Straw Hat

Due to budget cuts and such, our school has an unbalanced ratio of students to teachers this year. There are far too many students in each class, and not quite enough desks to go around. In American Economics, the teacher has tried to compensate by providing a few swivelly chairs off to the side.

And while most people try to avoid the swivelly chairs—most people make a beeline for the first empty desk they lay eyes on—There’s one guy who will always go straight for the swivelly chairs. That’s the guy in the straw hat.

He’s worn that hat every day this year so far. I think it’s his new thing—new identifying factor. It suits him. It’s creased on the top, and has a band around the middle. Like a fedora, but made from woven pieces of straw, rather than dark or patterned felt. The band around it is plain and black. It could use a little red feather or something. That’d suit him, too.

He doesn’t take many notes. Usually, he just chills in his comfy chair, maybe even reclines a little bit. Elbows rested, hands folded neatly against his chest, and listens. (Half-listens, really. Most of the time he has one little black earphone in his ear, the wires running up under his shirt so the teacher won’t see them. But he still pays attention well enough.)

Teachers get irritated with people like him, who listen but don’t take notes. Usually, Straw Hat's notebook doesn’t come out until Econ Teacher drops a hint to the class that they should always be writing stuff down. But even then, he doesn’t write much.

He gets good scores—he retains the information just by listening, mostly. Like many others in this class, he’s bright enough to be in AP Econ, but just didn’t want to take the time, or can't risk having a C on his transcript.

His clothes are simple. Other than the straw hat, there’s really nothing that makes him stand out. Like so many others, he sports new shoes—Nike, black and white and blue. He extends his right leg and balances the heel of his shoe against the floor, and gently rocks it back and forth against the ground, wearing it in.

His jeans are long and dark blue, unfaded, as yet unwashed. Clearly new school clothes as well.
The other day I saw him wearing a Resident Evil T-shirt.

He spends most of his lunchtimes in the computer lab just off of the library, with a lot of other gamer boys. The Loner and Fedora, they’re in there too, but they mostly study, I think. Straw Hat seems like he might be the studious type, too—compared to the other gamer boys, at least; they all have loud voices and loud laughs. Not like him. Straw Hat never says much, and never says it very loud, but he loves his computer games. Especially Addicting Games. His favorite is the one with the worm.