CRUSH

FIRST DAY JITTERS.

I feel someone tap my shoulder and I look back only to see Agatha staring at me with a big smile on her face.

"Agatha" I scream as we hug and laugh, she's my friend and classmate and the only Igbo girl in s.s.s 2.

"Ha see as you're shining, you've eaten all of mummy's chicken abi? (Right)" she asks wiggling her eyebrows.

I laugh at this "who told you I even ate chicken?" I asked jokingly. "No need to tell me o, it's obvious from the way your skin is shining that you've been eating chicken. This shine can only be caused by chicken" she says examining my arms.

I pull my arms away from her "what of you? I'm sure you've eating all of your mum's isiewu (goat head peppersoup)" she nods at this "yes nah, don't you trust me?"

Before I can say anything else someone covers my eyes from behind. I grab the person's arms and after feeling it a bit I huff "is it Abigail? I hear Agatha say no and I take another guess "then is it julianah?"

"You know she would have welcomed you with a punch so it's not Julie o" I grab the person's fingers and twist it as the person yells and pulls her hands back, I turn quickly and see zainab rubbing her fingers gently.

"So it's you zainab, how is everything?" I asked pretending I didn't just try to break her fingers and trying hard not to laugh at her pained expression.

"Everything is not fine o, so common play that I was playing with you now you wanted to injure me shey?" She asks angrily and I blink innocently.

"It was just self defence o, I thought you wanted to harm me so I had to free myself" she doesn't look like she believes me but she goes along with it.

About 25 minutes later I've greeted my classmates and we're at the duty post supervising the juniors. I can't wait for my besties to arrive, currently I'm the only one in the group who has arrived.

A few minutes later the bus arrives and I see Semiat and hephzy step out, Semiat comes running up to me and we both hug. Hephzy reaches us a few seconds later and we fist bump.

"I have something important to tell you but I'm going to the principal's office first" Semiat says with a sour expression. I nod even though I'm worried about what she wants to tell me.

After dropping their bags in the class Semiat goes to the principal's office to supervise the juniors and make sure that the office is clean and hephzy joins me.

"I have something to tell you" she says and we move a bit to the side. "Okay o I'm listening so talk" I say anxiously.

She looks left and right before talking "so Semiat and jack became friends on Facebook during the holiday"

"Which jack?" I ask feigning ignorance. She glares at me "how many jacks do you know?" I roll my eyes before nodding. "Okay so what happened after that?"

"Well one day when they were chatting he told her that he likes one of us" my eyes widen at this and I move closer to her.

"Are you sure? Did he really say that?" I ask with excitement, he must be talking about me. OMG he likes me too.

Hephzy frowns but nods "yes I'm sure, he said it by himself" "okay so who does he like?" I asked expecting her to say me.

I am greatly shocked when she answers "he... He... Um so he likes Esther" she tells me rubbing her neck.

My eyes widen in shock "what did you just say?" I ask with a trembling voice. "He likes Esther" she says again and I stumble back in shock.

"How do you know that? Are you sure? When? How? Why?" Questions keep tumbling out of my mouth.

"He told Semiat by himself, he said she's so gentle and even told her to help him talk to her. He said he can die if she doesn't accept him" she says in a low voice.

I clear my throat "well there goes my feelings for him. It's okay though, I guess I will no longer like him" I say even though my heart hurts.

"Yeah he's an idiot" hephzy says and I nod in agreement. "Forget about him jare, gist me about the things that happened in the holiday"

I try so hard to mask my expression and act as if I'm not affected by what she told me but deep down I'm badly hurt, I feel like crying and my mind has already started conjuring several reasons why this is my fault.

' maybe it's because of my stature, he probably likes skinny girls. Maybe he doesn't like girls with light complexion' I think to myself as I nod at the things hephzy is telling me. I'm barely paying attention though.

I manage to catch a few things like the issue of the guy who keeps bothering her about being his girlfriend. I also hear her talk about her trip to Lagos and all the preparations being made for her cousin's wedding.

I'm still nodding absent mindedly when I hear something that makes me freeze in shock. Did she just say what I think she did?

"Wait wait wait o, what did you just say?" I ask in a high pitched voice. "I said I'm happy about it" she said avoiding my eyes.

I shake my head "no before that" "em I said Festus and I spoke a lot during the holiday" I glare at her before sighing. "After that" I say gritting my teeth. She's trying to play smart with me.

"W std dn nowjkr" I frown at this, "what did you say?" She mumbles her words again. "See me I can't hear you o, you better speak louder"

"Heandistarteddating" i groan at her antics. "Can you repeat that? But this time make it louder and clearer" she sighs before looking down "Festus and I started dating in the holiday and I'm happy about it"

My mouth falls open in shock. "You did WHAT?" I scream. Well this wasn't exactly what I had in mind for my first day.