What Not To Do In The Lab

The second bell after lunch rang just as my posterior hit the stool.  I could feel a small smile playing around the corners of my lips.  Chemistry.  Wonderful, definite, factual chemistry.  Where everything was black and white and you were either right or wrong - no in betweens.  

My classmates filed into the room with either glum or indifferent expressions on their faces.  Some held incredibly tattered books in their arms.  I gazed down at my own copy of ‘Discovering Chemistry’.  It was nearly two years old and spectacularly well used but still looked brand new.  It, like all my other books, hadn’t a mark on it.  I ran my fingertips over it’s smooth, unmarred surface feeling the texture of the paper cool beneath my touch.  My long auburn hair fell in a curtain around my face and I used it to separate myself from the rest of the group, and to hide the shadows of bruising that decorated my jaw.

Just as I pondered how long it took facial bruising to fade, our teacher, Mr Collins came in.  He was young - only in his early twenties - and as many of the girls in the class (who I’m convinced he was the only reason they picked chemistry) described as beautiful.  I won’t lie, he was ridiculously attractive.  But he was a teacher and besides, he was my friend, I wouldn’t dream of flirting with him.  His electric blue eyes swept appraisingly over the group of students seated before him.  His gaze paused momentarily longer on me as a small furrow appeared between his brows.  I smiled and shrugged.  Clumsy, I mouthed to him.  He nodded, clearly not completely satisfied, but he stood a little straighter and looked back to the class.

“Okay, okay, quiet everyone and listen up,” his deep, warm voice filled the room with little effort.  “Today we’re doing an experiment so you just need your experiment copies open on the ethene experiment.”  His gaze moved over the class as many people’s faces pinked.  “Anyone who actually did the homework, please raise your hand…”

I raised my hand but I knew I didn’t need to.  Mr Collins knew that I had every single experiment already written up from ages ago.  What was worrying though, was that only three more people from our class of twenty raised their hands too.

“Right…  Let’s see…”  Mr Collins scratched his head thoughtfully, “Everyone divide into groups of five.  Remy, Lee, June and Nina, as seeing as you all actually did the homework, I want one of you to a group.”

I sighed.  The last time the class had been trusted to do an experiment, things had gone horribly wrong.  Let’s just say that the school had to invest in a load of new glassware and there would forever be a murky looking stain on the ceiling to commemorate our time here.

Three of my classmates wandered over to my bench, which I had cleared while emotionally readying myself for the impending chaos.  I smiled warmly as Lisa, Colin and Santiago all consulted my notes and divided up to gather the equipment.  In fairness, they weren’t the worst people to be grouped with.  In fact, Lisa and I were rather friendly.

Our apparatus was set up quickly as I measured out our chemicals.  I used a spatula to gently push a piece of glass wool into the bottom of a boiling tube and I poured the ethanol into the tube, watching as it was gently absorbed into the wool.  I fixed the tube horizontally into the retort stand.  But just as I carefully manoeuvred a spatula full of the fine white aluminium oxide powder into the boiling tube, a large bang made me jump, scattering the powder all over the desk.