Waltzing With the Wolves

Chapter 11

I really hope no one sees me right now. 

What Zainab had suggested after Madrasah last week, which had really pissed me off, is now what I see as the best option. So now I am at school, waiting around the staircase leading to the rooftop, my eyes on the lookout for teachers and students, hoping no one will see me go up.

Imagine someone sees me and figures out later that it was only Nasir and me up there the entire time? I cannot handle such. My father would murder me, or more preferably, as Iffat use to say, "Murder us, chop us into pieces, and put us on skewers like the suya Mallams sell in the evening." The last thing I want to happen to me is to be caught in any compromising situation with a guy, and since I am in a Muslim school, it will only get worse from there; the perfect tale of the forbidden teenage boy and girl scenario.

But I have to do this, and no one must see me. Meeting in classes is a no-go, I can't have anyone seeing me and Nasir talking and finally figuring out what it is about because if they do and at the end of the day if I do get-- no, when I do get the first position, it won't be a big deal because everyone would know it was Nasir's brain that helped me.

I really cannot have that happening.

I clutch my book tighter to my chest as some juniors walk past me to go down the stairs. For a brief moment, there is no one. As I am about to go up the stairs, Mr. Wasiu walks past, and I greet him. He answers me with a grunt, the doughnut he is chewing a more interesting matter.

As soon as he passes, I disappear up the stairs at a maddening speed.

I am only safe when I reach the top of the second set of five stairs leading up. The small iron door to the roof budges noiselessly as I open it, and a gust of dust greets me first, and then it is the silence of the place.

No one comes up here, I wish there are interesting tales to say about this place like the past headmaster had said when we were in JSS2, causing us all to avoid it like a plague. "It is because birds land up there and transform into humans." "If the door locks on you, no one can hear you scream for help." "They killed ten snakes last term, and if you die there, the birds that have turned into humans will carry your body to the other world, and no one will be able to even find your body." 

For a while, we said these as jokes, created versions of our own, and as we grew older, it got boring and repetitive, only a manner of teasing around juniors now. The current Principal had been very direct about why we should not go there. "It is out of bounds for students. Do so, and you'll be caned." Simple, direct, without spinning some fairytale about witches and imaginary snakes.

But then, why is only Nasir allowed up here? 

I look around for him, and I spot him at a corner of the roof, a phone in hand and directed up to the sky. He is even allowed a phone on school grounds? He hasn't seen me yet, and I feel an inner force pull me back to the door and down the stairs, but the reminder of why I am here hits me like my father's punch, so I approach him.

He looks back when I am close to him. His mouth hangs open as he regards me, and I clear my throat to speak.

"I...I only came to ask you to teach me how you solve equations without the need for a calculator." I get straight to the point. All I need is his secret hack or formula, and I will be gone in a second.

"What?" His mouth is still hung open.

"How do you solve maths, physics, chemistry problems, and so on without even using a calculator?" I clarify.

I don't miss the way he looks away, because he isn't so subtle about it. He looks at his phone, his finger scrolling absentmindedly through the pictures. My eye goes to the screen. Clouds. Clouds. And only clouds.