A Real Good Boy
What’s the definition of good people to you? Heroes with superpowers that only appear in comic books? A police officer that helps to keep the order in the city? Or a firefighter saving the people trapped in a building with uncontrollable fire surrounding then? Yes, they are good people, but good people could go down to just someone you met every day. To me, one of the good people I met is a boy I had been in the same class with.
He was not very special on the outside. He did’t wear a cape like most heroes we know. Nor did he join volunteering work regularly. He was just an ordinary student who did not stand out and blended into the environment seamlessly. He wore glasses, like what most students in our school. His uniform was clean most of the times, except when we had art classes. You wouldn’t see him in the basketball court or volleyball court playing balls with his friends. He usually stood in the corner of our school with his two buddies and listened to them while saying a few words occasionally. He really wasn’t that outstanding, despite being in the same class for two years, we barely said a word with each other, nor did we greet each other when we met each other in the hallway. I wouldn’t remember if he was in my class if you didn’t mention him, but one day he made me remember him forever and realize what “good people” really means.
It was a regular school day, during lunch. All of us students were glad to have a break after four hours of classes, and happily chatting away with friends while eating lunch boxes bought from the mall nearby. A lot of students were eating in the canteen, and it was loud, like every other day during lunch. I was no difference, making jokes with my girl friends, sharing what food we just bought with each other, playfully complaining why we didn’t buy drinks for ourselves, until a loud bang on the table rang through the cafeteria, making everyone in the large room go quiet. A boy from another class stood up, his back facing me, fist formed on his side, and you could almost see steam coming out of his ears. The canteen went silent. It was so quiet, and you could hear a mosquito fly by if you were there.
“I dare you say that one more time to my face. I dare you!” he exclaimed, and pointed to the boy sitting opposite to him, who had a smug look on him. Everyone else in the cafeteria had eyes on them and they didn’t seem to care. A fight was seconds away from starting, until he started to speak up.
“D-don’t fight, come on,” he stammered. His voice was not loud, but it could be heard in the room, and his shaky voice was heard clearly by me despite sitting a few tables away. Anxiety filled his eyes behind his thick lenses when he looked up to the boy who stood up, letting me have a good look at him. Fear was written all over his face, and the hand that was held up in an effort to clam the boy down was trembling, but the fear did nothing to cease him from stopping a fight that could ruin a friendship. The boy with his back towards me was breathing so hard, his shoulders were rising with his breathing. The tension created by the boys was in the room was so thick it could be cut by a knife.
After a few seconds, although it felt like a century, the boy banged the table again in order to relief his fury before storming away from the canteen, which he left with the boy, leaving the smug boy alone, sitting by the table. And after a few moments, the canteen resumed to its usual noisy state.
It had been two years since it happened, and the three of them are still like the Three Musketeers, always hanging out with each other and the two boys seems to have forgotten the incident. No one knew what caused the outburst, and no one seemed to remember what he did that day except for me. He still went on his day in school. We weren’t in the same class anymore after Secondary 3, but I always notice him when we walked past each other even though we still did not greet each other. And whenever I walked pass him, I could always remember the fear in his eyes that day and his determination to stop a fight, the image was pierced into my mind, and it made me change my view on what “good people” could be.
Good people are not only superheroes wearing a cape. Good people are not only the police officers patrolling the streets. Good people are not only the firefighter saving us from a fire.
Good people are the ones who are not afraid to stop something bad from happening.