When the bell for the second session squealed, the classroom felt as if someone had tilted it slightly and put all the energy on the floor. Children shuffled, chairs scraped like small geographies, and Ms. Hana Rivers bounced at the front as if she had been charged by the very wall sockets.
"Okay, everyone!" she trilled, voice laced with caffeine and optimism. "We are going to do something simple and fun. Draw something that tells the class who you are. You can be literal—like 'I am a cat'—or symbolic, like 'I am a comet who eats homework.' Let your crayons decide your fate."
Noah beamed as if destiny had been revealed to him. Klein raised a careful hand, eyes already calculating proportions. Chris grinned like a shark who'd found a new wave. Amaya folded her hands and smiled at everyone like a tiny diplomat. Eris, who had been watching Tyler from the start, traced the edge of her desk with a pencil and then looked away like that gesture had been embarrassing.
Tyler watched their hands move. He didn't need to draw loudly—he had learned how others made themselves visible. His circle would be deliberate: simple, centered, the kind of mark that could be read a dozen ways without forcing one truth.
"Tyler?" Ms. Hana leaned in close, lowering her voice as if she were about to share a grand secret. "Window seat are you going to draw the window?"
Tyler's mouth tilted in the ghost of a smile. "Maybe. Or a circle."
"A circle!" she echoed, excitement fizzing. A circle. Symbolic. Why am I already seeing a comic panel of this circle unlocking the hero's past? Calm, Hana. Calm. She straightened, telling the class to begin.
Paper crinkled. Crayons clicked. A small war of color began at three dozen desks.
"Pass me the purple," Layla demanded. "No, my purple."
"It's mine," Toby snapped from the aisle near the back, voice sharp enough to cut through the hum. He'd been quiet for most of the morning, and the sudden aggressiveness made the room pivot.
Toby was lean, with a chin that always seemed two seconds away from a challenge. He had that look some children wore like an uncomfortable jacket tough to get rid of. He'd sat two rows back from Tyler, glancing at him with a smirk that felt practiced.
"Noah, give Layla the purple," Ms. Hana said briskly. Do not let color wars escalate into turf wars; remember that email from the principal? No color riots on day two.
Noah leaned over, offering the box like an offering. "Here, Layla. You can have the purple if you promise to not break it."
"Promise," she declared solemnly.
Toby watched. He watched how Tyler didn't watch. That bothered him. A boy who looked at nothing could be everyone's center if you let him.
"Hey," Toby said, standing up like the chair offended him. "You draw anything cool, window boy?"
Tyler blinked slowly. His voice was small, carefully adult: "I'm drawing a beginning."
The class hummed some kids peeking, others shrugging. The phrase was harmless but had a way of making eyes tilt up as if someone had said a rare vocabulary word.
Eris, always sharp, whispered loud enough for only Tyler to hear, "That sounds like a poem."
Tyler heard the whisper as he heard most whispers soft, layered with her curiosity. Poem? Maybe. Or just a shape.
Toby's jaw tightened. "A beginning?" he mimicked, as if the words were a dare. "Sounds like you think you're special."
"I just think circles are efficient," Tyler said. "They go back to their start."
The simplicity of the sentence seemed to fluster Toby more than any insult. The boy was used to getting a reaction by making other children small. Tyler's nonchalance made that trick fail at the first attempt.
Across the classroom, Oh no—a potential rivalry! Is he forming a clique? No, Hana, it's the first week. Don't invent plots. But oh what if he's poetic? Do we highlight his poetry? Do we call the parents? No, no, I'll just encourage group activities. Unless the principal says 'Top 3' and I promised… okay breathe.
The crayon contest ended in a tentative peace. Students wandered like bees, showing each other dragons and suns and houses with doors suspiciously large for their rooms. Ms. Hana moved among them with exaggerated interest, taking each drawing as if it were an artifact.
When she reached Tyler's desk and saw the circle small, perfectly round, shaded in soft blue she actually made a sound like someone had rung a bell.
"Simple and elegant!" she proclaimed, which carried three tones: sincere, alarmed, and very performative. I
s the circle a motif? Does it mean he'll become the protagonist in my head? Be cool, be professional, but also assign him as class hero in your mental storyboard if you must.
Tyler acknowledged the praise with a tiny nod. Eris mouthed an impressed "Huh." Klein analyzed the pressure of the crayon as if measuring its intent. Chris offered a thumbs-up. Noah, for once, seemed unsure whether to celebrate or start chanting.
Klein leaned in with a tiny notebook he kept on him for reasons he would not explain—mostly maps and notes and star charts young boys prize. "My dad says circles are used in engineering for bearings. They never stop," he said matter-of-factly.
"Then they're reliable," Tyler said.
Reliability mattered. Tyler had spent so many years in a life where everything spun off center because one axis failed—he liked circles because they returned, because with them you could plan.
"Why is he always staring out the window?" Toby asked loudly, trying to bait Tyler into a reaction that would betray him as either arrogant or fragile.
Tyler glanced toward the window, at the street where a man walked a dog, at the gray folds of the city. "I like light," he said simply.
"And cloud-watching?" Noah offered, because Noah considered himself an expert in interpretation.
"Sometimes," Tyler allowed.
Toby didn't get the reaction he wanted. His expression closed like a fist. He muttered something about favorites and teachers and fairness, then walked away with the dramatic flare of someone who believed a withdrawal could be a power move.
Tyler watched him go. The adult memory made an inventory: Toby wanted an audience, a throne made of attention that he could stomp on to feel stable. The child in Tyler the conscientious pretend child knew how to let that hunger exist without feeding it.
The day folded into small, manageable pieces: math with blocks that smelled faintly of glue, a reading circle where Ms. Hana hyped the moral of every story until the morals began to squeal from overuse, and a nap-time that felt like an appointed peace treaty. Ms. Hana hovered, smiled, and tripped over her own knee in a private panic when she nearly told a silly anecdote about a romance comic she'd read last night something she caught herself and turned into a story about sharing.
At the end of the day, as parents came in and the class dissolved into the practicalities of pickup lines and backpack straps, Tyler folded his drawing into the neat corner of his satchel. The circle stayed with him like a quiet promise: contained, whole, returning.
Outside, Darsen's late sun gilded the street. Children scattered toward homes with shouts, treaties, and new grudges. Toby's shadow passed briefly by Tyler's window on his way home; the boy was already composing his next small battle.
Tyler watched the world keep making itself. He breathed in steady. For now, the classroom had become a small, warm orbit. He would learn the pull of its gravity, the ways people nudged and slid into new arrangements. He would observe, intercede when it mattered, and let small kindnesses stitch the seams.
Most of Class 1-A had already spilled out of the building like a flood of small, noisy creatures. Parents gathered in clusters, waving, calling names, comparing lunchbox leftovers. But on one side of the gate, two grown men were very obviously losing patience with reality.
Steven leaned against the wall, hands in pockets, wearing the expression of a man whose greatest enemy was waiting.
Richard stood beside him, arms crossed, looking like he was calculating the exact rate at which his brother was wasting oxygen.
"School ended fifteen minutes ago," Richard muttered. "Where is he?"
Steven groaned dramatically. "Maybe he joined a club."
"He's six."
"Maybe it's a really ambitious club."
Richard looked at him as if considering whether fratricide was legal in Varosia.
Then Steven clicked his tongue. "Or maybe he's making friends. Unlike you did when you were six."
"Oh, here we go," Richard rolled his eyes. "As if you weren't the one who glued your hand to the teacher's desk because you got bored."
"That was an experiment."
"You cried for an hour."
"I WAS SIX, RICHARD!" Steven barked loudly enough that a few parents stared.
Richard smirked. "Some of us matured."
"Some of us matured too much," Steven shot back. "Look at you. Even your posture is stressed."
"Because I work," Richard replied dryly.
"And I don't?"
"You literally skipped your lunch break to get bubble tea."
Steven gasped. "It was a healthy strawberry blend"
"It had whipped cream on it."
"It was medicinal whipped cream!"
Their argument gained volume, speed, and intensity like a storm approaching shore.
"Why are you even complaining?" Steven snapped. "At least you didn't have to run here after restocking the store!"
"You jogged for twenty seconds"
"IT WAS THIRTY!"
"fine, thirty seconds. Congratulations, athlete."
Steven looked personally attacked. "You know what? One day you'll appreciate my dedication."
Richard rubbed his forehead. "One day you'll stop being dramatic."
"Impossible. It's genetic."
They were ready to escalate into Round Two when a small voice cut through the noise.
"Uncle?"
Both froze instantly.
Both turned instantly.
Both smiled instantly.
Tyler stood by the gate, backpack neatly worn, expression calm as ever.
Their tone flipped like someone had hit a light switch.
"Hey buddy!" Steven beamed, leaning down.
"Tyler," Richard said with a softened voice he used for exactly three people in the world. "Sorry we're late."
Tyler shook his head. "I came out late."
Steven placed a hand dramatically over his heart. "You hear that, Richard? Our boy takes responsibility for us."
"He's covering for your nonsense," Richard muttered too quietly for Tyler to hear.
They each took one of Tyler's hands, though Tyler didn't particularly need help walking. Still, he let them. Adults needed small rituals like this more than children did.
"So," Steven said as they left the school grounds, "tell us everything. Were the kids nice? Did anyone try to steal your lunch? Should I fight them?"
"No fighting," Richard said.
"Just a little?" Steven whispered.
"No."
Tyler suppressed a smile. "Everyone was nice."
"Good," Richard nodded. "Especially your teacher? The one with the… uh… expressive energy?"
Tyler blinked slowly. "Yes. Ms. Rivers."
Richard hummed. "She seems genuinely kind."
Tyler nodded. "She talks a lot… and thinks a lot."
Both uncles nearly tripped.
"She… thinks a lot?" Steven asked.
Tyler quickly corrected, "I mean she's expressive."
Richard sighed in relief. "Don't scare us like that. Thought she was oversharing personal details."
Oh, if only they knew.
They passed the market street. A vegetable vendor waved at them; Steven waved back too enthusiastically, nearly hitting Richard in the face.
"So, Tyler," Richard said, now walking on the safer side of Steven. "Did you make any friends?"
"A few."
"Oho," Steven grinned. "FAST. He's a natural. Which ones?"
"Chris, Klein, Noah, Amaya."
Steven wiggled his eyebrows. Richard elbowed him in warning.
"And my seat partner is at the window," Tyler added softly.
"I approve," Richard said with an approving nod. "Good airflow and visibility."
"Visibility for what?" Steven asked.
"Life," Richard replied mysteriously.
Steven stared at him. "…You're so weird sometimes."
"And you're always weird."
Tyler exhaled, amused.
Childhood never changes only ages do.