The school authority at Pearl International High School had a tradition of conducting a scholarship examination before every new school session begins. The scholarship was a fully funded one and gave less privileged children an opportunity to study at the prestigious school which appeared to the outside world as a school meant only for children from wealthy homes.

Vincent was Brilliant and lucky enough to be among the three applicants that were chosen from a thousand of other applicants.
Ever since he got admitted into the school, he had managed to keep his good grades up while being very sociable with his classmates and teachers. Little wonders why he was elected into the position of the head boy.

"So tell me, what were the two of you saying about me?" Vincent asked with a mischievous look.

"You wish," Rita snorted, making Vincent and Rachael to burst out in laughter.

"Please let's take a picture. First day of the new term's picture," Rita suggested, already bringing out her phone from her gray school bag.

"Don't let a teacher see that," Rachael warned Rita, referring to the phone in her hand.

"Chill, it's not like we're using it in class," Rita said with a roll of her eyes.

"Okay just be fast with it," Rachael agreed.

"Daniel, can you please help me take a picture of us?" Rita said to a classmate passing by, pointing to herself, Rachael and Vincent.

"No problem," the fat-cheeked boy said as he took the phone from her hand.

Vincent stood between Rachael and Rita as Daniel took about three pictures of them.

"That would be okay, thanks," Rita appreciated as she took her phone from the boy.

"You're welcome," he said and walked away from them.

"I love this one the most," Rita said, showing a picture to Rachael and Vincent, they all had a wide grin plastered on their faces in the picture.

"It's beautiful," Rachael and Vincent both agreed after taking a look at the picture.

Their attention was taken away from Rita's phone when they heard the bell ringing, telling them that it was time for assembly.

"We need to get going," Vincent said to the girls.

"Yeah, of course," Rachael said and the three of them began to walk down to the assembly hall.

When they finally got inside the hall, Vincent left Rachael and Rita to go and take his place at the podium, just next to the pulpit while Rachael and Rita joined the line formed for their class.

The hall was big enough to contain the two hundred and fifty students the school had. It was stylishly designed, with the ceiling and about half of the walls made up of pure glass. The floor was tiled with shiny-brown marble. At the front where the floor was a little bit elevated, stood a glass pulpit where the proprietor normally stood to address the students.

"Here comes Diane our queen," Rita dramatically said with a funny look on her face as a tall girl catwalked through the front door with two other girls trailing behind her.

Diane was the typical attention seeker and obviously the most popular girl in school.
Coming from a wealthy home, she was over- pampered just as a good number of the other students in the school were.

She was putting on a skirt that stopped      mid-thigh and walked in like she was in a fashion show, definitely stealing the attention of most students as a good number of them had their eyes fixed on her. She finally stood behind a girl on a low cut while her minions; Sophia and Lisa stood at her back.

"She's definitely looking for trouble not scrapping off those nail polish before coming to school," Rachael said as she noticed the red nail polish on Diane's finger.

"And she would always get away with it," Rita added.

"Of course, I know that," Rachael  acknowledged.

"It's so irritating that Lisa and Sophia keep following her around like her faithful soldiers," Rita said with a sigh.

"Oh look who's talking. Like you don't follow her on her YouTube, Instagram and the rest of her social media accounts," Rachael replied Rita with a mocking laughter.

"Ouch!" she screamed as she got an unexpected pinch from Rita.

"I would surely repay you," Rachael said to Rita who was already running towards  the back of the line for safety.

"Later baby," Rita said, sticking out her tongue to her Rachael.

"Attention students," the familiar voice of the proprietor who had a German origin came through the speakers, bringing  the attention of the students including Rachael and Rita to the podium.

"We would begin the assembly today with an opening prayer from our amiable head boy," he said while gesturing to Vincent to take over the mic.

"Thank you sir, for the opportunity," Vincent said to him before going on with the opening prayer. After the short prayer, the national anthem came up and then the head girl, an art student just as Rita, Diane, Lisa and Sophia, led the students in singing from the hymn book.

After the hymn was sung, the Proprietor came up again, this time to officially welcome the students to a new session and then he buttressed on the need for the final year class students to study more, in readiness for their examinations.

The assembly ended with the school anthem and after which, the students dispatched to their various classes.

Rachael walked next to Vincent towards their classroom since they were both in the science class.

They got to their classroom and both settled down on two different desks that were kept just next to each other.

They had been seatmates since their first year in senior secondary school which was the time when the students decided if they wanted to be in the art class or science class.
Before that time, Rita and Rachael had been seatmates while Vincent sat with Diane.

Rachael's attention was focused on two of her classmates who were noisily chatting away at her front.

"I love your hair, it's so beautiful, and long too," Vincent said with his eyes glued to Rachael's hair as she brought her attention to him.

"Thanks, I made it two days ago," Rachael who was flattered by his compliment said.

"This is called twisting right,"  Vincent asked, his fingers now twirling around a strand of Rachael's twisted hair.

"Yeah, it is," she replied calmly.

"I've heard my mum saying it's really tough to maintain a hair that hasn't been relaxed. How do you manage to take care of yours?" Vincent asked.

"It's not as difficult as most people think it is. You just have to apply the right hair products on it and also, have a good natural hair stylist and adviser," Rachael replied with ease. Over the years, she had gotten that same question from people so she was always ready with the same answer whenever it comes up.

"I'm guessing all that would take a lot of cash right?" Vincent asked.

"Not too much. In a month I spend about five thousand for my hair oil, six thousand for my moisturizer, and another five thousand for my detangler spray," Rachael gave Vincent a breakdown, counting her fingers as she did so.

"Wow! That's definitely much for me," Vincent exclaimed after she was done, clearly shocked at how much she spends on taking care of her hair.

"That's probably because it's imported from the United States," Rachael said in reply and before Vincent could say anything, Mr. Saheed, the Mathematics teacher walked into the classroom.

Mr. Saheed was from India and had been teaching Mathematics in the school for over four years. He had a way of making his students love the seemingly difficult subject. Making him win the award of the best teacher for three years consecutively.

"Good morning class. We're going to be starting immediately today with the topic called Bearing," Mr. Saheed kicked off with the lecture.

The Geography  teacher came in to teach almost immediately after Mr. Saheed was done with his class.

At 11:30 am, the school bell rang again for lunch time, just when the Biology teacher was just finishing with his class. He left the classroom after giving the class an assignment.

The class became a little bit noisy as students started getting up to head towards the cafeteria.

In a matter of seconds, Rita walked through the door and went straight to where Rachael and Vincent were seated.

"Let's go and eat," she said, tapping lightly on their desk.

"We were just getting ready to come and call you from your classroom but once again, you've beaten us to it,"  Rachael said with a smile as she started putting her notebook and textbook inside the locker of her desk.

"Can you girls just stop talking already? I'm hungry," Vincent who was already heading to the door said.

"Chill boy," Rita said in defense, rolling her eyes at him. She always playfully liked to get on Vincent's nerves.

The trio walked towards the cafeteria, chatting and laughing away as they did so.

They finally got to the cafeteria which already had a good number of students in it, and made their order.

The three decided to take a glass of freshly made pineapple juice each, along with meat pie and water. They walked towards a free table at a corner and dropped their trays on it while sitting down on the chairs around the table.

"How did you enjoy your holiday at New York City?" Rita asked Rachael with so much excitement, ready to hear about every single fun place Rachael must have visited in New York city during the holiday.

"You know that I stayed there for only a week right?" Rachael replied.

"Yes you told me but at least you had fun, or didn't you?"

"I stayed in the hotel room most of the time. Mum was busy with her business meetings so we didn't really have the time to go out for sight seeing," Rachael said, a hint of sadness in her low voice. "I actually had plans to stay longer but once again she had to ruin it for me," she continued without much interest in the discussion.

"Sorry about that," Rita said, feeling bad for her friend whose mum was obsessed with her business.

"I'm really sorry things had to turn out like that for you," Vincent added, wearing a similar look to Rita's. He had been listening quietly as Rachael talked about how sad the holiday was for her.

"It's not a problem, I'm already used to it now," Rachael shrugged.

"How about you? How was Abuja?" Rachael asked Rita, not wanting to dwell any longer on her gloomy and uneventful holiday.

"Honestly it was really amazing, even if it was my third time going there. I even attended a concert there, it was really fun," Rita chattered away, joyfully.

"Good for you dear," Rachael said, almost envious of the fact that her friend got an opportunity to explore Abuja with her family, something she had always wanted to do with hers.

"Okay, my turn," Vincent interrupted Rita just as she was speaking admiringly about some of the Nigerian celebrities she met at the concert.

"What do you want to hear?" he laughed at the expression of anticipation on the faces of Rachael and Rita as they looked at him.

"How did the holiday go for you?" Rachael asked politely.

"I didn't travel to anywhere. I just stayed at home eating, watching movies, little bit of reading and helping mum out in the shop," he replied them.

"That's nice." Rachael sipped on her juice.

"What are you looking at?" Rachael asked Rita who was engrossed in her phone.

"Diane's YouTube channel. She just made a new video. She went to Dubai with her mum for the holidays." Rita stretched out her phone to Rachael and Vincent.

Diane was making Snapchat videos at the desert. She wore the traditional long gown, with her hair tied around with a scarf. She was sitting on a camel's back and screaming in excitement.

Just when the video was about ending, the school bell was rung for end of break time

"She definitely had serious fun," Rita said before turning off the video.

"Obviously," Vincent added.

"Let's start going."  Rachael was already on her feet.

"Gosh! You love learning too much," Rita murmured.

"No, I don't."

"Yes, you do," Rita fired back and they went on and on.

"I'm going to get a padlock for your mouths," Vincent said to the both of them and they both laughed.

The remaining of the school day was filled with one lecture after the other, with some of the teachers even going as far as giving assignments at the end of their lecture.

                               ~•~