Alright, I started writing Rational Love - my first book - on February and published it on February 8th, 2017. One month later, it had over 1000 reads and 200 votes.

Without you reading, commenting and voting, it won't have been possible to achieve that and I want to thank you. Please continue to comment and vote.

I love you all. :)

*******

I'm not sure when I became rooted to the spot on the lawn or how long I stood there before the gate opened to reveal Mum's car parked outside. She walked to me frowning. Her t-shirt plastered against her skin as a small wind whizzed across her face. She bent till our faces were at the same level and put my waistcoat on my shoulder.

"What's wrong?" she said, cupping my jaws with her hands.

I swallowed and reconstructed my face to show no emotion.

"Nothing," I said, "Tavy has gone to school."

She smiled and straightened up. "Otis will be going with you."

Otis, my next door neighbour, was the closest I had to an older brother. He was tall, dark, and had huge muscular arms.

He probably got the muscles from working at construction sites. Being the oldest year six student in his school, his motto was simple - get the certificate from Secondary School, make the money from construction. He worked every afternoon, some weekends and most holidays at construction sites and he had money to spend.

His pointy shoes looked like they were from some low-end designers and his ironed shirt tucked into his ironed trousers were perfectly in place.

His tall frame was leaning casually on the car. One hand adjusted the collar of his shirt while the other combed his curly hair. His black eyes rested on me and he smiled.

"Little one doesn't want to go to school, uh?"

His theatrics would have worked if various images of him coming back from work were not rapidly sifting through my mind at the moment. He always wore almost-clean blue jeans and fading white t-shirt, held a bag of his work overalls and left a trail of the scent of soap mixed with the stench of lingering sweat behind him.

This human standing in front of me wasn't Otis, my personally adopted older brother. He was a sham and it was almost too painful to watch.

I walked past him to the other side of the car and got in.

He opened the door, and put his trunk into the car. "If you ain't talking to me, you can go alone."

He slowly came out of the car.

Panic catapulted into me. Tavy had left me alone. Otis wanted to leave me alone. No, that wasn't going to happen. I held his wrist.

"Wait. Come with me."

A grin stretched across his face.

"Okay," he said and got into the car.

*******

After I ironed my shirt and wore it, we drove to Madeline Secondary School. It was speedy and uneventful. I dozed off several times but once I got to the school fence, I couldn't sleep.

We drove past acres of undeveloped school land on both sides of the road. On the white fence, the words - Property of Madeline Secondary School were boldly painted in dark purple. Behind it, the school flag and the blue and green country flag whisked quickly. The wind had increased and clouds were gathering.

Otis' eyes darted back and forth between the landscape on both sides of the road.

"Big, big," he muttered.

We got to the school gate and his eyes widened. "Very big."

I sighed and closed my eyes. If only being big could make a boarding school wonderful.

"Your school is beautiful."

"Yeah," I said, "the more beautiful, the higher the fees."

As we crossed the gate, Madeline's free school bus pulled up behind us. But the security guard closed the gate, leaving it outside the compound.

Mum took a pass from another guard that was about to answer a phone call. The guard that closed the gate ran to us.

"Madam," he said, "it's advisable you wait here for..."

But Mum had already stepped on the gas pedal. We drove in.

For a school that was barely seven years old, Madeline had done well for itself. We were driving through the sports area and everything was standard - standard sized Olympic track field, standard soccer field, NBA sized basketball court, volleyball court and tennis court.

An enclosed swimming pool area and a games building that had a gym, a hall for martial arts, a table tennis area and places where students could play scrabble, monopoly, chess or card games were also included.

Strangely, no student was loitering around. Granted, it was early in the day but parents brought their children to Madeline as early as 6am. And students never missed the opportunity of walking, playing or hooking up on their first day of school.

We drove past the sports area to the learning area where the buildings were painted a mixture of cream, white, light silver and purple. The staff building was looking bland as usual. The large classroom block was under construction. An unfinished floor had been added to the two storey building. Wood covered it from ground to roof with the words - Students Not Allowed written on it.

The library came into view and my eyes lit up.

The building had been put up when the president's daughter indicated interest in studying here. Unfortunately, Daddy President decided that Madeline was not up to standard or secure enough for his daughter and shipped her to another school across the country.

It was a huge three storey building painted a mixture of light silver and dark purple. The second floor was the career floor - an enormous hall divided into different sections. Each section depicted about five to ten related careers with drawings, illustrations, sculptures, a shelf of books and digital versions of what couldn't be put elsewhere.

The first floor was the science floor. It had the Computer room, Physics room, Chemistry room, Biology room, books room (a room filled with shelves of books) and reading room.

The ground floor was the arts floor. Aside from a books room and a reading room, it had a Fine Arts room, Music room, History and Artifacts room, and Media and Entertainment room.

In reality, the library was more of a museum. It was my sanctuary until Tavy enforced herself into my life.

I closed my eyes remembering the day Tavy talked to me for the first time. I was sitting in the Computer room browsing the internet for some information on a History assignment. Our teacher said it would only require our textbooks but that didn't stop me from searching further.

The scent of vanilla and the sound of books hitting the chair beside me made me look up.

Long brown hair. No. Gloriously exquisite sleek long brown hair with gold highlights was everywhere. A perfectly manicured hand pushed the hair away and the smiley face of one of the popular girls in our class beamed at me. "Hi, I am..."

"Tavy," we both said.

"You already know my name. That's good. And you are..."

"Riley," we both said.

"You live on the other side of my street."

I stiffened. "The poorer side, you mean?"

"Nope, the other side." She took my hand and gave me a handshake. "Now that the introductions are over, let's get down to it."

A feeling of trepidation washed over me. A popular person talking to me was never good news. I was the go-to-person after all the other assignment handlers failed in writing the popular person's assignment.

This girl with the pink lips I could never get and the bright blue eyes was definitely not good news. Would she ask me to complete her Physics project like that boy had asked me two days ago and landed me in trouble with our class teacher?

"Get down to what?" I said, logging out and shutting down the computer.

"We live in the same neighbourhood, go to the same school... It's natural we get down to being friends."

My mouth went dry and I turned slowly to her. What did this girl truly want? "Fr... friends? You... you want us to be friends?"

She put her hands over my shoulder. "Look at it this way. We have a great future and we can build it together."

"Um... I have to complete my Physics project."

I picked my bag and bolted out of there. Whatever that porcelain doll girl was planning, I didn't want to be a part of it.

But I had only erupted the volcanic mountain by not agreeing.

Soon, I was reassigned to her table at meal times. The year six student in my hostel room took a sudden interest in the year three student in Tavy's room and a mounting dislike for me and we were exchanged. I was mysteriously enrolled into drama club with Tavy.

Tavy sat beside me in class and picked me for every project. She didn't leave my private sanctuary alone too. She stalked me in the library and studied while I studied.

Her grades improved while my non-existent social life started living. Gradually, people started asking me about Tavy and talked to me about things that were not academic work.

I never really had a choice in the matter. Tavy had latched herself to me and our symbiotic relationship was working perfectly. We had become friends.

I opened my eyes smiling.

We were close to the School Hall, where I was to go in for my box to be searched. Again, there were no students in sight.

I shrugged. Maybe there was a new rule against students walking around on the first day of school.

Mum parked the car and before we could open the doors, our short and lean principal was by the driver's side. A smile was plastered on his face.

"Good morning Mrs Visions," he said, "Thank you so much for bringing Riley to school. We thought she'll use the free bus. Isn't it more convenient that way?"

I arched my eyebrows at his smile. That must be a plastic smile. Well, it suited its owner. A face that looked like a truck had slammed into it and changed its shape permanently to that of a pancake could only have a plastic smile.

Mum started coming out of the car.

The principal shook his head. "No, no, Mrs Visions. We'll take care of Riley from here. I'm sure you have a lot of work to do."

A guard was already at the boot of the car waiting. Mum sighed and turned to me.

"Riley, I've got to go or I'll be late for work. Otis is working too."

My shoulder sagged but I kept my face expressionless. I hugged them and came out of the car.

Once my bag was by my side and Mum had driven off, I heard a barely audible sigh come from the principal.

I shouldn't be able to hear that sigh.

Everywhere was quiet.

Too quiet.

I looked around. There were no students, parents or drivers outside. The door of the hall was shut and the curtains behind the windows drawn. Anyone inside wouldn't know what was going on outside. I could hear the Vice Principal addressing those inside although I couldn't make out what she was saying.

The Vice Principal usually addressed parents during PTA meetings and during an award ceremony.

Never on the first day of school.

The school hall doors were never closed on the first day too. The staff always tried to rush parents out so that the ordeal of searching the students could be done quickly.

But today was different and I wanted to know why. My neck and body turned at every angle possible, searching.

When I thought there was nothing to see, several guards came out of a large corridor. The guard that stood by the boot to take my box walked to them. Immediately, the principal put his hand on my shoulder and turned my body to face the hall and back the guards. He was facing me, his height the same as my shoe-induced height.

I raised my eyebrows so high that if they could touch my hairline, at that point they would have been.

"Riley," he said, "Madeline's board of directors has decided to give you the recognition you deserve as our star academic pupil."

I turned slightly and craned to look at the guards. From the corner of my eyes, I saw them moving forward in a circle as if there was something in their middle. A van pulled up in front of them and the back door opened. They moved to the door. Suddenly, a guard's leg slipped and he cursed.

In the few seconds that happened, I saw it.

My eyes widened and my breath hitched.

I felt a sharp pain on my shoulders where the principal's hand was and my neck snapped back to him.

"You're not listening to me, Riley. What did I say?"

"Um, I'm sorry Sir. I didn't hear you."

His eyes narrowed. "Why are you breathing like that? Did you see anything?"

I shook my head, my eyes still wide.

His hand dug into my shoulders. "What did you see?"

My hand shot to his palm to remove it. "Noth... Nothing. A white cloth covering fruits, I guess? You're hurting me."

He removed his hand and peered at me for a while.

"Fine," he said and turned towards the hall.

I spun around but the van had driven off.

Of course, I didn't see fruits back then. I saw a white cloth filled with blood stains on what looked like a stretcher. Underneath it, a leg was sticking out.

*******

So, whose leg do you think Riley saw? Guess, guess, guess.

Ah - aaaaaah. :)