The Game

Chapter 6

When I woke up, I was already late for school. I jumped from the couch and ran upstairs to get ready, prepare my bag and leave. I had missed 3 classes already this morning so I was running as fast as I could. When I finally arrived, everyone was in the amphitheatre of the school. The classes were mixed and when I came in the room, I tried my best to make myself discrete. No one had noticed me yet except Vic who was sitting in the middle of the amphitheatre with an empty chair next to him. He waved at me and I took place at this empty seat.

"So we forgot the alarm this morning ?" He smirked.

"I fell asleep on the couch !" I laughed. "What is this bullshit by the way ?"

"An intervention from associations about drugs, sex and stuff..."

We stayed here, barely listening to the intervention for about 15 minutes when I looked at the hour on my phone. 10h30, we still had 2 hours of intervention left.

"I swear to God I won't make it 'till the end. It's terrible !" I said, noticing that Vic had started playing some random game on his phone. He pressed pause and looked at me.

"Wanna get outta here ?" He asked, putting his phone away.

"Yes please !" I exclaimed, quietly enough not to be heard by the others. He took his bag and I followed him outside. Once we were in the corridor, we started laughing.

"Man ! No one even saw us !"

"I know right ! We're ninjas !" He answered then we high fived.

"Your hat Mr Fuentes !" remarked a teacher who was walking in the corridor near us.

"Sorry Mr Herold !" He said nicely, taking his beanie off. We got outside and as he put his beanie back on his head, making sure his hair looked nice, I took out my last cigarette.

"Damn ! You have one for me ?" He asked, desperate.

"Sorry it's my last one but we can share if you don't mind." I put it in my mouth, lit it up, breathed and gave it to him as we started walking.

"So you smoke, huh ?" I asked him.

"Not really, I mean I like one sometimes but it's not like I'm addicted either. Plus this shit is too expensive for me." He breathed and gave the cigarette back to me. "But you do ?"

"Yeah it's been a couple of years now. I'm not proud or anything like it's definitely destroying my lungs but whatever I guess. It relaxes me."

We soon arrived at this huge lake not so far and sat on a wood thing originally made for fishers.

"So how's life ?" I asked

"Great ! My brother and I jam a lot these times, school is okay and everything is fine so I guess I'm happy !"

"C'est la meilleure façon de voir les choses..."

"What ?"

"Sorry, french for 'this is the best way to see things'...I should stop speaking french when I'm outside what the fuck !"

"Your accent is good ! You're french ?"

"Yup !"

"I definitely don't know anything about you, do I ? How did you get to live here if you're french ?"

"I was born there, in the south of France and then I moved here for my dad's work when I turned 14."

"What's your best memory ? In your whole life ?"

"Er...I guess it was when my brother took me to my very first concert right before we moved here."

"And what's your worst ?"

I suddenly froze. I remembered all the details of that night. "I don't wanna talk about it. Another time maybe but I'm not ready...You're not mad, are you ?"

"Of course not ! Don't worry about it ! This is your life, not mine and only you can decide who you wanna tell it to."

"You're smart ! Thank you" I smiled. We talked a lot about life, its meaning and everything that can relate to it. And after a short silent, I asked him. "Do you wanna hear a personal story about me ?"

"Go ahead ! I like stories !"

"Okay so I was about 7 and on a sunny afternoon, my family and I went in some sort of grassland near our house you know. I remember I was running after that butterfly but it escaped and I fell down in the grass. My white dress was dirty and my knee was bleeding but I kept staring at the exact place where I had seen the butterfly disappear. Then my brother arrived and he sat next to me. He laughed and said in a sarcastic way 'You seem to be wondering what is life all about.' So I answered with a pretty serious face 'What is life all about ?'

He looked surprised of my answer but then he explained to me something I will never forget. He just said

'You know what ? Life is just a game. And we are the pawns. There are dudes up there above the clouds who play with us. They watch us live everyday. Sometimes they help us getting through life and sometimes they make it harder. We are their entertainment. But there is a goal to this game. Happiness. We live our lives with our qualities and flaws, our ups and downs and no matter what happens, if we die happy we win the game. If we don't, we loose. It may sound weird to you since you're still very yong but keep that in your mind forever cause that's what life is all about. Be happy, it's all that matters.'

"That's beautiful !" He exclaimed.

"I know right !" The sun was going down and the clouds started to let us guess what a real shower is if we did not go away from here quickly enough. "This is not good...I don't know about you but I'm gonna go home cause I'd rather no end up like yesterday."

"Yup ! Let's go !"