"Good afternoon everyone," Amir called cheerfully as we drifted in, trying and failing to uplift the somber atmosphere.

We all sat in our usual spots in the circular chairs gathering.

"I understand that there's no sense of excitement from a game like last time, but could you guys look any less like zombies?" Amir asked.

"How long are we going to be here?" I asked. I refused to admit that it was somewhat comforting to be here with everyone than in my room alone - or rather, alone with my suitcase.

I don't know if I would be able to resist this time.

"As long as we need to be," Amir responded rather unhelpfully.

"Sounds promising, I don't think anyone actually wants to be here," Indigo pointed out.

We hadn't talked since this morning, not even a glance at the other, but it didn't feel awkward per se.

Amir smiled good-naturedly. "Good thing I said need and not want then." He paused, sweeping his gaze around the circle. "Since you all seem in a hurry to get out of my presence, how about we get started?"

"Thor!" Amir called after a brief pause, scaring the poor boy out of his thoughts. "Tell me how you're feeling?"

"I...I'm not sure," he said hesitantly. "A little numb. I'm not in pain or anything but it's a bit hard to...form thoughts, li-like there's some sort of...static."

Amir leaned forward, focusing his kind eyes completely on Thor. "Is it disorienting?" He asked.

Thor met his gaze. "Not really...everything just feels kind of muffled."

"I want to divert our focus quickly on what you mentioned last time; the burning stare of people as you mentioned, the hyper self-awareness of their scrutiny, really."

Thor gulped and cast a quick nervous glance around the room but nodded.

"I'm only going to touch the surface here don't worry, we'll get more in-depth in the family session with your caretaker." He waited for Thor's nod of approval before continuing. "Now, I want you to look at your peers who you've gone to battle with. Though you haven't known them for long there should be a sense of camaraderie with at least one of them." He paused, giving Thor time to do as instructed.

Though timidly, I noticed he was able to make direct eye contact with us --something he probably couldn't have done at our first meeting.

"Do their stares burn like the others you mentioned?" Amir asked.

Thor seemed to ponder this for a moment, furrowing his brow as he thought about it, casting fleeting glances at us every once in a while.

"...I don't think so," he finally muttered.

Amir nodded slowly. "Can you think about why that may be?"

Again he pondered the question before ultimately settling with a shrug.

"Anyone has any ideas?" Amir asked, focusing his attention back on the group as a whole now.

"He's associated us with some level of familiarity in this otherwise unfamiliar situation," Indigo answered after a prolonged silence.

"I really like how you put that. Are you sure you're against becoming a therapist in the future?" Amir asked with an intrigued expression.

Indigo kept her deadpan expression but I suspected from the squinting of her eyes that the thought had amused her. "I thought you were supposed to be able to read people. Caring about people as a job would be about the last thing I would ever do - right next to karaoke."

Atlas raised an eyebrow. "What do you have against karaoke?" He exclaimed defensively.

Amir coughed pointedly before the conversation could veer more off-topic. "Anyway, I want you to try a little exercise for me, Thor. Do you think you can handle it or do you want to move on?"

Thor bit his lip and held Amir's gaze. "I can handle it."

"Very well. Keeping what Indigo said in mind, about the level of familiarity perhaps influencing your unease with others, I want you to look at each person in turn and say characteristics that you've noticed that may make their stare not as frightening." Amir said.

Thor stiffly turned to look at Atlas who smiled at him.

"Well...I-I guess Atlas just comes across as someone who's carefree and isn't judgmental." Thor offered, glancing at Amir to see his reaction.

"There's no wrong or right answer, it's your feelings and observations, after all."

Thor nodded and looked past Atlas at Nellie. Immediately his face softened from its past tenseness. "Nellie's stare is friendly and caring and I guess it helps that we have some stuff in common. Like Atlas, she doesn't seem judgmental at all."

Nellie smiled and did a small seated bow.

Less tense now, Thor's eyes reached mine. He held my gaze for a few seconds then awkwardly looked away. "I don't know about Mateo. His eyes give mixed signals, as if they don't know what kind of expression they want to take on."

Atlas laughed and I scratched my head idly.

"That's probably just the lingering effects of the bland waffles I was forced to eat this morning," I commented, shooting an accusatory glare at Amir who ignored it.

"And Indigo?" Amir questioned.

Thor held her gaze for a full split second before looking away. "I guess she's just very honest so her stare doesn't hide any ulterior motives in it, and I feel like she doesn't care about me enough to even judge me."

"Wow, you're like a real-life Charles Xavier," Nellie exclaimed in awe.

Thor shrunk back, his moment of silent confidence gone, and adopted an embarrassed expression. "Nothing that impressive."

"I don't know about that, just thinking about what I could do if I had that staring ability thing is making me jealous," Atlas said, a faraway glint in his eye. "Imagine I could use that on any girl I wanted and figure out what they're thinking when they look at me"

I snickered. "It doesn't take A+ observance to notice disgust."

Atlas fake pouted. "Hater."

Amir coughed pointedly, rudely interrupting our very on-topic conversation.

"That ability to observe people so accurately is indeed impressive, something that is likely thanks to your quiet nature, however, could you do the same to a complete stranger?"

"Probably not," Thor admitted after giving it some thought.

"Is this because you can't observe their eyes and habits or because you can't maintain consistent eye contact to do so like you just did with them?" Amir followed up, leaning forward once again and staring intensely at Thor.

"Uh...the latter?"

"Did you notice that as you went on with the exercise it became easier to maintain contact as you went down the line, though it was obviously influenced by those you felt more close to."

Thor nodded.

"Imagine you could maintain eye contact so casually with strangers as you did with Nellie just now. Wouldn't everything be much easier?"

He nodded again, this time a sparkle in his eye as his eyes wandered around the room, probably imagining just that.

"Did the pursuit of that feeling of ease and confidence lead to you picking up your first medicinal substance?"

Thor paused, his nodding halting so fast I half expected him to complain about whiplash. His face was a mixture of shock, disbelief, and something else I couldn't quite decipher. His eyes finally traveled back to Amir's patiently waiting face.

"How?"

"This isn't my first rodeo, I guess you could say I'm good at observing people overtime like you are. It's usually obvious who has fallen into the trap of misusing the various medicines simply trying to have fun and get high, recreational basically, and those who resorted to them to escape their problems; ranging from something as simple as peer pressure to mental health issues, like say...anxiety."

Thor shuffled in his chair.

I had lost track of how many days I had been in this prison but not once had I seen Thor shuffle in his chair once he sat down. It was as if he was scared to move or perhaps trying to draw as little attention as possible, but now he seemed especially uncomfortable.

"As I said before, I'm only touching on the surface so we won't go any further today," Amir said, likely noticing his discomfort.

"Ok," Thor replied in an even softer voice than usual.

Amir moved on to the next in line, Atlas, asking how he was doing but Thor tuned out them both, instead losing himself in his thoughts. Maybe his story was generic after all because Amir had been able to read him perfectly in just a few days.

Nonetheless, his mind wandered back to times forcibly forgotten, that led up to his first usage of any drug...

"You sure you don't want me to walk you in, Thor?" My mom asked, her eyes flicking toward the large crowd entering through the glass doors of a respectably large school.

"Definitely not," I muttered.

This was the first day at my new school, after all.

A new beginning.

I hadn't exactly been the most popular student at my old one, quite the opposite actually; I had started out as the quiet guy and my shy nature caused me to become a pretty frequent target for bullies. Now, with an opportunity to completely leave that chapter in the dust, I couldn't risk something as trivial as my mother walking me into school killing any chance I had at being popular.

I said my goodbyes to my mom and walked toward the stairs leading to the big glass doors.

For many, this was a simple task that didn't require too much thought - if any, but for me, every step was measured, every glance noticed and every laugh analyzed.

I always felt like I was being watched and it made me have to consciously focus on putting one foot in front of the other or risk walking awkwardly or worse, falling over.

Thankfully, I made it up the stairs and into the building without much problem. As I walked through the hall toward the office a few turns down, every casual glance felt like a torturous stare, like an owl casting its wavering stare as you trudged through the forest - though it was likely all in my head.

It made it even worse. Throughout the years I had realized it was mostly all in my head and yet this knowledge changed nothing. It was like I had watched this movie over and over and I knew the exact plot and ending but it still completely immersed me every time, its mental grasp too strong for me to switch the channel.

I made it to the office and received my timetable with all the information about where my classes were. I was set for my big day and my quest for my destined popularity.

I had spent all weekend watching YouTube videos like 'How to Socialize' and 'Ten Ways to Instantly Become Confident' and according to them, having this knowledge placed me halfway along my path, so that's oughta count for something.

Surely...

Throughout the day I tried the multiple tips I got from the YouTube videos and failed spectacularly. It turns out that doing things like maintaining eye contact and talking in a consistently even and relaxed voice required you to actually be capable of doing those things in the first place. You couldn't train a dog to fly and even training a dog to sit took time; so my weekend of watching YouTube videos and practicing in the mirror turned out to be extremely fruitless.

Sure I was approached a few times, a girl - probably driven more by a sense of duty than being interested in me, offered to give me a tour and after an embarrassingly amount of stuttering and failed eye contact during the tour, and a disinterested look from her at the end, I realized it was all doomed.

Similar potential companions approached and time and time again I failed to perform in their social game adequately. It was depressing really.

During lunch as I sulked in a bathroom stall at my repeated failures, a group of boys loudly barged into the bathroom, talking like they were all half-deaf.

I tuned them out, refocusing on my own inferiority until a familiar fruity smell wafted through from behind the door.

The boys were vaping.

I had never vaped in my life or tried any unprescribed drug for that matter, rather the smell was familiar because my uncle owned a smoke shop. I had visited him a lot over the years but since moving to Minnesota a week ago, he suddenly lived just ten minutes away and I had been eager to help him out in any way I could. He was a wise man who told great stories and so I loved being around him.

The familiar smell caused me to idly listen to the boy's conversation. Not eavesdropping.

"This buzz isn't doing it for me anymore man," A deep voice said.

"You know I can't bring weed in here anymore, Sneako got caught with that shit just last week. It's too soon bro." Another voice, huskier this time.

"You know there's this new shit called the Valyrian 3 that I hear hits different. My friend down south has one but it cost him like 5 thousand because of shipping."

"Bro I saw that shit, everyone's been talking about it," The first voice said. "No way I'm spending all of that on a vape though, I'm not broke but I'm not rich either, feel me?"

"Heard you."

"You right."

The boys switched to another topic as they continued smoking but my mind didn't stray. Within my eavesdro...listening, an opportunity had arisen. This Valyrian 3 vape appeared to be like some sort of mythical creature to these boys of questionable ethics and I had not only laid eyes on it, I had touched quite a few when I was helping my uncle in the shop. There was a compartment in particular behind the main desk that hosted some excess high-demand products that he didn't place on shelves.

I smirked as the boys left and I came out of the stall, my dream of popularity in reach once again.

He wouldn't notice one missing.

The next day I came prepared with the vape I "borrowed" from my uncle in my bag. Like before, I made a beeline for the bathroom as soon as lunch came around, this time standing in front of the mirror instead of going in a stall.

After five minutes of waiting poised with the vape near my mouth, I realized how stupid this plan was. For starters there was no guarantee the boys even came in here every lunchtime, not to mention I had never done any type of drug before and I constantly heard the 'don't do drugs, stay in school' speech. Was this really worth it?

I pushed the vape back into my pocket with a shake of my head. What was I even thinking? I knew enough to know nicotine was highly addictive and turning into some sort of addict certainly wasn't in the cards for me.

"-she's totally feeling me, bro!"

I recognized the deep voice from yesterday just as the boys from yesterday barged in. They locked eyes with me before I looked away, unable to hold their stare.

"Scram," One of them said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

I awkwardly looked forward at myself in the mirror without moving. The silence stretched into awkwardness until the same boy took a threatening step forward.

"I said leave." He said, his voice dripping venom this time around.

The boys followed his lead, taking a step forward to back him up. The tension in the air built with every second that passed, three predators sizing up their unfortunate prey.

Me.

I realized everything was going to end up as it did before, with me getting bullied and neglected. The thought was frightening really.

I dug into my pockets just as they took another step forward.

The leader's foot paused mid-air.

"No way..."

I took a pull of the vape after fiddling to find where I was even supposed to smoke from. The sudden burst of euphoria that followed was probably comparable to Albert Einstein getting an idea. The sudden quiet in my head, the sudden calmness that washed over my body, the twisting of my lips into a natural feeling smile, but most importantly, the wide-eyed stares of the boys that had absolutely no effect on me anymore.

How could I ever turn back?