From The Ashes We Rise

Chp 31: Meeting the Cat Again

Ariff didn't come to school for two days. Delta informed me that he said something happened to his hand and needed to go to the hospital. I was confused by this because I had thought Delta didn't wanna be with Ariff anymore. I guess either they still communicated online about stuff or maybe Ariff just decided to tell him.

He came back on Wednesday. His left hand was in a bandage and every time he tried to write, he would grimace because his hand hurt.

His hand movement was very limited, judging by how he had to do almost everything with his right hand.

Sometimes during the day, Ariff would glance at my wounds and narrow his eyes at me, which was pretty creepy. Sometimes he'd look at my wounds from afar before shaking his head, as if he thought it was something else.

Ariff wouldn't be doing what he usually did when he bullied me. Instead, he would keep eyeing my scars and then look away. I found that super weird. I got that he found pleasure in my misery but that was on another level of creepy.

The next day, after our PE lesson, I was talking to Delta as we made our way to our class for recess. I forgot to bring my wallet so we went back to retrieve it.

"So, Delta, why is it that some girls look like they're wearing a Japanese girl's uniform?" I asked.

"The lower sec girls wear that. It looks good on them. Sadly when they reach upper sec, the girls have to wear the same kind of uniform as us guys. The girls in our class are pretty salty about it," he explained.

We burst into laughter at that last sentence. I imagined the girls in our level just being annoyed that they can't be Japanese schoolgirls anymore.

As we walked, I didn't realise Ariff was right behind us. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that someone was following us but brushed it off as my anxiety acting up again.

Suddenly, I felt someone shove me into a wall near our classroom. I yelped as my face hit the wall.

"Hey! What are you—"

I was turned around and stood face-to-face with a fuming Ariff. He pinned me against the wall, even with his bandaged hand.

I looked behind him and saw a couple of our classmates watching. Some of them have their phones out, ready to film the shit that's about to go down.

"You fucking stabbed my hand!" He yelled.

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

I was confused; I didn't remember attacking Ariff during the weekend.

Ariff slammed me into the wall. I grimaced. What's his problem?

"You stabbed a branch into my fucking hand!" He insisted.

"But I—"

"Don't lie! Don't fucking lie!"

Delta watched on as Ariff interrogated me. I glanced at him. He covered his mouth with his hand, frozen on the spot. He didn't seem like he could do anything at that moment.

Ariff kept insisting that I was the cause of his bandaged hand. I kept arguing that I wasn't. He didn't seem to take kindly to my arguments and got even angrier.

"How you get those scars, huh?" He asked in the midst of this.

"I... fell?" I answered hesitantly.

"No. I gave you those wounds."

"No, you didn't," I argued again.