“Now class. Let’s have a review on Zudora before the test tomorrow.”
The class, including me groaned. No one liked tests. I mean, perhaps there were a few kids who did like the occasional test but in history, no one liked tests.
“Ok. First question. What was Zudora once called?” The teacher, a woman in her middle thirties, pointed to a girl who raised her hand first.
“Earth,” the girl said, her tone already indicating she was right.
“Well done.” The teacher smiled, her white teeth showing through the blackened room. I watched her turn to the white board and pressed a few buttons on the side of the wall, before an image appeared on the board. It was a picture of what we were told was a rainforest. Trees as tall as buildings covered in bright green moss towered over everything else.
“What is this?” the teacher asked the class. No one raised their hand and the teacher sighed. “We learnt about this last week. It’s the Amazon Rainforest, located in what was then known as South America.”
A few people started scribbling down notes as the teacher clicked to the next slide. This time it was an image of an adult male. Chains wrapped around its foot, which was welded to the wall behind him. He was dirty, thin and scared, his hands held in front of him as the picture was taken.
“Review now. This,” the teacher pointed to the picture, “is an adult male. Its skin is weak and loose. Able to bruise under low pressures and cut with blunt objects. Its eyes,” she zoomed in on them. They were a dark brown, but appeared black in the shadows, “cannot see in blackness like ours. Its senses aren’t as fine-tuned as ours; therefore they were slow, loud and reckless creatures.”
More scribbling. I quickly scribbled down dot points in my book, mentally reminding myself to study later on after work. The teacher continued on with her lecture until the bell for home rang. Everyone packed up without a word, silently grabbing their bags and walking out in one line. No one said a word until they had left the school building. There, everyone burst out into chatter and laughter.
I never understood why everyone was silent when they moved from class to class. It was like an unwritten rule amongst the children. But no one complained about it during breaks. Atleast, I didn’t over hear anyone complain about it. I preferred to have no friends. Atleast until I move to one of the other cities.
I moved to the side of the crowd streaming out of the front doors, making sure to stay against the school wall. I reached up and pulled out my hair from the pony tail, shaking it loose. Silver curls spilt free and I raked my fingers through them, hoping it would do as a brush.
I heard her before I saw her. She was chatting to her friends, and then laughed at something they said back. I mentally braced myself in my head before her group walked past. I looked up just in time to catch her eyes rake over me before she rolled them and whispered something to her friends.
“Really?” her friend giggled, a little too loud. “She lives where?”
“Down south I heard. In a run-down old house.” I gritted my teeth together and waited for them to move on, but today Adel seemed to have a super sore spot for me. She stopped only a few feet away with her group, her back to me.
“I heard she lives alone. No one wants her.”
I didn’t want to put up with her anymore. On any other day I would have kept my head down and just put up with it. Today I woke up on the wrong side of the bed, so to speak and I was in a foul mood. I wrapped my arms around myself and headed home, pushing past Adel. I heard her snort and could feel her eyes burn holes in the back of my head as I crossed the school grounds.
Litter blew across the roads. Old tins, chip packets and bottles piled up in the gutters. The walkways were stained black, brown and even yellow. I avoided those patches. The air was stale, occasionally blowing in the rank smell of the dump that was placed only a hundred kilometres away from the area.
Railway lines - crumbled away from the weather and lack of maintenance - still stood tall as the day they were built. Only now graffiti practically dripped from it and old barrels full of burnt wood littered in any caves or shelters it provided. An old street sign stood crooked in a patch of weeds, the sign faded but still readable read Tintinara.
A few minutes’ walk away from the railway was where a few people tried to set up a place to live. A small cluster of identical houses sat in a group at the end of a side road. White picket fence, white walls, small green garden with a few flowers sprouting here and there. It was the basic of the basic in houses.
My house was the second to last in the right. There was an elderly couple that lived on the other side, but they rarely came out. Sometimes I had to walk over to make sure that they were alright. But all the other houses were abandoned, leaving them weatherworn with weeds.
The houses were placed shortly after the Great War. In school we learnt that the humans were greedy parasites, wanting anything and everything. It was their greediness that sent them halfway to their graves. Then when we came along, all we had to do was give them a shove which was then known as the Great War. But I don’t believe that. No one just ‘hands over’ an entire planet.
I almost ran inside, slamming the door closed behind me. I dumped my bag on the couch and headed into the kitchen which joined into the lounge. The familiar smell of lavender greeted me. The flowers I had growing out the back was blowing in through the open kitchen window. When I was a child I used to always bring inside a batch of lavender flowers. I quickly poured myself a glass of synthetic orange juice and gulped down the powdery-chemical infused liquid before heading to the back of the house. A quick look at the wall clock told me I had just less than half an hour before I had to head to work.
Within ten minutes I was in and out of the shower, smelling like fruit and soap. On the bathroom wall was a small panel a few centimetres larger than my hand. I pressed my palm on it and a few buzzes later, I felt a small electric shock jolt through my body. I shuddered and ran my hands through my now dry hair.
In my bedroom I quickly grabbed my work clothes that was lying on top of a pile that looked to be the clothes I’ve worn for the past week. I quickly grabbed a pen that was sitting on my bed side table and wrote a reminder on the wall; washing. The word glowed for a moment before it disappeared. When I get home it would show up in the kitchen, hopefully reminding me.
“Five minutes, Arina.” The female voice of the reminder echoed through the house.
“Oh crap,” I cussed, pulling on the tight work pants. I cussed the whole time I jumped and stretched as I squeezed into my work clothes. Ok, they weren’t that small but it was hard trying to put on leggings while I was still damp. Another reminder; fix the dryer. I scribbled it on the wall as I pulled the top on and jogged into the kitchen.
“You’re going to be late,” the reminder told me. I growled at her as I put my shoes on. Once I was certain I had no more time to get ready, I bolted to the door. The mirror on the stand by the door reminded me again. I had a terrible memory half the time.
I leaned forwards to make sure that my contacts were still in. My dad told me that the reason I had to wear contacts was because my eyes were special. They weren’t like everyone else’s. They were green. Not silver. I grabbed a hair tie from the bowel and bolted out the door, only to smack into something fleshy.