Days rolled in uneventfully and before I knew it, I was caged inside the walls of the school again. I found myself sitting in a sociology class of Ms. Castro. She was one of the two remaining pioneer teachers at Prep, the other being Mr. Agustin from the faculty of mathematics, the rest were already dead, or senile. From the way she talked, she's ancient. She had this tone in her voice that sounded like she caught a terrible flu or something. Her cheeks sunk in her face like the rest of her features. She had a look that instantly tells you it's only a matter of time.

Ms. Castro labored her way inside the classroom with a walking stick. She always paused in a middle of a sentence like she suddenly forgot what she was mumbling about. She also called us different names every single time because old age had reduced her memory capacity to that of a goldfish. I looked at her sometimes and wondered what the hell was she still living for.

"Roman." She called for me. I did not bother to correct her, it's pointless.

"Yes ma'am." I said.

"Would you be so kind to share with us what you were up to during the summer break?" She always started with Would you be so kind whenever she wanted us to do something for her in class. I fought the urge to tell her I don't feel so kind today.

"I had a summer job." I blurted.

"Did you thhay you had a blow job, Roman?" Chimed Alexander The Cleft much to everyone's amusement. He used to be a nice kid you know. That initiation fiasco back when we were on our freshman year totally changed the guy. I felt sorry for him.

"You wanna be funny slit face? Why don't you sing for us huh?" It was really just the upper lip but calling him slit face would have been more dramatic. He sunk back to his chair, red-faced. What I said got the whole class excited. "Sing, sing, sing" they chanted. Thankfully good old Ms. Castro did not understand the meaning behind the common slang Alexander The Cleft used. I bet my ass she did not even hear anything.

"Excellent, Rogelio." she said. That's two names in one go. She could go 4 or five when she's in the mood. When she was done prying on our summer break affairs, she proceeded with the discussion on Piaget's theory on Cognitive Development and the nature of human intelligence (which half of the class lacks obviously) until the bell rung for lunch.

With Tina on MIA for days now, I savored the rare opportunity to eat my lunch in solitude when Larry popped up out of the blue.

"Look who's here!" He flashed me one of his old-fashion golden retriever smile.

"Hey!"

"What are you doing here all by yourself? Where's your girlfriend?"

"She's uhm, she's with her, uhm...friends." God, that was a struggle. I hated lying to him.

"I see. Come sit with us, we're over there." He pointed a table in the far corner where two guys and two girls buried their faces on the pages of their books.

He introduced me to his friends who were hand-shakers through and through and were just as keen at smiling as him.

"You guys, this is my best friend Florante Ariza. He's a book worm too." Larry said.

"Really? What sorts of books do you read?" Asked the girl wearing the world's thickest reading glasses.

"Old stuff." I said.

"So, you're artsy, that's cute."

"Hey, Larry, you did not tell me your best friend is a hot shot!" said the boyish girl named Princess. She must've hated her parents for giving her the name. Her pixy hair was neatly tucked inside a black hippie cap which strangely looked good on her. The other guys, Romeo and Niqoulas bumped fist with me.

They were discussing the Darwinian Evolutionary Theory for their upcoming group report in Biology. The girl wearing the world's thickest reading glasses led the brainstorming. She drew some weird analogy on the theory of Natural Selection on why the students in the campus were smarter than the others. She viewed that students at STEM were brighter than the others. She was kind of a bitch.

"I mean, tough environment breeds tough students. I have no problems with other students of course, they are doing their best given the circumstances. Besides, taking up arts is cute, right Florante? I'm sure you will agree," said the phoniest girl I had ever met. "School is supposed to prepare us to the world outside, the real world and it's a dog-eat-dog world out there you know, remember what Charle's Darwin said about Survival Of The Fittest?"

"What do you know about the world?"

"Excuse me?"

"It's Herbert Spencer." I sighed.

Everyone shifted their eyes on me.

"Excuse me?" Two 'excuse me' from a girl in a row meant she's beyond pissed. Third one would mean World War 3.

"It was not Charles Darwin who coined the term Survival Of The Fittest, it was Herbert Spencer." She cleared her throat and readjusted her world's thickest reading glasses.

Larry gave me a look of approval. "Oh, looks like artsy guy won..." chimed Romeo. "Hear, hear," said Niqoulas. She did not take it lightly, what I said. She grabbed her things and walked away without a word.

"Am I in trouble?" I asked Larry.

"You're not. She's a babbling know-it-all bitch and you did a good job putting her in her place," commented Niqoulas.

"Is she not your friend?" I asked.

"Maria? Hell no! She only sticks around because she likes Larry." Said the boyish girl named Princess.

"She's not so bad. You guys are being too hard on her." Larry quipped.

"She's hot when she's not wearing her fake lenses though," added Niqoulas.

"You will still fuck her with or without the glasses," teased Romeo.

"You guys, just stop, okay? That's not funny," Larry rebuked.

"I gotta go." I told him. "Nice meeting you guys."

Larry walked me outside the cafeteria.

"That was really cool man," he said.

"What cool?"

"Never mind. See you around, buddy." He tousled my hair. Where's all that confidence coming from? Damn, Larry.