I closed the book and glanced at my watch. It was 3.14am. I wondered if I should ‘chew’ a few more pages of the capture of Timbuktu in the‘Rise and fall of the Mali Empire’. It was 1992 May, secondary school form three. Exams week. I was high on caffeine and sugar, the result of leaving everything till ‘the last days’.
I looked up from my Casio watch. There were just three of us now. It had been an almost full class four hours ago. Obviously the ‘weak’ or the ‘intelligent’ had taken their leave, the remaining… well; they could just be like me. My eyes hadn’t blinked for a while now; I could watch an army of ants move a car and I still won’t blink.
The paper was at 8.30 that morning. I decided I’d go take a shower, eat a bowl of soaking, clean my locker and return to the classroom to finish off with the divisions in the Mali kingdom that led to the rule of the Bambara and Senufo people… ha I thought to myself ‘I will murder these questions so badly these Malian’s will wish someone else did the killing’
I stole glances at the others before I left the classroom. I was making sure everyone of them had their full body support. Two years ago form one; whiles I was trying unsuccessfully to sleep through the delicious smell of ‘homecho’ that some seniors were devouring below me, I heard a commotion outside. We all rushed out. A final year form five student was screaming and shaking like a leaf on the veranda. When she was calm enough to talk she said she was leaving the classroom when she decided to say bye to the girl sitting a few chairs behind her. When she got close enough, she called out but there was no response. She decided to knock on the book covering the face of the person. The hands let go. The book fell flat on the table. There was no face, just hands.
A few days later her parents picked her up. She never returned.
As I made it past the science block I thought again for the tenth time that day what I was going to do with my hair for the long vac. I could go to the Labone lady under the trees for my braids or I could just ‘stretch it’ in the salon. The braids were easier once you got past the eight hours of push and pull torture these girls put you through, plus the smell of the armpits, and the endless gossip about Lumba and how he’s sleeping with his girl dancers. The ‘stretch’ took only an hour to do but I always ended up with burns around my ears. One time I spent my entire vacation nursing a rotting ear…
I stopped. There was a click and then silence.
I thought I head the click of a high heel shoe. I looked around. I was half way between my dorm and the classroom. It was dark; there wasn’t a single person in sight. I took a few steps, the click sound of the high heel resumed. I stopped. It stopped. I broke into cold sweat.