BaSatai: Outside In #1

“Have you looked in the mirror lately?” Armani questioned, pointing out Lily’s oriental heritage.

The girl’s cheeks burned red. Her eyes narrowed even further into slits. Lily came from wealthy Chinese parents. Her dead straight, jet black hair was cropped in a sharp bob to match the latest posh trend, long at the front to her sharp angled jawline, and super short up the back. She wore all the latest fashion and had three minions to terrorize the St Michael’s elite students. From the stormy look on Lily’s face, Armani had managed to score one against her.

Marchina, one of Lily’s followers, tugged at her hand, her puffed up curls bouncing around her narrow face. “Sit down, Lily.”

The class remained silenced by the obvious taunt.

Marchina looked uncomfortable in the midst of their argument, glancing at Armani before tugging on Lily’s arm again, trying to yank her down. Marchina had a full head of thick, curly dark brown hair, was more chubby and not a typical popular girl, but her parents’ wealth kept her high up on the scale next to Lily with designer clothes purchased from Europe and New York. Her whiny voice irritated Armani whenever she opened her mouth.

She bent down, picking up her books. They had once been childhood friends until junior high and puberty hit. Armani kept growing, while Lily remained almost childlike in her figure. And then one day, Lily stopped talking to Armani and it was never the same between them. They had become enemies as if they had never been friends at all since they were little girls.

She slammed her books down on her desk, bang, the echo reverberating in the classroom. Students jumped in their seats, a few gasping in shock. She cringed as they all stared back at her, horrified. Her strength could have smashed the books through the table, she needed to take more care and learn how to control the fire in her more.

Mr. Borgan took his seat when Armani plonked down into her own chair. He waved his hands for the students to turn around and get back to work. His eyes remained wide and scared of any further confrontation, but the diversion from the boredom was an eye-opener for some students, while some others promptly fell back asleep.

Lily sneered, dusting her Sass and Bide jeans down around her skinny legs. Her almond eyes twinkled with triumph before she spun around, flicking her finger for one of her friends to put the desk back into place. Marchina scrambled to do Lily’s bidding, pissing Armani off even more. She wondered what hold her former friend had over these pathetic followers.

Armani flipped her book open to the spot she had been pretending to read before. Anger simmered deep within her for the way Lily continually targeted her. The class settled down and resumed what they were doing before: nothing.

“Mr. Borgan?” a student whined. “I’ve done this ethics case study, can I leave?”

Armani sat up, silently berating herself for not thinking of that idea to get out of the class so she could have a smoke. Her fingers itched to grab a cigarette out and light it up in the middle of the class; nothing was keeping her interested.

Damn, I’m bored.

The teacher continued to read his computer magazine behind a textbook. “No, do the next case study. Do all of them if you are such a whiz at it. Damn talented kids,” he muttered under his breath.

Deflated, Armani shrank back down in her seat. No one was leaving the class. Still, her mind remained preoccupied.

I’m not the one… I can’t be.

The curse awakened sometimes, pulsing through her veins as a call out to her enemies. But Armani still sensed it wasn’t her they should be protecting, instinct niggled at the back of her mind and all the way in her gut, screaming that it wasn’t her.

“Okay, class.” Mr. Borgan came to life at the front of the classroom, snapping her out of her thoughts. “Use the questions in the ethics case at the end of the chapter to make some conclusions of your own on how the case between this doctor’s choice affected external factors. You guys are the geniuses so work it out.”

Armani rolled her eyes at such a lame case study. This ethics class had almost bored her to death. The BaSatai should worry about that! Mr. Borgan, a rotund, lazy teacher, couldn’t even inspire the students in his class with a challenging lesson.