Tuesday, September 6
"Hey, hurry up, would you? We're going to be late if you don't move your short legs fast enough." My brother, Cain, shouted at me from a meter away. My shoulders sagged as I tried to catch up to him. The bus stop was right across the street from the park, which was a five minute walk from where we lived. A bus rolled to a stop in front of us as soon as we cross the street, and took off again as soon as we stepped on.
"Now remember," Cain looks at me straight in the eyes, as if he was searching for something. "You only need to stay there until 11:30, and then you can leave. All you need to do is collect your time table, and put a lock on your locker. After that, you will go straight home, understand?" His tone is harsh and firm, and I nod along slowly. We roll to a stop at an intersection, where we would walk again for 5 minutes, until we got to the school.
"Go have fun, okay? And don't look at people with your glare, it makes you look like an a**hole." He pats me on the back, before shoving me through the entrance. He walks me around the first floor again, before sending me to my classroom, which was the second hall through the main hallway, labeled B-wing.
The classroom is empty, so I wait outside. It gets quite boring when you're alone and in a pretty deserted hallway. I tap my foot against the floor, observing the walls. They're lined with science stuff; paintings and pictures of the elements from the periodic table, and micro-organisms that are drawn out and framed on the wall. Someone much taller than me stops and stares with me.
"Fascinating, isn't it? Don't worry, you'll have the chance to do stuff like that too." A tall man holding a coffee mug in his hand smiles down at me with tired eyes. He has a skinny frame, and his handed are worn from years and years of teaching. I jump a little, too startled to response. He walks into the classroom and I follow after him. The man's movements are quick, bolting from one side of the room to the other.
Slowly, more people start filling the classroom. I don't recognize any of them, except for Kenneth, who I detected instantly from the way he walked. He slides into the desk beside me, and I make no effort to greet him. The bell gave one loud ring, and class began.
"Good morning everybody. I hope you all had a nice sleep, and if you didn't, you can go grab coffee from McDonalds later that's right across the street. I heard it's only $1 right now, which is a pretty good deal if you'd ask me." Nobody laughed. Our teacher pouted, and took a big sip from his cup.
"Okay, I see that my class has absolutely no humour in them today. That's fine, I'll give you all a minute to wake up. For now, I'll take attendance." He whips out a pencil and a sheet of paper from somewhere, and starts going down the list.
"Avery? Avery Bai?" A girl sitting adjacent to me raises her hand, and he marks something on the list.
"Fiona Chen."
"Hi." Fiona waves from across the room.
"Merrick Cho."
"Here."
"Shaun Dai? Wow, what a huge French pun." Our teacher giggles quietly. The boy rolls his eyes dramatically.
"Yeah, I hear enough of that from my friends."
"Tyrese Domingo?"
"Here." A bulky athletic kid raises his hand. He's really tall, but then again, I am only 5'2".
"Holliday Gao. Is it okay if I call you Holly?" The one named Holliday sits in front of me. She's sort of pretty, but I wonder what's underneath all that makeup of hers...
"Here, and of course you can call me Holly, I don't mind." Her voice is light and silky. She's shy.
"Sophie Guan." It's the girl sitting beside Holliday. They seem to be very friendly with each other, perhaps they're friends from the same home school?
"Kenneth Hu." The lanky boy beside me raised his hand. His scratchy voice replied with a lazy "here", and went back to texting someone on his phone beneath the table.
"Darren Hu."
"Sup."
"Beni Jargon."
"Here."
"Jeremy Jiang."
"Yo."
"Terry Leng."
"Hi."
"Peter Liang."
"Here."
"Melissa Ng?"
"Hey."
"Veridian Ping?" There's a silence. The teacher glances up from the attendance and takes a look around the room. Suddenly, a girl with a camo green jacket bursts into the room, a McDonald drink held tightly in her hand.
"Here! Wait, did you call my name yet?" She looks terribly confused. Our teacher motions for her to take a seat. She takes the desk to my left, beside me.
"Does your name happen to be Veridian?" He asks as soon as he sees that the girl has settled. She nods enthusiastically and takes a huge sip from her drink.
"Alright, next up we have... Uh," He's squinting at the paper, which is inches away from his face. "Chael Raider..." My face turns red, and beside me, Kenneth snickers.
"Mr, you've pronounced it wrong. It's supposed to be pronounced as "kale"." I correct him. He thanks me, and moves on. I kick Kenneth in the shin, and he doubles over the desk in pain. It was my turn to laugh now, but only an airy chuckle makes its way out of my throat. Looks like I busted my voice again. It's always been pretty fragile after that incident.
"What, cat got your tongue?" Kenneth sneers at me. I self-consciously pull the black scarf around my neck tighter so that nobody could see what was underneath the soft silk.
"Venn Roi." A boy way playing on his phone, his music turn up way too loud. The teacher called his name again. He didn't answer.
"I GUESS HE ISN'T HERE THEN." He yelled out loud, which startled all of us, including the student who was on his phone.
"H-here."
"Diana Wang."
"Hello!"
"Faye Xu."
"Here."
"Nicole Zhou."
"Hey."
"Emily Zhu."
"Hi."
Our teacher claps his hands together, and beams at us. We all stare at him confusedly.
"It's about time for some introductions! Hello students, you can call me Mr. Hui, and I will be teaching you science for the next ten months! I'm also your homeroom teacher, so be prepared to see me a lot." The room is silent, an awkward tension fills the space. Mr. Hui sighs deeply, but a smile still plastered on his face.
"So, I see that you guys are clearly not interested in me. Perhaps you will be a little more interested in knowing your classmates instead. Well then, how about this," He holds up a stack of papers and waves them around. "When I hand you your timetable, you're going to state your name, the school you went to, and one interesting thing about yourself." I instinctively pull my scarf tighter and try to make myself smaller.
Here we go again.
YOU ARE READING
Caving In
General Fiction"Do you really want me here?" "I-I..." "You've always been pretending, in front of me, and behind me. Haven't you?" Chael Sans Raider is not having the best time of her life, especially since her friends are always leaving her behind. She wants to f...
