A Secondary School Survivor; Year One...

Not So Sunny

Duna nearly gave the poor girl an elbow to the face.

Sharon flinched slightly with Duna's response. She couldn't blame her; the place was dark and quiet, and she was at least twice her size. Somehow, they had both missed the siren over an hour ago.

Duna heaved again and Sharon rubbed her back until she calmed down.

"Are you sick?" She asked to which Duna replied by shaking her head.

"I don't feel ill. I guess my body just wanted to be rid of today's lunch", Duna said, relieved that she was no longer feeling nauseous. All she had to do was clean up the mess she had made and all the while, she forbade any help from Sharon and the bigger girl resigned to sitting aside while Duna worked.

Duna decided against taking a bath, which would draw too much attention, and instead, she slipped into the most presentable version of the checkered evening wear she owned. In a few minutes, she and Sharon were tiptoeing down the corridor and towards the lobby. As if it was empty by miracle and not even the security ladies were stationed outside the doors. Neither needed to be told twice that they had to make a break for it. Dinner was in five minutes and then night prep. Arriving any later attracted consequences.

They made it in time however and forty-five minutes later, Duna was somewhat settled in her class for prep, feeling every ounce of regret for eating even a morsel. Hunger did wonders, turning the pickiest of eaters into savages over a mere crust of bread. Until after consumption, one would never realize that it bore potent poison.

She took out the first textbook she saw and began flipping through it. Coincidentally, it was her Basic Science textbook, and the first page to catch her interest happened to be the module on experimentation with green plants. Her stomach calmed enough for her to picture herself in a laboratory right next to a greenhouse and she let her mind wander far, far enough to almost feel the warm sunshine on her face as she grafted a quarter of a young plant onto the-

"Somebody, tell that girl to wake up."

Duna felt a harsh slap on her back, and she jerked into consciousness, a frown on her face. She heard muted snickers and felt the mocking grin of her assaulter before she even met his eyes. Then she looked for the source of the voice and found him just outside the door, wielding a two-feet long cane, dutifully bandaged. She bit the inside of her cheek and went back to her book, focusing only on committing the theoretical aspects to memory.

Halfway through prep time, Duna put down the book as she had grown quite weary of the dead silence in the school, and it had begun to put her mind to sleep. She took up a pencil and her sketchbook and began doodling. Not too many minutes later, the same teacher reappeared and began walking through the rows of desks and chairs, poking the dozing students with his cane. Cups of coco pops were removed from sight and milk sachets were slotted between the pages of dictionaries. One boy in a corner was counting his illegally retained Daria notes and promptly made them vanish by the time the teacher drew near. 

Duna had her sketchbook snatched from her.

"Is this Visual Arts class?" the stern-looking man asked, brandishing his cane. Duna flinched when he waved it a little too close to her face. He flung the sketchbook at her, and she tucked it away, replacing it with another textbook, visually menacing in comparison to the last.

The next fourteen minutes felt like two whole periods to Duna as she struggled desperately to force something into her head. She settled for reading and rereading about water and its components. Fed up with the incessant pacing of the assistant teacher up and down her row, she switched to the crossword puzzles in the assignment section.

She had just finished the puzzle in the thirteenth chapter when the siren finally went. The joy of the Lord in her bones began to sing with a frenzy that demanded enough adrenaline to sprint down the stairs and straight to the hostel–