the perfect square

🎀 chapter 1 🎀

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jumaina is a good girl as one could say and she supposes that yes, she is.

but you know what? she wishes she was - because up until zarah showed up in her life, she was pretty much a benevolent passive human. though, you're wondering.. how did she meet zarah?

on a lovely summer day at school, sitting idly by at her math's table and working oh so hard on her maths exercise, she was sat in the corner with her friend. being in advanced maths was pretty quirky of her and she didn't mind the scribbling pen sounds and crumples of the paper. actually, this routine got boring. sitting in the same corner looking out the window with the rain pouring down was extremely boring and well at first, jumaina did like maths but their teacher couldn't even teach quadratic equations to them.

she looked out the window with a terrible sigh. the rain escalated further down the window with translucent droplets that poured down the glass.

'oh?' she straightened her back upon seeing a girl run across the pavement with a book above her head, her black dyed hair effortlessly gets drenched by water and her school clothes... was something. the girl outside stops for a moment before picking up something on the ground. she must've dropped it.

by the time the girl was about to run off again, jumaina had rushed out of the classroom blowing wind to everyone from her amazing speed and sprinted across the hallway to find the aforementioned girl. and when she did, she called out to her.

"HEY!!"

the nameless girl turned around in such a frazzled state, she was confused as she watched jumaina run up to her who was getting poured on as well.

"oh sorry um, what happened?" the disoriented girl asked, her face in a more concerned state now. jumaina scrambled as she found the item she wanted to give to the girl,

it was an umbrella.

"just take this," jumaina stated as she held out a pink umbrella to the girl. she didn't even know her name but- she was entranced, entangled, strucken. her black hair with blonde roots, regardless of being wet, was still pretty as hell and jumaina wishes she had short hair now. and her blue-as-the-sky eyes gleam back at her, she could even see the droplets reflected in her eyes because of how light they were.

"but you're going to get wet too," she said, jumaina held back a giggle before saying "its okay, my classroom is all the way back there" she points behind her as her math classroom eyes them both with ferocity.

"ha, you might get in trouble," she says,

"it's all good, take the umbrella," jumaina exclaimed before running back, just because she didn't want the girl to shove the umbrella back to her, she wanted to be kind today because she's a good girl who lives up to people's expectations! right?

as she came back to the classroom, her teacher baffled by the gesture could not muster a sentence due to her act of kindness, other than a "don't run off like that again."

her friend, afifa, who sat next to her earlier and watched her bolt out started hollering about it.

"i was about to chase you before i realised you were talking to zarah!!"

"zarah? is that her name?" jumaina sighs in wonder as she captures the image of her once again in the rain.

"yeah. anyway you were meant to explain this question to me you rat, you just stared out of the window and then ran off,"

"sure sure.." jumaina is clearly dozing off into her own space as afifa continuously asks her questions about why she ran off.

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zarah faintly recalls the girl who ran up to her, she believes her name was something along the lines of j u and m. ah, jumaina. friends with at least half of their grade and somehow interacts with people zarah would've never thought she would.

she walks down to her music class, dripping wet but at least a nice pink umbrella to keep her nice and shady. awesome.

passing by the main building, she walks down to a different building held for performing arts. basically her safe space.

'ugh i'm late, no. it's fine, i'll just tell her i needed to get my umbrella from my locker the moment it started raining, yup. plausible excuse.'

she carefully avoided puddles, i mean she doesn't really want to get soggy socks! they stick to your toes with an eternal cold feeling.

she enters the warm and cozy classroom, a puddle underneath her due to her clothes and hair and umbrella and bag.

"zarah, why are you late?" the teacher asked, hand on hip with eyebrow raised.

"well it started raining the moment i left, i had to get my umbrella from my locker all the way in the in building," zarah said, cheering to herself as she did not stutter through her excuse.

"mm right, just go sit down and please.. try not to get the seat wet."

'yeah okay i'll TRY not to get the seat wet, as if i control the weather or how drenched my clothes get.'

zarah sat in her usual seat, between her two lady friends. the drummer of their band and the pianist of their band. oh yeah, did i mention they had a band? their entire music class is a band - which is like about 7 people probably.

'oh, where does she even hang out? like at the playground? where am i gonna give her umbrella back? shit, i should've asked- why'd she run off?'

zarah will figure it out eventually, she just has to look through the entire playground to find an indian girl, who is short, has big brown doe eyes and the most coolest smile. it can't be difficult.

'and maybe i could ask jana to find her with me too,' zarah thought to herself.

"so what am i talking about zarah?" the teacher caught her off guard. she'll think about it later.

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A/N: wabam!! hi