Hell Mary

Chapter Two

Dominic took it upon himself to drive the girls to school before turning the wheels around to go to work. He had been there when the head matron ransacked their items with her eyes as sharp as an eagle waiting to see a contraband.

"These earrings are bigger than the normal full stop," The middle aged matron said, handing the earring to Dominic. That was surprisingly the only thing they found in the bag of Ashley and confiscated.

Turning over to Mary with a sheer look of disapproval, she looked into her traveling bag.

"You're new?" The lady asked, seemingly jotting something down.

"Yes ma!" Mary replied and stepped aside as the lady checked her items.

"Is that all? Where's your hoe, detergent and the rest?" The matron asked, locking the bag up when she had finished as there was only a handful of things to go through. The wrinkles in her forehead were furrowed and her dark skin glowed lightly as sweat beads were evenly distributed on her skin.

"My wife didn't buy that for you? Is this all she bought for you?" Dominic asked perplexed and Mary slowly shook her head. "Anyways," he dipped his hands into his pocket and counted out some currency notes then handed it over to the matron. "I'll get the others during visiting OK?" He had spoken to Mary silently.

"Thank you sir," she beamed graciously and her teeth shone, a great contrast to her skin.

Dominic gave his usual words of advice to the both of them and prayed with them before hopping back into his range rover sport and drove away. Since Mary was new, she fed her eyes with the wonderful scenery while still speeding up her pace to meet Ashley's.

"Is that the hostel?" Mary had managed to ask referring to the building at the far end but Ashley gave no reply and so Mary glued her tongue back into her mouth.

They arrived the building in no time and soon two girls sprang out of the hostel and jumped on Ashley. One had to be Stella, Mary thought. That name was far too mentioned in the house not to take notice and she was sure Stella had visited once or twice probably when she had been too occupied with work at the kitchen or somewhere else in the house to take cognisance.

"Who is she?" One had asked referring to Mary. Her hair was not as long as Ashley's, but a rich black and so was the other's.

"Some girl that lives with us," Ashley replied and waltzed into the building with her bags being released from her by her friends.

The hostels were built in a square format, erecting large rooms end to end and the dinning hall was at one end in a separate building. The rooms had giant iron doors guarding them and Mary later learnt that each room belonged to a senior class while the juniors lived upstairs.

Mary followed Ashley and her friends keenly by their heels and observed the room they had landed into. The space was massive for the number of bunks she could see inside. Their wardrobes were inbuilt and had been firmly attached to the walls some bearing giant locks and others defaced by the writings of the owners.

Mary took a bed space she noticed had no occupant and had nothing which indicated anyone was claiming it soon, but somehow made her choice to be close to Ashley's bed space since she was the only one she had known.

The rest of the day was spent arranging and packing up their items while the many others that resumed earlier, glued their eyes to the windows and would scream whenever any of their friends returned.

Darkness had set in soon enough engulfing a large portion of the sky and sprinkling stars on the night's sky like a cook would do to salt to enhance the deliciousness of their meal and yet not everyone had returned.