Friendship Has No Goodbye

Chapter 3

October arrived with its autumn heat and humidity. During this time of the year, the confirmation class is usually taken for a retreat. A retreat is where the class visits a holy place for seminars for 4 days where phones and other kinds of entertainment aren't allowed. Sounds terrible I know. So this batch of confirmation class included the group. They all left their homes after lunchtime. A 6-hour long bus ride was passed by joking around and playing games on the bus.
Teachers confiscated the group's Uno cards after reaching their destination in the evening (Sadly, there went one of their sources of entertainment).

The group was divided as per their confirmation groups for their respective rooms. So sadly everyone couldn't be together. The Father (Priest) called them once they settled down and explained the importance of this retreat. He finished it up fast so they could rest a little and eat something. But not before giving them the news that he would be taking a session after dinner (The look on everyone’s faces must have been priceless).

After dinner, the Father took the session with them and then finally let them head to their rooms to rest. Since everyone was mostly tired and were eagerly waiting for it to be over, they jumped at the opportunity to leave. Jack’s roommates decided to do an overnight. They joined their bunk beds together, sat on top, and were doing time pass. Later, Ash came to meet Jack around midnight, when mostly everyone was asleep. Then they all finally slept after the adrenaline of the first night was gone.

John and Leo came to kick Jack’s and Ash’s butts to wake up since they knew these sleepyheads wouldn’t wake up on their own (2 hours of sleep aren’t enough for anyone). Everyone had to be up by 4 since those were the instructions given to them. The first day was prayer in nature. It was a good peaceful day. The group's favorite teacher Alice Ma’am arrived that day, so the group spent most of their time with her. In the evening, their confirmation class was divided into two and they had a great time doing debates. The next day, the teacher's son who was in charge of the session, took them for a nature walk. He gave them the message of seeing the good in every little thing.

Later, everyone was supposed to give confessions to the Priest, and then they could have counsel sessions with any animator (teacher) they were comfortable with. After everyone was done with confessions, Jack had freshened up and was in his room when he heard a commotion from outside. From the next room, one of the students rushed into Jack’s room screaming “Ghost” at the top of his voice. While the guys calmed him down and joked around, they went to check out his room.

His roommate was laughing uncontrollably. He had hidden in the cupboard and screamed out at his roomie like a ghost when he opened it. The poor guy felt so embarrassed he started swearing at his roommate and was heading to hit him while the rest were not able to hold back their smiles and laughter. Thankfully John, who had just come out of the shower, cooled his mind and he walked off peacefully.

Alice Ma’am left that day because she was required somewhere else. The group felt a little sad as they enjoyed spending time with her. There were counseling sessions for some selective people in the night with the Father. After his talk with the father, Jack went to Ash’s room and they were brainstorming to do something fun and they ended up on the plan of doing a night out. Ash and Jack together went to John and Messi's room. Leo had promised to come. But after a while, when he didn't come they went to get him.

They saw him sleeping in his room and tried waking him up. But apparently, he was dreaming that he was already in the night out with everyone and told them not to disturb him. He was genuinely dreaming that they all were having loads of fun at their night out. Everyone laughed so much over it but they let him sleep and went back to John's room. At 3, Ash and Jack were feeling sleepy so they slept in John's room, promising him that they would leave in an hour since it wasn't their room they were supposed to go before any animator came.

An hour later, Jack got up but Ash wasn't ready to do the same. When they tried waking him up, he started swearing at them, saying that it was his room. After a few minutes, he finally got up half asleep took a pillow along with him, and went to his room (Guess he liked the pillow too much). John, later in the morning, confronted Leo about his dream. He was so convinced that his dream was real that he couldn't believe them when they told it was a dream. Later on, they filled up Alisha on all the details. She had a good laugh over their nightly antics. Finally, the retreat had come to an end. Everyone had a good time, better than they expected. 

Soon after the retreat, the gang planned for a movie with Alice Ma’am. She agreed long with the condition of bringing along her friends and the group readily agreed. Her friends turned out to be a few of her students which included Selene too. Jack was so elated he invited Ash to come along too. But he politely declined as he wasn’t well and had already seen the movie. They all watched ‘Golmaal Again’ together and had an amazing time.