After Rain ✅

[ four ] ground

Mrs. Ross was glancing at me every now and then and I was tempted to leave to class before the time could end. She was looking at Zaid more, instead of roaming her eyes all over the class, it looked like she was relaying the lecture to him and me and it was pretty infuriating.

''You look sick.'' Beside me, Silas whispered, keeping his head buried in the history textbook and pushing up his specs over the bridge of his nose. Silas was in most of my classes, and it wasn't helping the matters. Without even saying anything, he had decided to tag along and it had already earned me more stares from what I needed.

In the morning I caught Bianca sneering at me as I made my way to English, ''New friend?'' she had asked in an icy voice and Silas had thrown a confused look in my direction. He didn't ask anything, in fact since that time he had quietly walked beside me without saying a word.

''I'm okay'' I whispered back, leaning over him a little so he could hear me alright. He didn't say anything and nodded in response.

Mrs. Ross droned on, explaining events that were lost to me and paused when she had about fifteen minutes to go, ''We're done with the topic, now lets talk about this term's assignment.'' Class let out a collective groan which she ignored,

''Its says in your term outline what the assignment is about but I'll briefly explain again,'' she began to say, ''you have to write an essay, specifically a research essay, no longer than three word pages.''

''Three pages?'' Someone exclaimed from behind, their cry was dismissed,

''This essay will teach you how to write academically and read widely on your topics,'' she clapped her hands, ''topic is your choice. History is a vast subject and you can choose anything, any event, any place that interests you. If I like your topic, I can even give you bonus marks.'' She assessed the class, beaming with excitement as if it was the most generous act that had ever been done by anybody.

''You can do it alone or you can pair up with someone you want. The choice is yours, but you need to submit your names after ten minutes so I can add you in the list!'' The final clap indicated that they were free to chose partners. People began to buzz around each other looking for pairs.

''Hey, should we do it together?'' Silas offered me, for a moment I thought he was joking but he looked solemn enough, ''I don't know anybody else and I'm bad at writing things. I feel comfortable working with you.''

I didn't feel comfortable at all, not with him tagging along with me, not with him sitting so close to me that I could smell his cologne and not with working with him on a school project. I shrugged,

''Okay'' I breathed out before any other thoughts could cloud my brain.

A smile broke over his face, crinkling his face and making his eyes shine with joy. Something thundered in my heart when I took in his smile and my fingers clenched in a fist, I tried to return his expression but all I could do was stare at him.

''Thanks Nicola, I really appreciate it!'' He gave me thumbs up, ''Lets go get our names on the list.'' I kept ogling him like a fool, he had to reach out his hand and grab mine to lift me off my seat and walk towards Mrs. Ross's table. Dazed, I followed him and saw several people eyeing us. One of them was Zaid and his gaze burned through mine, piercing. I felt a shiver run down my spine from intensity of his gaze and I dropped Silas's hand.

Mrs. Ross regarded us with interest as she typed our names on the list she had open on her laptop, ''Nicola Moore...Silas Reid...all good! I expect great things from you guys.'' She beamed again, '''Silas, you should know that Nicola is particularly good at writing. She even won a creative writing award last year.'' The memory was so distant that even I had forgotten about it. When I thought about the stupid competition again, all I saw was Lee smiling back at me, her hands clenched in fists and raised and she whispered me good luck.