Married, Not Dating

CHAPTER TWO

"Happy birthday, my first Lady. Remember that the only thing greater than you is the man above"

my father had scrawled boldly across the blank space inside the card.

Even though I didn't understand what he meant by those words but it made me feel very important,as if I was the most important human on earth or some kind of a demi God.

Sometimes I wonder why he called me

"First lady"

Since I was an only child. I didn't think there could be a first unless there was a second. Maybe he was hoping for a second, may be he was. How much I wished God granted my father his wish for another child because sometimes I wondered how it would be if I had a sibling though. But my friends told me that brothers could be very annoying and dirty, I wanted a sister instead,Well that was not difficult to believe.

Because I had imagined having a brother like Dew, the boy in my class, who called him self the King of the class.. Although he was a smart one,Dew was the most unserious human being that walk the face of the earth and I haven't even seen much humans to conclude like that.

He is specialised in making fun of everything and playing pranks on everyone.

I remembered what happened during Mathematics class the teacher wrote 'Mensuration' on the board, but Mr King of the Class saw he had to read it out loud as 'Menstruation' like who does that? The whole class erupted in laughter. I didn't find it funny and so did the teacher.

"Quiet, all of you"

she screamed.

"I wonder what was so funny about what he said that is making all of you to laugh and you"

she said, pointing at Dew, the culprit as she sigh,

".....must you always be a jerk?" She asked menacingly.

But dew stood up and answered calmly.

"No Ma'am",

this sends the class to another round of loud laughter, this made her even angrier and she sent Dew to the well.

Still, Dew managed and got an A in Mathematics at the end of the term.

I thought it was his own strategy to throw people off balance and it was such a clever plan if that's was true.

It was a Tuesday morning, the day I turned Sixteen. I woke up expecting to feel different, to feel like a Sixteen year old. But I didn't feel anything more different than the days before it. In fact, I had slept off the previous night not thinking of my long awaited birthday, but about the examination that would start later In the week. Well, maybe one was not meant to feel anything Or maybe it was the thought of the coming examination that was affecting everything. I had always been a straight A student,until I entered senior high and started physics. I still scored A in all the other subjects, including Mathematics and chemistry which most of my classmates were struggling with, but I never scored anything higher than a C in physics.

As it happened , it was my first paper in this examination.

There was two blocks of eight rooms In my hostel and there were four of us in each room. We had ten bathroom cubicle, five for each blocks, so we took turns to have our bath. But this was not a problem. Usually,, you only had to wait for one person to finish up. I took a quick glance at my clock beside my bed. I still had time about an hour before the morning assembly. Of my three roommates, one was about my age although she was slightly like older and smaller than me. Her name was Cherry.. The other two were juniors.

They had all wished me a happy birthday that morning.

As I made my bed , Cherry returned From the bathroom. She had a towel wrapped around her chest and another one on her head like a turban. I turned to her and asked,

"Cherry, did you feel anything?"

I was referring to when she turned Sixteen, "did you like, feel different in any ways from before?"

I asked expecting some kind of never before heard story of how she felt something more than the ordinary.

"No, it was like the birthday before it. Couldn't feel any difference, to be honest,"

she answered with a shrug.,

"well that was disappointing"

I said with disbelief..

Cherry was not much of a talker, it was as if someone was going to charge her for the number of words she spoke each time, so I didn't blame her for the answer she gave could have been what she felt or maybe a sigh of "not in the mood answer".

Many people thought she was a snob.

But I knew she was a nice and generous person, who would prefer to be left alone most of the time. I wouldn't say she was my bestie, but we got along just fine, even though we are not in the same class.

"But..."

I started to say,and later changed my mind.

"Never mind"

I added I knew she would have liked for me to not say anymore and leave her alone and I should respect that.

In any case I thought I should focus more on the exam for that day

"the almighty physics"

as I liked to call it, because it was might in my sight and I would want to conquer it with all I have got.

I had worked harder in this term toward physics on like the other terms and it was reflected in my continuous assessment thus far.

Still, I was more than a little worried.

We started on a good feet, when I saw the examination questions it was from the places I had being studying from but the problem was that there was no much time to answer the questions and do all the practical tests.

I had improved on my speed by taking five minutes off the time allotted to each question.

On one occasion, I managed to finish about seventeen minutes ahead of time. But I still wondered how I would hold out in real examination conditions.