Naïveté

"It takes a smart person to know who they are, and a genius to question it." - Anonymous

My name is Leopold Stotch. But for whatever reason, everyone calls me Butters. I don't even know where they came up with that nickname, it just arose on it's own. This, of course, was amongst many a variety of nicknames that seemed to ease over me on the years - Butterscotch, faggot, goody-goody - you know the works. Most of them bother me to a greater extent than I let off. I must appear indifferent to life's daily criticisms, so I don't really let it bother me visibly.

Walking down the halls of my high school isn't… charming, per se. Every day in this god damned place they call an educational facility is exactly the same as the day before. It's rather uneventful, making life seem quite dull to me. Every day - every, single day - is the same: come to school, go to first period via cutting through the theatre or face being picked on in the hallways, ignore the spit balls & snide remarks from Cartman, slip out undetected & head for the stair well no one uses to second period, go to third block, get picked on during lunch by the boys & sit for a chat with the girls, go to fifth period & ignore Cartman once again, go to sixth period once again through theatre to avoid being picked on any longer, sit through seventh period, wake Kenny up after seventh, and go through the hallways - teased as always - so as to avoid disrupting the drama club to take the forty-five minute walk back home before it goes on five-o-clock so my parents don't beat me. By this point, you should have long-since been wondering where fourth period was, and if not, then you're likely going back to check to see if you accidentally skipped over it. That is, if "you" actually exist, like my philosophy teacher once said. And, by this point as well, you feel rather silly for going back to check & finding it wasn't there because fourth period is actually lunch time, and while reading that rather painfully long run-on sentence of my usual day you didn't take the time to notice that fourth period wasn't there in the first place. Now, my knowing that "you" went back to check makes you feel stupid - and stop pretending that you actually did notice - because you obviously didn't.

Cutting through theatre as always, I find myself sighing in rather odd relief. I step over the stage, but looking around at all the empty seats, I figure I might as well take a seat on the stage & rest for a bit. I take the bus to school in the mornings, but I just feel so tired, for whatever reason. Looking around the stage brings me to my next point.

They say life is a play, and you can either be an actor, or you can be a spectator. I am an actor. Rather, I am an actor pretending to be a spectator. In the social latter, I sit to the back of the spectator's crowd. I go unnoticed by many, which makes my life a little easier. Well, that's a lie, actually. Since my years back in elementary school, I've really climbed up on the social latter. Now, I'm in the "popular crowd." Then again, that's a lie as well. My being friends with Wendy Testaburger & Bebe Stevens has really upped my popularity.

Well, not really, as that's a lie. If I was a girl, like I look to be, I would be much more popular. But, my girlish charms & looks don't exactly pull it off for the boys, which leads to a rowdy teasing every fifteen minutes in my case.

It takes a lot. It takes so much out of me to appear like nothing was ever wrong, and now that I am seventeen, a senior in South Park High School, I am slowly slipping. I will occasionally drop my mask, and I won't notice. I'll stare off into space with a sad, sullen expression on my face until someone comes to attention & I immediately perk myself up. As the years have gone by, I have been losing more & more of my innocence, and I can blame it on everyone else. I could blame it on everyone else, but I know it was always me. I was - and am - so tired of acting, but I didn't want to ever trouble anyone, so I continue to act like life is good, singing & dancing & acting merry. Even when no one is around & I know that they aren't, I still continue to act.

Most would describe me as a "Melvin," a gullibly naïve character who can be pressured into doing just about anything. There are a few things in which I do compare to the "Butters" everyone believes I am. Though we share few similarities, and some of them are rather… hard to admit to. But it's not as if "you," can do anything to me - that is, if "you" even exist. But enough of that. I better you are wondering what it is that I share in common to my naïve other self. Well, I'm not going to tell you.

I mostly question everything that happens. Yet, I have everything perfectly planned out - a charted map that I follow rather easily. South Park is a rather… odd little podunk town, and even though many people will do things that often surprises you, you still manage to know exactly what it is that anyone will do next. People are so typical like that.

By now, you are probably confused. Don't worry, I am too. Well, I am confused, and then I'm not. Maybe I should start over.

…

Hello. My name is Leopold Stotch.

This is my story.