"How so?"
(She smiled.) "You're blushing." That was instead of an answer.
I met her again at the Cross-Quarter's Day Festival last year. She's married now, with four children. She was carrying her youngest with her. "She's cute," I said honestly, and she asked me my name. She didn't remember me.
This happens a lot. I'm attractive enough to kiss, but not to remember. Somebody once said that I was blandly attractive; it seems about right.
So who am I?
Everybody agrees on a few details:
- That I'm male.
- That I stand somewhere between 5'2" and 6'7", definitely leaning towards the upper end of that range. Most people remember me being much taller than I am. (Since I left home, even my family has become like this; my mother always tells me to "stop slouching" at the table. In part this is because she simply dislikes me, but I think that she remembers me being taller.)
- That I wear pants and a shirt. (Which is true.)
- That I have two eyes, a nose and a mouth. (This is true too.)
In fact, I am male - but not a man. Yet. At least not according to the people who matter in my life. And I think they're right. People have told me many flattering lies about my appearance, but I've never been called "handsome." They ask my father about what his son is doing, and they ask me if I have a wife yet - but if they saw a portrait of me, I think they might hesitate for a moment or two before they guessed at the sex of the subject. Such is my nature.
I'm not sure how tall I actually am, but I think of myself as being small. Of my associates, I'm the shortest save one. I don't know why people expect me to be taller than I am, but I think it has something to do with my not being "a man."
There are a few people who don't remember me as being taller. I trust them, and I think that's why they've never said anything about my height. The rest of the world has to ask me about my height because they can't openly tell me that I'm less than what I could be.
Which is true, in more senses than you'd guess.
I'm not a weakling. I bruise easily and sunburn easier. All together, I've spent six weeks of my life under the constant care of the town's surgeons, and I don't like to swim because every time I spend a summer afternoon in the lake I catch a cold for the rest of the week. (My stepmother's uncle said that I caught colds better than I caught fish. It's true, but I don't go fishing much.)
I have weaknesses. But I'm not a weakling. I don't let the weaknesses stop me; I can grit my teeth. (And I still have all of them. Except for one. Or maybe two. And one that got cracked, which I'll probably need to have removed sooner or later.) The colds are getting shorter and rarer than they used to be.
And I'm a student of the martial sciences. (My mentor called it an art, but it's a science. The beauty just comes later.)
And yes, before you ask: I've used it. A few times. More than I'm happy about. I've beaten myself up before; I don't want to do it again. I've drawn blood. Heart's blood a few times. Weaklings don't do that.
I eat well, but people always seem to serve me more than I can eat. Maybe it's because they think I'm bigger than I am. Maybe it's because they think I'm weak and want me to get well soon. I try to oblige them, but even when I do clear my plate I don't seem to bulk up.
(People seem bent on forcing drinks on me, too. This I mind. I've seen drunks - messy, noisy and violent drunks. I don't want to become one. But I know that wine can be safer than water, especially hot and spiced - spiced especially. I should know. And mulled cider is good for colds.)
I do indeed wear pants and a shirt, but the only piece of clothing that I'm really attached to is my coat. It was given as a gift by some family members I've never met, and it's still a bit big on me. It's heavy and hot and velveteen, with blue embroidery and a few Turk's-head knots that serve as buttons. I wear it every day, and people seem to like it.
Underneath that I wear one of my shirts. None of them are white.
Four years ago, I had the misfortune of meeting the people who whitened the town's clothing (and flour) for a living. I cried after they left, and since then I've stopped using bleach. None of my old shirts are white any more; they've absorbed other dyes and faded to a bunch of interesting shades. Everybody else calls them "gray."
I wear scarves - several. One of them is around my neck during the summer; I sunburn painfully. Another is over my forehead.
My stepmother would cut my hair very short as a child (I'm not sure what color it is. People say that it's a very pale straw blond, but not quite.) To spite her, I was threatened with a beating if I ever had a lock of it cut during my education. I've gotten used to having hair below my shoulders, but the other scarf helps keep it out of my eyes.
It also helps me sleep at night. I sleep better with a blindfold.
I have a hat, widebrimmed and black, which I wear as the mood suits me. It's unmarked and unexceptional, except that if you fill it with gravel it makes a comfortable pillow.
I still have both eyes (no mean feat.) Nobody else in my family has eyes matching mine, which makes sense. We don't discuss it.
Nobody else does either. People who forget my name, but have no problems remembering me as being a foot too tall and eating for three, don't seem to find my eyes remarkable at all.
They're blue, incidentally; the same color as the embroidery on my coat. This is why I find it odd that my eyes go unmentioned.
Nobody else I know has eyes like cornflower.
