Sparks

Anne

“An impromptu test! Are you serious right now?” I yelled at Pamela over the phone as Jane and I hurried to class.

“You guys should hurry, I saved spots for you. Anny! There are people I can’t fight, once they overpower me, your spots are gone.” Pamela warned.

We quickened our pace to the lecture hall for a test we weren’t prepared for. Pamela and other early risers had gone earlier than us to either study a bit before class, or to secure seats closer to the front row. That was when the general student representative climbed the podium and announced the test. Like other lecturers, the reason for impromptu tests was to fish out people that hardly attended classes. We call them the ‘non-acadas’. 

It is funny how they keep trying because as soon as words get out about a test, even the dead would hear about it. Someone can contact 10 people simultaneously, and the 10 would contact another 10 each, and so on. Some students who are not on the school premises would call on people who aren’t offering the course. These people would now impersonate them. However, this was a general course, so a lot of departments were offering it. 

Medical laboratory, microbiology, biochemistry, and more departments filled the hall to the brim. 

When Jane and I arrived, we were finding it hard to maneuver through the crowd of people. We had contacted Pamela who was directing us to her location. When we got to her, we saw her struggling with two guys over the seats she kept for us.

Jane, the quick-witted one, jumped over the table and pounced on one of our seats while the guys managed to get mine. Pamela and Jane smiled apologetically at me but I shrugged it off and opted to stand with the crowd on the stairs. The hall is a typical lecture hall, you know, with staircases that held seats. 

Now, if I had known things would go down the way they did, I would have squeezed myself in-between Jane and Pamela, but no, I decided to leave them to their comfort.

The class was filled to the brim with hundreds of students and impersonators. It was so stuffy. We were so packed up in each other’s spaces to the extent of perceiving what people had for breakfast and other scents that over time blended to produce a master, revolting, nauseating odor. Tsk, we had no choice. It was how the system worked around here. Miss the test and you’d be on your merry way to carrying the course over. 

This particular lecturer, Mr. Simon was considered deadly. He was ready to fail anyone that missed his tests.

In our discomfort, we held our writing material close, and our valuables closer because, in that crowd, one could easily get robbed.

As soon as the lecturer walked unto the podium, there was a massive uproar and then shuffling followed as people settled, at different parts of the hall. Some were sitting, some swatting, while others were standing or leaning at different points. The test scripts were shared with much difficulty by the make-shift invigilators who were students at higher levels.

Just halfway through the test, a small ruckus began at the back of the hall. Those at the front were oblivion to this and continued scribbling away on their scripts. Soon enough, students began screaming. Just imagine pouring sand into a tiny funnel, that gradual dipping at the middle was how the movement began before it escalated.

The lecturer was gone even before people started screaming for help. Jane, Pamela, and I were confused but we weren’t waiting to find out the cause of the screams. They both stood up and together, whilst holding each other’s hands, we began moving with the crowd towards the exit.

“He has a gun!!!!!” Someone screamed from the back. The movement took on another pace. It became more violent as people started running for their lives.

Everyone was trying to get out through the two big doors at once, making it impossible as the door became clogged with entangled hands and limbs.

“Aaah!” Pamela screamed, falling to the ground. I slipped my hand from Jane who kept moving, pushed through the crowd towards where I last saw Pamela. Thankfully, when I saw her, she wasn’t hurt. She had gummed herself to the elevated podium, so people only brushed against her.

“Come on, Pam!”

“My glasses Anne! You know I can’t see without them,” she cried out.

“Take my hand, Pam!” I yelled. She was going to but then my eyes sighted her glasses close to her leg. “Found it!” I said and bent over to pick it.

That was the worst move I’d ever made. Just as I bent over, someone’s knee made contact with my face sending me sprawling to the floor with an oomph sound escaping my throat.

Just then, gunshots were heard. This created more frenzy and pandemonium as people began running in different directions, crying and screaming, tripping and falling on one another.

Books, pens, phones, test scripts went flying in all directions.

I leaped to my feet and held onto the wall, shaking my head to stop the dizzying caused by the impact on my head.

I looked at where I saw Pamela last but couldn’t find her there.

“Pam! Pam!! Pamela!!!” I screamed searching through the crowd.  

It was hard to move with the confused crowd, as the door could only allow few people to pass through it. Everyone wanted to leave at once

People were being pushed and stepped on. 

I was almost at the door when a massive force came from behind, pushing everyone all at once. I would have made it out with that force but someone had stepped on my sandals causing my ankle to make a painful twist. I screamed and fell out the door onto a cemented ground.

Just when I thought I had gotten out bruised but alive, someone who was trying to jump over me, ended up stomping on my ribs, knocking the air right out of me.

I jerked up at the impact and fell back to the floor, gasping for air. The last thing I saw were my two friends pushing their way towards me before everything went dark.

***

I awoke to the smell of bleach. 'Freaking hospital.' I stretched and sat up on the bed. A nurse was scribbling away on her chart or whatever that square thing is called. She looked up when she noticed my movements.

“Hey, how are u doing?" She asked sweetly.

"I'm fine. Just a little headache,” I said squinting my eyes.

"Your friends brought you here because you fainted,” she explained, coming to my side to make adjustments to the drip.

'Great. Just great.'

"Don't you worry though, you'll be out of here in no time. We just need to run some more tests, okay?"

"Okay. Thank you, nurse," I said with a small smile.

"You’re welcome. The doctor will be here shortly to check your vitals, so relax and I'll get you something for the headache."

With that, she exited.

I sighed and laid back on the bed. I thought of what the nurse said about my friends bringing me over. That meant Pamela was alright, right? I wasn’t convinced, so I searched around the side table for my phone.

“Hope I didn’t drop it. Oh, there it is…shoot! It’s dead.”

Someone knocked, and almost shocked me off the bed. Soon after, the doctor entered.

“You got to be kidding me.”

I mouthed.

Everything from that incident came rushing back as soon as I saw his face. The struggling, dragging, tearing, it all came at once.

This was the same man that dropped me in front of my hostel and found it needful to bribe me. He was coming towards me, his face buried in the charts, the one I saw the nurse holding earlier.

If it wasn’t for our past encounter, I would have actually gawked at his gorgeousness. The urge was there though, but I kept forcing myself to suppress it.

"Good day miss Anne, I'm Doctor Vincent, I hear you had quite an adventure today?" He said looking up. Our eyes met and I could see him stiffen. I guess he recognized me. Why wouldn’t he?

"Yes, doctor." I replied coldly, with sarcastic emphasis on ‘doctor’.

I know it was a low blow, but that was the only thing I could come up with when I was trying to ignore his physique and handsome face.

He stared at me for a couple of seconds before going back to the chart.

"You have just a few scratches and bruises, nothing serious. How are you feeling?"

"I feel fine doctor. Please when can I leave?" I asked harshly.

He didn’t flinch. 

"Soon Miss Anne, I need to check your vitals," he responded calmly.

He removed his stethoscope from around his neck, put it in his ear, and then came closer to me.

“Could you please open a few buttons,” he said gesturing at my button-up shirt.

I stared from his face to my shirt, and then slowly I complied with his request. I had forced myself to think up reasons I shouldn’t, but nothing came up. Deep down, I knew he wouldn’t harass me or anything. 

He placed the other end of the stethoscope on my chest. When he removed it and placed it on another spot, his fingers touched my skin, creating a sizzle at the point of contact. If not that I caught myself early, I would have jerked back.  

The effect of that single touch didn’t stop there. Goose pimples rippled down my body straight to the middle of my legs, where it began throbbing in a dull lazy rhythm.

My face heated up. I was freaking turned on by a mere touch from this man. A mere touch!

I must be going crazy.

My body was reacting weirdly and I didn't know why. I should be repulsed by him. 

After checking my heartbeat, he placed his fingers on my lower eyelid and drew it down. He did the same to the other eye.

His hand on leaving my face mistakenly brushed softly against my lips and for a second, I could have sworn it lingered there, along with his eyes. But with the way my body was going haywire, I could easily blame it on my imagination. 

“A nurse will come shortly to release you. Good day miss Anne." He said and walked straight out without giving me a second glance.

I just sat there dumbfounded. I couldn't decipher my feelings. I was glad that my body stopped its weirdness shortly after he left, but at the same time, it annoyed me that he didn't show any form of emotion whatsoever. He was acting like a typical robot.

My thoughts went back to that moment in the hallway when he held me. He was totally different. Well, that might be because it involved family. I wasn’t family, why would he care? The thought of that annoyed me.

Later that day I was discharged. Without delay, I hurried off to inquire about Pamela.

On reaching the hospital door, I made to pass through, but the door flew open and hit me on the head, sending me flat on my butt, with an oomph.

"Aww! Not again!”

"I'm so sorry miss, I didn’t mean to. Are you alright? Here let me help you up,” the owner of the voice asked and without waiting for an answer, rushed behind me, held my shoulders, and pulled me up.

“It’s alright, I’m fine…” I couldn’t finish the statement. I had frozen on the spot on seeing the face behind the voice. He was no other than the rapist dude.

'You've got to be kidding me again,' I thought, glancing at the cemented ceiling.

He too froze. He was still holding my shoulders from behind as our eyes locked.

"Excuse me?" I finally said, wriggling out of his nauseating touch. 

"Oh sorry! " he exclaimed, quickly withdrawing his hands like someone that touched hot coal.

"Thank you," I said with sarcasm dripping from my voice.

I’d decided both of them deserved all the sarcastic comments and responses I could come up with.

I moved past him and went outside. I knew he would come after me because he made no move to continue in his direction.

"Wait miss, please!” He yelled from behind.

I stopped and turned.

"What?" I clipped.

"I know what I tried to do to you was very wrong and I sincerely apologize. Please forgive me. I have been searching for you for a while now. Please permit me to make it up to you," he rushed everything out at once.

"No need for that. I don’t want to talk about it. I’ve forgiven you, haven’t I?"

"Please, I need to make it up to you, for my peace of mind,” he pleaded in despair.

"See, I'm in pain right now, leave me be," I clipped, turning to leave 

"Please," he pleaded pathetically. "Just an audience is all I ask for. It'll be in an open place or any place of your choice. Please miss, hear me out," he said. I was even scared he would begin crying.

"I’ve been going crazy over everything," he continued. "I know I’m no saint but I’ve never in my life gone that far before. It is eating me up. Please... I beg of you." Now I could see the tears.

I pitied his desperation. I could see the turmoil on his face. His supratrochlear vein was threatening to explode. 

"Okay,” I said sighing deeply, hoping and praying that I wouldn’t regret my decision.