"When you want to exclaim, use only one exclamation mark no matter how terrified you are," Miss Evelyn said and wrote a vivid example on the board.
It's Ah! and not Ah!!!!!!!
The whole class laughed.
"You think it's a joke?" She continued. "All of you that when you're tweeting, 2going, snapchatting and facebooking will be using wrong grammar and carry it over to your school work." She taught with so much elegance and poise and all the students loved her. It appeared as though she had glowed marvelously the past week following her engagement as she would occasionally flip her hair to the side with her left hand, ensuring you saw the diamond that radiated on her middle finger and would walk from one end to the other at the front with her pair of pointy stilettoes and suit trousers.
Dayo rose his hand from the back seat and quickly added, "ma, no one uses 2go anymore." His response stirred up a lot of side comments and chattering.
"My dear, you are right!" She replied, "but I'm sure you understand where I'm driving at. Using social media shouldn't have a negative effect on your written English. Now to the next point, umm..." She looked around as though searching for something or someone. "Who has an 'S' at the end of their name?"
A few persons rose their hands and she picked Martins at the back seat. Instinctively, he rose up from his seat and so did Ashley when she instructed her to do same.
"If this marker on my hand belongs to Ashley, we say it is Ashley's. Right?" The class echoed in the affirmative. "If it belongs to Martins, we say it is what?"
She handed the marker to Caleb who had risen his hand at the front seat and he went over to the board to write Martin's.
"OK, thank you!" She said and watched him scoot over to his seat. "You see, that's the mistake most of us make. The 's' is a part of his name already. The correct thing should be Martins's but then we remove the last 's' to have this," she said and wrote Martins'. "Do you understand?" The class echoed in uniform agreement. "Same applies to Queens', Girls' but in those cited examples, we use them when we talk about plural possession. So it is Martins' book, Martins' pen-"
"Martins' girlfriend," Dayo said and the class bursted out into a round of laughter.
"This Dayo, I'll soon cut your lips. Please sit down my darlings," Miss Evelyn said and the duo sat back on their seats.
The bell for a change of class rung and Miss Evelyn picked up her copy of the text book, some lesson notes and two board markers, making to leave when she suddenly remembered something.
"Ehen! Before I forget. I gave you all an assignment on a comprehension passage and few works on letter writing. You all failed woefully! I'm so disappointed! It's only Ashley that got nine over ten. I don't understand, are these the students we're breeding for WAEC? I'm giving you all an opportunity for a redo but I expect it on my desk tomorrow morning. If I enter the staff room and I don't see it there, I'll not take it oh!"
"Thank you ma!" The class echoed, grateful.
"Who will be Ashley's assistant class prefect from the boys?" She asked.
Dayo and a few others rose their hands and Evelyn pointed to the boy at the back by the wall and he stood in obedience.
"What's your name?" She asked.
"Kelvin, ma!" Kelvin replied.
"You seem responsible, you'll help Ashley with the books so follow me," Miss Evelyn made to leave.
"Ma, Kelvin?" Dayo asked. "Kelvin is a gangster oh! Forget his calm face," Dayo added and as usual, the class laughed. Kelvin beamed too, his light brown skin complexion glowed and so did his pearly whites as they settled on his pink lips. He was indeed very handsome.
*****
During short break, a lot of students in the SS2 class clustered like flies on rotten meat to the SS2 general notice board and saw the announcement regarding the Interclass Quiz competition.
Kelvin sighted Mary straining her eyes at the back to see the notice board and walked stealthily behind her and stood, feigning interest on whatever was written on the board.
A push from the front made her step on his toes literally and turning to apologize, she noticed it was Kelvin and a smile formed on her face.
"I'm so sorry I stepped on you, I didn't know you were the one," she said.
"It's OK, I didn't know you were the one here too," he lied. "The annual inter class competition right?" He asked the evidently obvious question but she replied anyways.
"Yeah! It seems fun and the money is promising. I'm interested," she replied.
"Wow! That's great. It's just... Ashley always wins. She has been winning since we were in JS2 and not to be a discouragement or anything, but if she's competing this year, she'll most definitely win again. That girl is a prodigy."
"Right, well I guess I can just try. It's better to try than not to," she said.
Kelvin looked behind her and saw that Martins and Dayo approached from the stairs that led to their class and were casually walking towards the notice board.
"Hey can we walk?" Kelvin said, slowly grabbing her by her wrist.
"Walk? Where are we walking to? It's almost short break over." She said, confused.
"Just a quick walking around downstairs and we'll be back. Since the last time, we didn't really talk again. Tell me about yourself. You're Ashley's sister right?," he said and subtly dragged her from the crowd as they took the stairs at the their end, down.
"Myself? Well we're not really sisters sisters like that like that," she replied, smiling at her English.
"Like cousins?" He asked again.
"You know what? How about you tell me about yourself instead. Given the fact that I'm a very boring person. Dayo and Martins are your friends right?" She asked. They had taken a seat at the base of the staircase and given how busy it was, the students that trod that path up to their classes brushed their shoulders and diluted the air with their voices.
He paused briefly as his mind registered how he would change the subject matter quickly but not so quickly so as not to stir up confusion.
"Yeah they are. Known ourselves since nursery school I think," he replied.
"So are you just friends with them because you've known them all your life or you're friends with them because they're actually your friends?" She had asked and just then, the bell for short break over went off.
*****
"So which is it Stella? Are the pages missing or she didn't just write much about you?" Detective Uju asked. One of her thighs laid over at the desk while the other rested on the floor. She had sat so close to Stella, that Stella feared she could hear the sound of her heartbeat.
"How would I know that? I'm not Mary. I don't know why she did the things she did," Stella dared to say.
"Well, for someone you so desperately defend and claim to care so much about-"
"I do care for Mary, I always have," Stella cut in.
"You cannot call for an investigation to be carried out and yet not have anyone in mind. Who do you suspect? What are you hiding Stella? What happened that night? Tell me the truth!" The detective said, raising her voice at the last word.
Stella closed her eyes and had her mind race back with short glances to their End of the year party and still recalled Ashley walking over to her with mud stains all over her silver dress and slight stains on her cheeks and formerly stylishly packed hair. She had been crying and was grateful to have met Stella outside.
"Something bad happened to Mary," Ashley said, releasing light sniffles. "It's all my fault," she said and fell into Stella's ready arms. "It's all my fault," Ashley said again and wept, bitterly.
"OK," Stella said, slowly. "I'll tell you the truth," Stella added. "I suspect Kelvin."
YOU ARE READING
Hell Mary
Teen FictionA game of truth or dare goes wrong amongst friends when the victim of a devilish prank goes missing from school and is said to be dead. Everyone becomes a suspect for the murder including the girl as confusion arises to the possibility of suicide. T...
