Chapter 2 – Her Trouble - Mate

The scratching sounds of the pens have echoed the walls of the classroom upon the lecturer’s instruction. Some girls were seriously discussing a leisurely topic and some girls were giggling on the plain senses of humour. Some boys were sleeping on their desks and some were gaming on their phones.

The lecturer named Mr Alexander Thijarux, who has been lecturing them for solidly three hours without quenching his throat, didn’t mind any of the activities of students since he know about his students.

He is known for his short – temper yet sociably to befriend with and the most handsome man around late 60s who is two decades younger in his appearance. He allows the freedom of the student to do whatever they want without disturbing his lecture. Students too mutually agreed to him.

When all the students were enjoying themselves instead of bothering to take notes which were recited by their handsome lecturer, a pair of spectacles worn green eyes was concentrated on her notes.

 “Psst, psst”

“Here knocks the trouble”, she thought. She raised her eyes to look at the trouble straight into its eyes and asked by raising her arched eyebrows, “What?”

“Show me the last line, I have missed his lecture.” The person beside her asked in a lower tone carefully not to be caught by their lecturer.

She showed him her notes while her mind was cursing him, “Damn, this little monster. Don’t you have ears to get his words, he is loud enough? Why do you ever-present in this classroom and disturb other genuine students like me?”

She expected thanks from him for showing her notes, but he returned her a chuckled laugh which gave her only irritation. She asked him through her sealed teeth, “What is amusing you?”

“Your handwriting amused me. It is not note-taking; it is note-scribbling, Mrt.” He chortled at her again.

Mrtyu Nyfintome, often called ‘Mrt’ by her friends, was fumed in anger and closed her notebook with a loud sound.

“Hey, Mrt, cool! I was just joking. Your handwriting is divine. Show me the notes and help me with my survival, please… (Mrtyu maintained her silence) the French beard man might kill me if I was picked to answer his question, Mrt…” he pleaded.

“Seriously, should I care for your survival!” she thought as she rolled her eyes at him and finally decided to show the notes to him, ignoring his controlled laugh.

Seyfert Broomrape is not only her desk-mate; he is also her trouble-mate. He always invites trouble to share it with her. Apart from that, he is the only person who has the guts to talk to her since everyone ignores her like she never exists in the world.

“No! Not today, Fert, I don’t want to be punished today as I am fonder of this particular subject. Please don’t ruin this, will you?” she requested him.

Seyfert nodded with a controlling laugh who later busted out his hilarious laughter. To add fuel to Mrtyu’s worries, both Mrtyu and Seyfert gained attention from all corners of their classroom, including their lecturer who threw the chalk piece at Seyfert.

“Both heaven and he'll curse you, Seyfert.” She cursed while she passed her sharp looks at him.

Mr Alex rooted his long legs in their direction while other colleagues were laughed at them. Dmitri, who claimed to date Seyfert threw her anger bombs on him. Seyfert winked at her to take it easy and doesn’t bother the situation. Dmitri turned her head away from him.

“Miss Mrtyu, can you show me your notes?” Mr Alex asked her. Mrtyu nodded and opened her notes to show him that she was genuine in taking notes from his lecture, unlike her colleagues who were funning them.

Mr Alex bent down to take a closure look at her notes and asked me, “Can you elaborate your notes especially this last line? I see only images, not words.”

Seyfert gurgled with a laugh. Mrtyu stomped her foot on his shoe to shut him and she explained from my notes, “I take notes as symbols and pictures that I can sense... my easier understanding.” She waited for the return response from him.

Instead, Mr Alex looked at her with an unusual look mixed with wonder which gave rise to Mrtyu to think, “What’s with his eyes? Am I invisible to his eyes too or do I look like a phantom?”

“Miss Mrtyu, help me to get the brown file from my desk.” He directed her. Mrtyu eyed at Seyfert and trailed to fetch the brown file from his cabin which was situated a few feet away from her classroom.

“Mr Seyfert, can you show me your notes…?” these words from the lecturer was fallen on her ears when she scooted outside the classroom and thought happy inside and talked back to her, “Finally the little monster is caught red-handed. Hooray!”

Mrtyu entered the lecturer’s cabin stating the name board as ‘Alex Thijarux’ a French man with a French beard known for his physique and sound knowledge in the architecture field and also the chief lecturer in Ishvakar Academy of architecture and also known for his short-tempered nature and his weird punishments.

Mrtyu searched for the brown file on his desk which has a desktop computer mounted on it followed by many wall-mounted bookshelves and famous pictures of unique and ancient buildings. When she was locating the brown file, she mistakenly shook the mouse pointer.

The sleeping desktop awakens to reveal his desktop picture of ancient buildings. But Mrtyu didn’t look at his desktop and concentrated on the brown file. She found the sealed file in red and wondered, “Is he suffering from colour blindness? The file is in red, he mentioned it as brown…?”

Mrtyu took the red file and was about to leave the cabin. The desktop dinged to some notification which halted Mrtyu suddenly. She told to her, “What if, I was wrong? I should reconfirm it before taking this file to him. Otherwise, everyone would laugh at me for my wrong fetch of file and will mock at me for colour blindness.”

After locating the correct file in brown colour, she replaced the red file in the same place, “Phew… thank god, my instinct has warmed me earlier.”

When she raised her head after replacing, her eyes caught the ancient building that was shown on his desktop. She was drowned in the beauty of the aesthetic structural beauty.

“The person who designed the building would be a god of the architect. I can’t stop praising the beauty of this building.” Mrtyu said while searching the name of the building and location.

As nothing was mentioned in the picture, “Oh my god, Mr Alex would kill me, if I didn’t get there on time.” She rushed towards her classroom and found Seyfert was still standing. “Finally… he got his punishment alone this time.” She handover the brown file to the lecturer and entrenched it to her place to be seated besides standing Seyfert.