the Unshame, and as we reached our toddler years, we would be mogged and pointed at by the spoilt rich kids in the other room. And at five, we would be assigned to a master. We would be worked till our hands were bleeding and our last oxygen was caught in our throat and our heads were aching at the labour and our feet were blistered and scarred.

And by the time we reached fifteen, we would be booted into the School of Shame.

And we would be disciplined, rocked hard by the labour, and be taught how to respect the Unshame and how to an address them.

Our fate as we reached eighteen would be decided by the Unshame, depending on how disciplined you were and how dangerous your eyes were.

The boy had some luck; strawberry-coloured eyes were the least-dangerous of the five coloured eyes of the Shame.

Me, I had no such luck.

And the boy had known it. So he had looked at me, and smiled. A connection passed through us like electricity in power-lines. He had been sending me a 'good luck' smile that pointed out the world was not as cruel as I predicted.