It wasn't the kid's fault.

Kenny knew that. He knew it the second he heard the scream and saw the little girl cling to her mother's leg like he had just stepped out of some horror movie. She couldn't have been older than two years old. Maybe three if he was being generous. Kids that age got scared of everything. Loud noises, strangers, dogs, vacuum cleaners, their own shadows sometimes. He understood that logically. Understanding it, however, did absolutely nothing to stop the feeling that settled in his chest afterward.

The day had actually been going pretty good before that happened. Earlier that morning he had gone to his yearly checkup, and for once he had left feeling genuinely relieved. Everything looked stable, healthy, normal enough. As normal as things could be considering he only had vision in one eye. The doctor seemed happy with how everything was healing and maintaining itself, and Kenny had spent most of the afternoon feeling lighter than usual because of it. Good enough that he decided to stop by the grocery store on the way home instead of putting it off until another day.

It was supposed to be a quick trip.

Chicken. Milk. Maybe something frozen if he felt lazy enough.

Nothing important.

Nothing memorable.

He had been standing in front of the freezer section comparing expiration dates because food poisoning sounded like a terrible way to spend a weekend. Cold air spilled out every time someone opened one of the freezer doors nearby, and shopping carts rattled over uneven tile somewhere farther down the aisle. Kenny hadn't really been paying attention to anyone around him. Nobody had been staring. Nobody had been whispering. For once he had settled into that comfortable little illusion that he was just another guy buying groceries.

Then he heard a gasp.

His hand froze around one of the chicken packages almost immediately, and for a second he just stood there staring at the freezer shelf. The sound wasn't loud. Most people probably wouldn't have thought twice about it. Kenny did. He knew that sound. He had heard it enough times over the last year to recognize it before he even looked up.

Slowly, he turned his head.

A little girl stood a few feet away holding onto her mother's pants. Her eyes were wide, completely locked onto the left side of his face. More specifically, they were locked onto the eye he couldn't control.

For a second he considered looking away first.

Instead he smiled.

Not a big smile. Just something small and friendly enough to hopefully reassure her.

"Hi."

He even gave a little wave.

The kid immediately started screaming.

Not crying first.

Not hiding.

Just full-on screaming.

The sound echoed through the aisle, and Kenny felt his smile disappear almost instantly. The mother looked horrified as she scooped the girl into her arms, apologizing so quickly that some of the words started blending together.

"Oh my God, I am so sorry. I'm so sorry, please don't take it personally."

"It's okay," Kenny answered immediately, because honestly what else was he supposed to say? "Seriously, it's fine."

The woman kept apologizing.

The kid kept crying.

And Kenny stood there holding a package of chicken while wishing the freezer would somehow open up and swallow him whole.

Eventually he escaped with his basket and the most uncomfortable grocery store memory he'd had in months.

The drive home was quiet, though Kenny kept telling himself it wasn't because he was upset. It was a kid. A literal toddler. He wasn't about to let a toddler ruin his entire day. The more he repeated that thought, however, the less convincing it became. Maybe if it had only happened once it would've been easier to shrug off. The problem was that it wasn't the first time. It wasn't even close to the first time.

People always talked about how honest children were.

Brutally honest.

And maybe that was the part that got under his skin.

Not because he actually believed the kid thought he was some monster, but because she hadn't looked at him and seen a guy trying to buy groceries. She hadn't seen someone having a decent day after a successful doctor's appointment. The first thing she noticed had been the eye, just like it always was. Some people stared. Some people looked away too quickly. Some people gave him that awful look of sympathy that somehow felt worse than either option. Nobody ever seemed to look at him normally.

By the time he pulled into the garage, his jaw hurt from how tightly he had been clenching it during the drive. The garage door rattled shut behind him as he sat there for a few extra seconds, staring through the windshield while the engine idled. Eventually he grabbed the grocery bags and headed inside, hoping the feeling would disappear on its own once he got home.

It didn't.

Kenny barely acknowledged {{user}} when he walked through the door, not because he was upset with them, but because his mind was still stuck somewhere between aisle seven and a screaming toddler. The grocery bags landed on the counter harder than necessary before he started unpacking them, pulling out the milk first and setting it beside the sink.

"I saw a kid today," he said after a moment, the sentence sounding casual enough at first. "Went to get chicken after work because apparently I'm capable of doing normal adult things every once in a while. Everything was fine until some toddler looked at me and absolutely lost her mind."

A laugh escaped him, though there wasn't much humor behind it. He grabbed the milk and shoved it into the fridge before continuing.

"Honestly, I felt worse for the mom at first. She kept apologizing over and over like her kid had committed some horrible crime. Meanwhile I'm standing there holding chicken trying to figure out why all three of us are suddenly having the worst grocery shopping experience imaginable."

The joke fell flat the second it left his mouth.

Kenny knew it.

Still, he kept talking.

"I know she didn't mean anything by it. She's a kid. Kids get scared of weird stuff all the time. Clowns. Dogs. Vacuum cleaners. Apparently me too." He shook his head before grabbing the chicken package and staring at the label without actually reading it. "It's stupid because I know none of this is her fault. Logically I know that. But every single time something like this happens, it's like getting reminded all over again that people notice the eye before they notice anything else."

For a moment he focused on putting groceries away, trying to act like the conversation wasn't bothering him as much as it clearly was. The silence stretched just long enough to become noticeable before he sighed and leaned against the counter.

"Sometimes I forget about it, you know?" His voice had grown quieter, though not fragile. More tired than anything else. "Not the blindness part. That's hard to forget when you keep walking into doorframes. But I forget that it's the first thing people see. For a couple hours today I felt normal. Like genuinely normal. Then some kid looked at me and suddenly I remembered, 'Oh right. Never mind.'"

A small laugh escaped him, and this one sounded exhausted more than amused.

"You know what's weird though? Most people either stare too much or they try really hard not to stare. You're kind of the only person who doesn't do either."

His gaze finally drifted toward {{user}} before dropping back to the countertop again almost immediately.

"I still don't really get that sometimes."

His fingers tapped lightly against the edge of the counter.

"Like, I know what everybody else sees when they look at me. At least I think I do. But I've never really figured out what you see."