Toxic

The golden duo

Mariah turned around as she felt a hand along over her shoulder. She shivered when she saw his face.

"Turn around" He said and Mariah did as she was told. She took a deep breath in as they walked towards the school gates.

Students were piling up at the assembly ground already. A lot of them smiled at her. A few waved. Everyone in school knew her, everyone. That presented a problem in itself albeit the least of her worries, she hated that in a school of not less that 600 students, she was the most popular. It wasn't in her nature to go seeking for attention, attention came looking for her. She was beautiful, she knew it and when she had first arrived at Cedar Court High School, she'd been told that there was an ongoing bet on who would succeed in taking her out. JJ won that bet. Didi she regret going out with JJ?

A little.

"Hey" he said squeezing her shoulder, "see you later"

Clearing her throat a little, she nodded and he left. JJ was always slinging his guitar on his shoulder, he loved that thing, maybe even more than her.

Shaking her head she walked to where her class was standing and joined the back of the line.

Students stood by class. Mariah was in the advanced classes and JJ wasn't so they never stood together.

Mariah always felt that she wasn't the type of girl boys liked. Sure she was beautiful, but she was nerdy and she always felt herself to be quite awkward. But then she went through puberty and then she grew curves, and everything guys admired.

She droned out the voice of the vice principal as she let her thought wander off. He was saying the usual boring stuff, first day of the week, be good... Don't loiter... Blah blah blah.

Her eyes wandered into the crowd. A pair of eyes on the boys line caught her attention. He had his hands in his pocket and he had his right foot in front of his left as he rested his weight on his right leg. He was looking at her but he wasn't staring. It didn't look like he knew her, like he was trying to figure out something from her face.

Kami tapped her shoulder
"That's the new guy" she said excitedly

"He's already eyeing Mariah, na wa o" Rebekah said dropping behind her.

Mariah rolled her eyes. Girls were jealous of her, she was used to it. She didn't understand why? Because she was smart? Or because she was dating JJ?

"He's rich" Kami continued, paying no attention whatsoever to Rebekah.

Mariah rolled her eyes again, "Like I care" she said to Kami, "How do you know sef?

"He came with military men as escorts" Kami said in a duh tone

"Well, how was I supposed to know that?" Mariah forced herself to say.

"How would you know? When you're always so busy with him" Kami said pointing to JJ's side of the line. As if on cue he glanced at them and looked away. Then he looked back at her and fixed his gaze on her. He was telling her something. She had learnt to read his facial expressions early on in their relationship. She quickly turned away. She could feel JJ's eyes boring holes into her head.

"I hope he isn't in our class" Mariah said quietly.

"I hope he is" Kami said, "Then I'll get to talk to him and maybe he'd be my first boyfriend. You never know"

Mariah chuckled. Kamikaze was class president, which meant that she got to speak to all new students before anyone else all while claiming to be 'doing her job'
"That should be a crime of some sort. Using your power as an unfair advantage"

Kami shrugged just as the whispers go louder at the assembly ground.

"What's going on?" Mariah asked Kami. They both hadn't been listening, so none of them could tell what the Vice Principal had been talking about. Kami took a few steps forward as she listened to the conversations of the girls in front of them.

"It's a science competition. We'll take an exam to chose the top three. 'A' classes only. The exam is today"

"Okay" Mariah said half heartedly. She and Kami were in the 'A' class. They advanced class. Where the teachers speak a thousand words per minute and they covered the syllabus in a month and they were all on fast track to the university even at age 15.

The students were dismissed and Kami headed up to the principal's office with their teacher to get the exam questions.

Mariah made her way to her seat by the window facing the street. She hung her bag on the handle of her chair as she settled into her seat.

Kami came in moments later with test questions and Mr new guy behind her. Mr Micah, their class teacher followed closely behind.
The students quickly made it to their seats.
Mr Micah cleared his throat.

"Are you all here?" He asked

"Yes sir" they chorused

"I would take a roll call but I don't care. It's not like any of you stand a chance if passing this test anyways" Mr Micah said.
Mariah chuckled. Was she nervous? Heck no! Mariah never failed. That's not pride, that's a fact. Mr Micah was not necessarily mean, he just couldn't be bother by a lot of things and he hated dummies or as he exquisitely called them, 'olodos'

"We have a new student with us today. This guy." he said pointing at the new guy. "decided to show up two weeks after the term had begun. Pretty stupid if you ask me" the class chuckled, "So tell us your name... "

"My na..." new guy began

"Shut up" Mr Micah said shushing him. "I didn't ask you anything"

Mariah chuckled. What a bad day to start school. First the test and now Mr Micah.

New guy smiled and nodded. He wasn't fazed by Micah at all

"Tell them your name, your previous school and your score on the entrance exam"

New guy remained silent, staring at Mr Micah, "Go on, talk" Micah urged him.
"My name is Harrison Akpojevwe. I moved here from owerri, from Command secondary school. I scored a 96.8 in the test"

Gasps and whispers were heard through out the room.

"He almost beat Mariah's high score"

"He's freaking smart"

Mariah rolled her eyes. Sure the guy had a 96.8. But she had scored a 97 the highest score in Cedar Court's history of entrance exams.
This Harrison guy, was not all that.

"Enough." Mr Micah said, he nodded to Kami who started distributing the test questions, he pointed to an empty seat and Harrison took his seat. "Let's see how stupid you actually are. This test is probably the hardest you'd ever write. Try not to fail"

Mariah flipped the script over as soon as Kami dropped it on her desk, she carefully wrote her name and number on the dotted lines left for that purpose.

"fifty questions, forty-five minutes" Mr Micah said when Kami had gotten to her seat beside Mariah. "Start now" The room was silent only the sound of pages flipping through out the room and pencils shading the right answer.
"If you do not know how to solve number one, you might as well give up now. Number two is not going to be any better"

Mariah rolled her eyes. Number one. She read the question, particle distribution theory. Pfft. Easy.