MOMENTS BETWEEN US: PART 12

The air felt tense as I stood frozen in place. Up ahead, a senior led a group of friends, their faces twisted with anger. My heart raced as I looked for an escape route. The tension crackled in the air, sending shivers down my spine. Just as things seemed ready to explode, the head prefect intervened. The seniors backed away, but I knew the trouble wasn’t over yet.

From that day on, I decided to stay away from Lora for a while and focus on my studies. After all, that was the reason I came to school. Besides, I knew that the senior and his group would ambush me, knowing very well where I would go to meet Lora. I’ve learned to always use a long spoon when eating with the devil.

I was able to avoid Lora until the day before we left for the break. I needed to get her phone number so that we could continue our relationship outside of school. So one evening, I dressed up and went to see Lora at my housemaster’s place. On my way there, I heard an announcement that all first-year students needed at the assembly hall.

I reluctantly went there, and the head boy’s prefect advised us to be of good behaviour when we go home and to take our studies seriously. Other prefects also gave us their advice. The last prefect, the entertainment prefect, spoke about a tradition in the school called Ghost Night. No one slept the last night we spent in school before the break. If you dared to sleep, you would be whipped with a belt or a sponge. After their talk, it was past nine, so we were asked to march straight to the dorm and prepare for our departure the following day.

Albert Einstein said there’s nothing faster than light, but clearly, he didn’t live long enough to see how fast I had fallen for Lora. If our love story was grammar, I would replace our simple past with present continuous and hope to be her future perfect. The next morning, I went straight to her house to bid her farewell. “I’ve been reading the Bible since morning, but when I got to Numbers, I realized I didn’t have yours. Can you give me your number?” I asked her. She smiled and wrote down her phone number.

As soon as I got home that day, I tried calling her. I did the first time, but her phone was off. I tried again but got the same response. I waited for an hour to call, but the phone was still off. I called the following day, but her phone was still off. I continued to call for the next few days, but there was still no answer. A week later, I tried calling again, and this time it went through. I was super excited, and without waiting for her to say “hello,” I started talking, “Hello baby, I hope strongly that your middle name isn’t Grace because I don’t want to share you with anyone.” I was expecting to hear her usual giggles, but to my surprise, I heard the deep voice of a grown man. “As soon as school resumes, see me in my office,” he said, ending the call.