I walked into the front of our class where all the teachers were seated, I stepped up and took

a look at all their

faces. Finding them to be all lined up in that familiar, sleepy way; like a box of matches could burst into flames.
It’s always the same, my mind goes like this when I think about secondary schools. I took my seat beside a boy
with a high voice. I sat next to him for about five seconds before I could see that he was nothing like me at all.
He was all big and brown, and far, far away from me. He represented everything I never aspired to achieve. I
took my hand out of his pocket. He stopped looking drowsy and put his book down. I listened to him saying
something to the teacher but I couldn’t hear a word. They refused to turn up the volume on the microphone.
Perhaps because only the teacher has a microphone. I looked at the clock. The teacher would have to have
finished his literature assignment before I could get my assignment done. She smiled. I imagined him saying:
what a smile. And I smiled back. He told her that he still had one thing to do and was going to be back in ten
minutes while he got his things done. The teacher smiled again as if she had no clue what was going on; as if
she was too mysterious to know what was going on, shook her head like it was a burden on her mind and then
went back to her work. I smiled at her again. She looked up and smiled. I looked at her, wanting her to know
that I could never really care for her. I can never really desire that kind of attention. She saw that my
imagination had cheated her out of a smile and then, slowly, she smiled again. I laughed. The bell rang, the
teacher closed her book and all the students placed their packs on their shoulders and went out in groups. I saw
my friend across the corridor and turned around to say bye to the teacher. She was already writing her essay.
She looked at me, smiled and waved goodbye. It was only after that I knew she was missing one tooth. I saw a
boy I placed into the fifth class. He was so happy to see me and he asked: “Did you read my book?” He asked,
looking at me with the smile of a victor. “No” I said.