Chapter 1: Iron and Peanuts
Cough
The sound is wet, heavy. I try to open my eyes, but the dust in the air makes it an impossible endeavor. The cold from the floor against my face doesn’t make it any more comforting of an experience. A small dark patch of liquid creeps into my narrow vision. Tears? Well that would’ve been better, but the iron taste on my tongue serves as a strong reminder of my punctured lung.
“Arghh….”. A weak pathetic cry, barely audible to my own ears. But that’s all I can muster up right now, my whole body is in pain. Did they really have to make pain this realistic? I can’t move, and I can barely see, but I can tell - Familiar silhouettes lie motionless on the cold marble floor around me, but before I can grieve.
Thud….
A single drop of sweat rolls down my nose, merging into the bloody pool. The steps I hear are heavy, heavy enough to shake the floor beneath me
Thud….
The sound is terrifying, the one of impending doom floating above my head. The silence of the reaper, waiting beside me to finally collect my crumbled soul
Thud….
He’s getting closer…
The footsteps, in sync with the slowed down beating of my heart, cut through the long hallways of the throne room. Piercing through my eardrums and any sense of sanity I have left.
WHY?
Why am I scared of him? This isn’t real, none of this is. But why does he still terrify me?
Present day [2017]
BEEP BEEP BEEP
“Navire, wake up. It’s time for school”.
Ugh… it’s Monday already?
I open my still drowsy eyes and look at the poorly taped schedule attached to my room door - “Geography?” Sigh “It’s gonna be a long long day.”
By the time I get dressed, it’s already 6:40 AM. “Navire! You’re getting late! Hurry up!” Elara shouts, impatient as ever.
“I won’t be, don’t worry.” I say as I put on my ugly and uncomfortable school shoes. I don’t have a driver’s licence yet, after all I’m only 14. But Sector-CHD isn’t that strict in terms of traffic surveillance drones and I keep to the smaller lesser used streets, so my parents let me ride my mom’s old beat up scooter. It’s in rough shape and I hate the pink colour, but it’s the only way I can get to school on time. I unwillingly put my keys in the scooter and ride it out of the apartment’s parking lot.
School starts at 8:30, but I have to attend a cram school for math first. My school teachers and parents think I’m some kind of a genius, but I barely passed math last semester, shocking everyone I knew. But I’m not surprised, I only just figured out that you can’t add fractions by adding the numerator to the numerator and denominator to the denominator. And why would I have known this? I’m spending more time and energy avoiding the bullies at school that I never get to pay attention to or ask questions when I don’t understand something.
As I park my scooter, I see them… the bunch of bullies who pretend to be my friends. “Hey loser, you handed me the wrong homework yesterday?” says Oleo, the scrawny kid who is always seen eating peanuts. But it suits him, his manners are sized the same after all.
Not him again. Oleo is much shorter and skinnier than me, but I still can’t fight back. He grew up with the other five in the group, and they back him up in everything he does. I never really had any problems with any of the others, but they always take his side, so I hate them to my core.
“Answer you loser!” Oleo sprayed a mist of half-chewed peanut fragments as he barked. He wiped his salty, oily fingers directly into my shoulder, leaving a smudge on the white fabric. “The teacher made me write it all again. You think it’s funny making me work twice?”
“I’m sorry... I just don’t know how to solve that one,” I muttered, eyes on the oil stain.
Tanner stepped forward, he didn’t look angry; he looked disappointed, which was worse. “See, that’s the problem, Navire,” Tanner said smoothly, his voice loud enough for a passing student to hear. “You’ve got all this talent, but you’re so lazy you’d rather see Oleo fail than spend five minutes helping a ‘friend.’ It’s honestly kind of cruel.”
Oleo reddened, feeling validated. “Yeah! Cruel! Give me your bag.”
Tanner watched with a faint, bored smile, already looking toward the teacher’s car. “Careful, Oleo,” Tanner murmured softly, just for them. “Don’t leave a bruise. We wouldn’t want people thinking you’re the problem here.” Both of them then proceed to enter the classroom.
Thank goodness, I’m safe for now. But it won’t last long, I still have the entire rest of the day in front of me.
