Our Insecurities

Chapter One

Chaos. Fear. Anxious. Nervous. Apprehensive. That’s how the juniors and even some seniors felt whenever the chapel prefect was near. Favour Chidimma Okoye. Her name always sent goosebumps crawling the skin of her subordinates.

And there she stood chin up, in the middle of block A hall of the Ss1 hostel, as calm as ice while the students scampered to leave the hall before the count of ten. She watched, her face expressionless, as they jumped over and dunked under bunks to get out of the hostel, careful enough not to collide with one another.

While she counted, she scrutinized her olive skin for signs of any blemish or speckle. Finding none, her lips turned up in a little smile. She had feared her skin would be ruined since it was that time of the month.

At her count of eight, the hall was empty. She surveyed the empty hall with a slight nod and was about to leave the hall when every fiber of her body seemed to go still.

She was getting that feeling again. That foreboding feeling. She froze as it seeped into every part of her organ, leaving goosebumps at its wake. 

This wasn’t the first time she felt it. In fact, it started two months ago. That day, she had entered the school premises to hand in her WAEC fees teller in order to be assigned a class. Except that day, she came with two tellers; hers and her boyfriend’s. She had decided at the last minute to use that as a gift for his birthday which was coming up in the month of December. What other way to make his year better than to pay for his WAEC registration fee, submit it at the same time as hers and ask that both of them be assigned to the same class. That way, she could help the not-so-book-smart boy in class during assignments, tests and exams and put a momentary stop to him being an ‘academic disgrace’ as his father always said.

As she stepped out of the principal’s office, she had felt it for the first time. She had suddenly gone rigid, every muscle in her body tightening to the point where she couldn’t take a step forward. Then the goosebumps came crawling out and she held her breath, one that had her stomach sinking into a pit. Ten seconds later, the feeling was gone and had her rapidly taking gulps of air.  There was no trace of it, like it has never been there. For a moment, she had thought she only imagined it. But as it continued reoccurring, each time with a fear greater than the last, she became sure it was real. It happened rarely at first, but these days, it occurred more frequently and she knew very well what it meant. 

Something was about to happen. Something huge, something bad. She could only hope it has nothing to do with her. She wished to graduate with her boyfriend and travel the world together for one year like they have been planning. And she wasn’t going to let anything ruin that.

She shook her head and blew out a series of short breaths as she stepped out of the hostel block only to come face to face with three students at the entrance.

“Senior Favour, please can we just be allowed to dress up properly. I don’t have my bra on, Jane left her flip-flops inside and Jade didn’t bring her scarf along.” The student spoke with a subtle tilt of her head. 

For a moment, she allowed her eyes to linger on the infamous SsI triplets. She contemplated letting them in, but immediately changed her mind. That would defeat her purpose of being a mean senior. Again, she had heard from her fellow classmates how stubborn the triplets were but never got to encounter it first hand. That seemed to conclude her resolve.

“Jada,” Favour spoke, referring to the girl that did the talking, “you have a vest on right?” Jada nodded confused at what she was getting at. “Good. Wear it like that to the chapel. Jane, you can go barefooted for all I care and Jade, use your handkerchief as a scarf or did you forget that too?” She watched them grumble as they left but that didn’t make her reconsider her decision. She followed them instead to make sure they went straight to the chapel building.

As they approached the building, Favour could already hear Harmony’s voice as she sang a worship song. Favour’s boyfriend once joked that her voice could make angels join a party, which had earned a scoff in response. As she got nearer to the building, Favour couldn’t help but wonder why the school chose to make her the chapel prefect instead of Harmony. She had always wanted to be the academic prefect, but instead, Cherish had gotten that and chapel prefect duties were dumped on her. Now, she was stuck doing something against her wishes.

While Harmony sang alongside three other students as back up singers, Favour resorted to walking the hall to make sure no one was doing something outside what was supposed to be done. As she got to the space assigned to the Ss1 students, she ignored a group of girls who thought it was the right thing to discuss at that particular time. She doubled back though when laughter rang out from their midst. Favour could recognize only one voice. And while the triplets were stubborn, the owner of said voice was the bane of every school prefect’s existence. No one wanted to willingly deal with Deborah ever and Favour always found that amusing. What was so bad about the Ss1 student that everyone wanted nothing to do with her? She was about to find out anyway.

Slowly and quietly, she walked back to the pew where they sat. For a while, she simply watched them discuss how their vacation went. They were so engrossed none of them noticed her for twenty seconds. She watched one of them throw her head back in laughter only to freeze as she caught a glimpse of her. Her eyes widened and she tapped her friends one by one to quiet down. 

Favour almost smiled as she watched their faces morph into horror when they came to terms that she had been standing there for quite some time. But she didn’t let her smile show as she maintained her stoic expression. She also noticed something akin to fear flicker through Deborah’s eye for a while there.

“So your fellow students are leading worship and you think it’s the best time to share your long vacation stories?” While she spoke calmly, that didn’t stop the students from panicking.

“We are sorry,” they chorused like they had been rehearsing the sentence.

“No. You’re not sorry yet. But you will definitely be when I catch you again doing anything other than worshiping.” She watched them squirm in their seats before she continued. “You just returned to school yesterday and you can’t even behave yourselves for a complete twenty-four hours.”

“We are sorry senior.” This time they said more loudly as if to show how truly remorseful they were. Favour ignored them as she walked to the back of the hall to observe the rest of the students.

She listened to the songs, singing along to some but her peace didn’t last for long. She felt a tingling sensation, one she got only when someone was watching her intently. She scanned the hall carefully to figure out who was watching her to no avail. She shook her head and sighed in frustration. She said a little prayer for whatever bad thing that was going to happen not to have anything to do with her.

But she knew that wasn’t going to be the case. Somehow, she always managed to be at the middle of every crisis in school and this wasn’t going to be different. She only wished for it to be something she can handle easily.

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