When I was going through elementary school, my classmates were composed of the same group of kids from preschool through the ninth grade. And when some of the boys started developing earlier than others, in a hormonal sense rather than a physical one, it became clear to me that I would have to either go along with the crowd to avoid being ostracized, or just be myself. Even at such a young age, I knew that being myself would get me nowhere, so I tried my best to act like everyone else.
Because we were such a constant group through the years, any student that transferred into our class would immediately be seen as exotic, since they were brand new to us. This fresh blood would make them instantly popular, and they would ascend immediately to the cool crowd, much to the ire of myself and the other unpopulars.
During a year that we were all too young to find one another attractive, we managed to grow so affected by teen dramas (such as Saved by the Bell and, to a lesser extent, 90210) that we convinced ourselves that we needed to act more mature. Maturity, it would seem to us third graders, meant dating one another and trying to find out who everyone thought was cute, or, more accurately, who thought we were cute.
It was in this period of my life that Caroline transferred into our class. I doubt that she was such a subject of fascination at her previous school, but at ours she was a sensation.
Part of what made Caroline stand out so fiercely was her red hair. Personally, I've never found redheads attractive, but that might be the fact that I, myself, am redheaded, and want nothing less than to spread those genes on to my future children. Whenever a new girl came into our class, she would be descended upon by the other girls as they decided whether or not she would be worthy of their friendship.
On the other hand, the boys of the class, in their pre-pubescent logic, had decided that Caroline was the girl for them. I think, in part, it was the allure of the red hair, but it was probably mostly because they found the idea of dating the girls that they had been mocking since kindergarten slightly gross. Soon they were talking about how she was the prettiest girl in the class (she wasn't) and how they had never known anyone as funny as she is (she wasn't) and how they were going to give her their phone numbers and have her call them (she wouldn't).
I had no interest in Caroline as a person. She had a bland personality, she was kind of stupid (she once told me that the abbreviation 'etc.' was actually 'ect.' and was short for 'extension'), and she was a little bit of a bitch. Granted, most children are bitches, but I imagine she never grew out of it.
Rather than voice my opinion about this rude girl who so suddenly invaded my space, I decided to conform to the rest of the class and pretend that I was as madly in love with this little monster as the rest of them. I did my damndest to be as pleasant to her as I could, trying to figure out her interests and hobbies, but she shut me down fairly fast, after having seen the other kids in the class being rude to me. She's lucky that that popularity thing panned out for her, because, had they later rejected her, she would have already alienated all of the uncool kids and she would have had no one left to talk to.
My efforts to get into the good books of a girl I didn't like would continue through the years, but with Caroline it would lead to more than a few awkward situations.
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