Dubem [A NIGERIAN STORY]

Chapter 6

Dedicated this chapter to Teefabulous

««« Chapter 6 »»»

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Brushing my shoulders against the rough walls of the pathway, I paused at the steps that led to my classroom. "Have you... started with your work?"

"Which work, are you for real now."

"Did you forget we were instructed to fill a whole sixty leaves exercise book with an apology letter, Vicky stop pulling my legs."

She froze. She wasn't smiling again, the corners of her mouth widened, forming the perfect shape of an 'o'. She threw her arms to her head immediately.

"It's okay, I forgot mine too! Do you realize we're thirty minutes late for school."

Somehow, I had managed to successfully avoid any sort of interaction with Ella. I shunned her down when she asked me if we could have a brief conversation at lunch, each time constantly reminding her that I had a meeting with a teacher. I couldn't be with her anymore.

What kind of friend sells you out like that.

It was really sad and heartbreaking. I could remember vividly, the very first day I got admitted into this school. While the others stared me down and exchanged strange glances with the students from the class situated adjacent ours till recess, she was my savior.

We were perfectly getting along. Though my perspective descried about the boys of my class that day, it was only for the reason that she made me see them differently. It's sad enough that I had to think about it.

She hung around with the boys, and while I would be alone or far from them, she would sweet-talk me into joining their conversation, always saying it was only for a short while.

I was introverted, she knew that, and I did not like to talk much. Do not get me wrong, I was the shy type - well not until I met her. As the weeks passed, we were gradually becoming inseparable.

We worked on our projects together, including the one's we were given to work on individually. If there's one thing I'd observed from Great Minds, definitely it was the small exclusive cliques they formed amongst themselves.

This school was never friendly, I'd known this specifically, from I the day I stepped my right foot in here. Recently, a new person had joined us.

This newcomer was a chocolate skinned with exceptional light brown eyes. 'Hazel', was what Dami would often call her. He was the tall one with the swag, pretty much handsome may I add.

And as shameless as he was, he proceeded further to call her other pet names, while she would bow her head in embarrassment. Names her father probably would just not call her in public, just not to get misunderstood or seem like one of those creepy old men.

They called her, 'Dami's Girl', and laughed about it. I could tell some of them were jealous by the way they hovered around him. These people seemed like the one's she moved around with.

"...Prokaryotic and eukaryotic micro-organisms such as bacteria from the Kingdom Monera..." I hadn't realized when my biology started talking. "...break the food and recycle them to make them available to us again through the nutrient cycle". He said, after which he had sketched on the white marker board, different organisms and their cells.

Two minutes later, I sighted what seemed like the protruding stomach of our average heightened, dark Chemistry teacher barge into our class. He smiled cornily at Mr Elijah, our Biology teacher. "Can I have the science students of SS1? You're using half of my period, I have them now."

Somehow, I had found that sentence really amusing.

Mr Elijah did better to ignore. He pretended like he hadn't heard the other man speak, and while he watched Mr Samuel, our Chemistry teacher hang impatiently around the walls of the Biology lab, he took his time to speak. "Form a note on Adaptation. I do not want joint work. Read and summarize, there's a test tomorrow".

There was something really up with those two.

Like Bio class, we hurried to grab seats as we ran to the Chemistry laboratory. Earlier when I went through the day's time table, I'd already known chemistry was the next period, and as the only teacher I knew, never missed his period for anything, I headed to my classroom to pick up my Chemistry notebook from my school bag.

It was weird enough I had to see Ella in class too. I tried all means possible I could to avoid looking in her direction. Immediately she got whatever she was looking for in her bag, she headed for the Chemistry class. I guess she came for her notebook too.

I reached for my desk where my black bag sat as I shuffled through the notes in my bag. "Geography, Civic, English... ". There was no sign of it. This time, I floored all of my books to the ground, proofreading over and over through the subject plate of each one of them.

"Are you coming? He's waiting for us oo. Better hurry up." Vicky stood beside me to explain.

"Yes, I'll be there."

Did you enjoy this one? What do you think Ella's up to?..