PSPA

5

Just what you thought was a disappointing ending opened the door to your true beginning. - Shuttle_river.

"Don't worry" Angelica whispers to my ear, seeing me agitated on the spot.

"I'm not convinced, Angi," I say truthfully with a lump in my throat.

He looked at me with hatred before, I'm really afraid of what might happen to me.

"You stay calm, don't let him see you're scared or just make it worse. Pretend nothing happened" suggests Angi putting a hand on my shoulder.

I inhale his intense cologne and swallow...I feel like at the doctor when you smell alcohol and you know that soon a needle will pierce your skin, but still try to stay calm and keep the fear inside.

I wince when the door is closed and the professor goes back to sit in his place, then rummage in his briefcase.

Out comes a celestial register and opening it, click the cap of the black pen and write something in the register, maybe the date and what we talked about.

"Alaya Myriam" begins the appeal.

"Present," Myriam says unawares.

"Please raise your hand or I don't see you," he spits arrogantly, looking back at the ledger.

"Yes, excuse me. Present" ritenta Myriam alzando la mano.

We look like stupid little soldiers.

The professor nods and continues with the appeal until my turn.

"Fernando Benedetta"

"Present" I raise my hand with my eyes down, I don't have the courage and the strength to face it at the moment.

I expect him to continue with the appeal, but I hear grave silence, until his hoarse and persuasive voice asks "Everything ok, Miss Fernando?"

I lose a heartbeat, it's so weird to hear my name coming out of his mouth.

I slowly look up as he boldly asks, "Perhaps she is disturbed by my presence?"

I have to bite my tongue hard not to tell the truth, "No, why should I?"

"You tell me," he replies with a haughty rhyme, raising his eyebrow.

He looks at me with a mixture of fun and contempt, then looks away and continues the bored appeal "Galioto Maria Costanza"

"Present," Mari replies, raising her hand, while I throw up all the air in my lungs and close my eyes for a second.

This is never going to work.

"Okay, we have 15 minutes. I have explained to you a little bit what we are going to start with tomorrow's program, we are going to spend an intense year and I need your maximum attention and cooperation. Can I count on you?" the professor asks as he closes the register after having finished the appeal and rises from his chair.

"Yes, Professor," some of the class bleat in chorus, while he leans back on his desk, crosses his muscular arms and adds: "Well, then, let's use this remaining time to get to know each other a little".

Giorgia in the front middle row starts to speak, but the professor stops her with one hand, then points at me and says with a tilt of his head, "Let's start from the side row, from her".

I open my eyes wide for surprise and straightening my back I murmur "I...my name is Benedetta"

"And we all got there," he says, making the whole class laugh.

I look at those goats of my classmates and I say torturing the skin of the nail "I live in Palermo"

The professor smiles with amusement and the whole class starts laughing at me again, fuck you! It was not obvious that I was from Palermo, maybe I could stay in a small village nearby.