centre? what centre?

My phone buzzed non-stop for months. Ping, ping, ping — thousands of messages, some serious, some trivial, some outright ridiculous. Then, suddenly — silence.

I'm not a big picture person. Big pictures actually terrify me because I never see them coming. Once, I pasted a picture in Word, expecting it to be small — it took up half the page. I started sweating, first from stress, then from embarrassment — I was intimidated by something I could cut out of my sight with a click.

My substitute teacher seemed amused that — despite having the marks to secure a seat in medical school — I didn’t want to pursue medicine. Many of my teachers were baffled.

Growing up, I wanted to be an artist, a singer-songwriter, and a dancer who also built machines that broke the laws of physics. I'm finally the same age as the person I once dreamed of becoming. Although we made many of the same choices, we also made small, significant choices that were different; that added up to two different people.

When students achieve school or national colors in sports, their teammates cheer the loudest. During inter-house sports events, even the winners of opposing teams are celebrated. But when it comes to academics, success is often met with quiet resentment rather than applause.

I’d woken up the same way since 2012: at five o’clock in the morning, tired after escaping a madman in my sleep and hopeful there were leftovers for breakfast. That morning, however, felt like I’d woken up on the wrong side of the bed: I noticed a primary school girl wearing a white blazer. Immediately, I knew her parents were unreasonable people.

Hollywood's nerd is instantly recognisable: they're the loner, the outcast, the one who chooses books over parties. However, their sad social life often stems from something deeper — their non-conformity. This character usually rejects societal norms, standing apart from their peers in ways that make them an outsider.