My Favourite Muse

by Atabo Mohammed

School was boring since Monday. I felt I was in a trial moment; a moment when everything turns upside down. My gentle soul felt as if it's chained in a steel cocoon with no escape route. I felt lost with all that happened during the weekend especially with Phil whom I had an unsettled feud with. All the things we used to do were dashed because we were not talking.

  I approached Phil during break time on Tuesday and he snubbed me. I didn't want to do it again to prevent embarrassing myself. Phil was angry and could create a scene out of the little misunderstanding and let the whole school know how such a jerk I was.

  There's no way I could see Pam now as she'd probably still be in the hospital. I had no intention to see Mr Glasgow that day; I was still reading his book and will be better if I visit him when I'm done. So I sat alone in the cafeteria reading the book; but just when I was through with a page, I heard the most unbelievable voice from nowhere:

  "What did you think you were doing, sneaking up into my room at the hospital?"

  I looked up; Pam was standing before me with a straight face.

  To be honest, my mind went blank and I didn't know exactly why. Something heavy hit me on the heart which much later on, I defined it as an awkward mixture of surprise and fear. I didn't say anything at first as my sixth sense seemed to be calibrating on the right reaction and words.

  "You are still an idiot, you know that?" She said with a surprisingly soft tone. "You seemed not to have any idea what you were putting yourself into."

  "I guess you are right, my mom said that to me." I said.

  "She's right. You should be careful on things like that; you could get hurt."

  "How you feeling?"

  "Just be careful." She said and walked off. My gaze followed her to the door.

  "What just happened?" I asked myself. My gaze returned to my book; I looked at the page I was reading and couldn't remember what I read. I closed it; and when I raised up my head and looked around, I saw Phil standing at a corner staring at me. Our eyes locked for some seconds, then he walked out of too.

  I don't know exactly what that look was all about; but I knew there were tons of messages in those eyes; messages replete of bad contents.