When I found a pair of wire-framed glasses on the floor of JJ’s last Thursday night, I knew I was about to deceive you bitches. When I pressed my thumb against those curved lenses and they popped out as easy as pie, it felt like fate had kissed me on the forehead. I would be the man I’ve always wanted to be: a man with obvious intelligence, tasteful carelessness, and mousy bookishness. I’d be the man with wire-framed glasses.
I went straight home, slipped into my wool sweater, laced a striped scarf around my neck, and tied a piece of twine around my stack of well-worn hardcover books. As I slid the metal bridge of the glasses over my nose, a shiver ran down my spine. I looked myself in the mirror and declared, “You’re the man.” As I walked down my dorm steps, I brainstormed how I would manage to not draw too much attention to myself, since my irresistible new facade would be sure to turn heads. But you ignorant little self-absorbed dweebs didn’t suspect a thing. Ha! Not only did I raise my hand in class for the first time, but I sat in the front row, furiously writing notes with a quill and ink. What is this new life of intelligence and esteem? Who was this new version of myself? At lunch I brought up Voltaire and Picasso to my simpleton friends, who looked at me strangely over their unsophisticated meals. “Pfttt,” I scoffed at their confusion. “People like you would never understand.”
It wasn’t until I attempted to enter the Barnard campus with the intent of inconspicuously perching myself upon the ledge of Barnard Hall with a leather bound journal, when the Public Safety man asked me to remove my glasses. Hands shaking, I removed them, only to drop them right by his feet like a visually unimpaired klutz. As he picked them up he turned to me with a sour rapport, saying, “Hey yo, these aren’t real? That’s lame bro, I dunno what you’re tryna do here, playing tricks or what but—” I looked up at his towering stature, ashamed, and a tear rolled down my cheek. He looked rattled, stammering, “Woah dude, no I didn’t mean it like that, I mean, they’re cool. They’re really cool, bud. I-I…I’ll let it slide, don’t worry, please just stop crying.” He handed them back to me and I slipped them back on my head. And as I walked away, I couldn’t help but smirk. “Master of deception,” I mumbled under my breath.
