Chapter 3: The Stories Much Nicer Than the Books Cover
The boy holds the door knob and slowly pushes it forward, opening the door slightly forward. As he steps in, he can see the entire classroom revealed in the front of his eyes. He keeps on walking forward into the massive room, while inspecting the room feature. The chair lines up and makes a half circle around the teacher table.
The classroom takes a stadium approach, where each line at the back will be on a higher pedestal from the chair that is lining at the front. He walked to the nearest front row, dropped his entire weight to the chair and sighed deeply, already feeling exhausted before all the lectures even began.
He always took the front row if the classroom didn’t do some silly lottery pick up, and always worked himself up if the picking chair method is the score. There is no particular reason why he always took the front row, he always thought the back row was always full of distraction, and he does not like to get distracted when he is doing something.
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There is almost nobody here, only me and two strangers that take seats far from one another. The clock that hangs on the wall ticking each second, and it vibrates deep into my heart. It’s awfully quiet that I can feel each second ticking into my bloodstream. I closed my eyes and let the stillness steal the moment, there were only a few white sounds around the room, the girl sitting on the back seemed to be writing on something, she clicked her pen every few seconds. The man sitting down at far right snored lightly, someone doesn’t get enough sleep it seems. I keep my eyes closed, until some rustling sound comes from the door that I was just used to.
“Good morning! Oh! Joshua!”
I open my eyes and see a woman in her late 40’s come in barging into the classroom. A warm steam can be seen coming out from the coffee cup that she is holding, she just came from the canteen not too long ago and went straight to class. Her hair folded neatly, her glasses sticking from her hair, her posture looks like someone who has not slept for three days.
Her step is small yet quick, and in no time she makes her way to the podium and puts everything on the table, and proceeds to sit down on the chair. Her short and petite body was almost swallowed all by the height of the table in front of her, which showed how small she actually was. She made a gesture with her hand, which signaled me to come closer to her.
As I walked to her distance, I studied her features at the same time. She has this childlike feature, oftentimes she is also mistaken as a new student instead of being a lecturer. She is an IT Lecturer, IT Major people are known to never dress nicely, or I’d say they tend to value their time to study more than their sense of clothing. Mrs. Yuen what you called a Female Nerd at this point in her life.
“You seem to always come early, yes?” with a smile plastered on her faces.
Mrs. Yuen always appears to be cheerful, she always connects well with her students, probably because her attitude and looks, all the students seem easy to be related to her classroom. She for some reason always has this bright attitude in the morning, I guess she is really a rare case of a human. Either she has weird attraction with morning, or she just got her coffee right. She is a fun lecturer, it’s always nice to hear her “back in my day” story despite her look, and it did not help at all.
“Well, isn't that better than actually late for the class?” I smiled and lowered myself to her level.
“Definitely” she smiles and sip her coffee while her eyes are still focusing on whatever happened on her laptop screen.
I can see many data moving and changing from one another from blue reflection on her glasses. She is the best at what she does, data programming is her specialty, though her teaching can be fun, she is still strict in some aspects. She is the type of person that you would like to be friends with instead of turning them into enemies.
“I do not have anything to do in the morning if I’m at my home anyways, so might as well just go to campus”
“However, do you need to do that every morning?” her eyes still fixed at the screen.
“Oh well, then I guess I’ll start getting late then” I jokingly replied to her.
She grabbed my arm with both of her hands, eyes still fixed on the screen, not moving.
“No no! You are one of the students with better attendance! I do not want upper up complain to me!”
I just let out an awkward smile toward her.
“The thing is, every teacher that have morning class with you always said that you always there before anyone else, at this point you might become topic for us talking about student”
“Is that even a bad thing? I thought you all lecture like a student with a punctual tendency” not that I do it on purpose, but one stone for two birds, right?
“I guess so~” she pouted, but this time she looked straight at me, no longer dividing her attention.
I do not like to make small talk like this, I can’t understand them, I can read them, I don’t know their intention. She let go of my arm, and I just stood there not knowing what to do. I straighten my posture and put my hand at the back of my head and rub it. This is getting awkward.
“anyways, whatever the reason that makes you wake up early and go straight to campus is, I just want to say that at least make it your real habits, being punctual is good”
She came back to focusing on whatever was happening on her laptop screen again. Am I actually a punctual person or not, I’m not sure myself, I could be as lazy as a student that is always late. But I don’t want to find out what the price that I have to pay, when that is really revealed. Is that even a good thing in general?
She faces me and smiles wide from ear to ear showing all her teeth.
“In any case, I called you because I want to inform you that; assignment that I’m planning to give to entire class for closing of this semester is a group project”
She continued typing something.
“This one quite heavy if a student do it alone, programming not easy matter after all”
“And?”
She rolled her eyes, as soon as she heard my response, she clicked her tongue, as if she was ready to give me a lecture that was worth one year.
“Who are we kidding? You’ll end up do it alone like usual”
I lift my left eyebrow when she replies to me with that piece of information.
“And I don’t know whether you purposely did it or you just always in bad luck, but not this time young man!”
Working with others is troublesome, 99% of the time it always turns awry and not as I expected, most of these people are not even decent enough to be a good partner. I always end up doing everything alone anyways, it's better I do it all by myself anyways, the outcome is still the same. Socializing with people is hard, their mind is like the season, changing every second, and I can’t catch up with all those changes.
“Plus… I’m being serious when I said this one difficult and you can’t bear it alone, this is in bare minimum work that worth for two people”
She extended her arm, her hand pat my arm since she can’t reach my shoulder. What is she? A hamster? But this is going to be a bad case for me, working with strangers has never been my forte. If anything I’m concerned with how my end score will be like. I just can wish if she can forget all about that, I can end up alone again, or at least please pair me up with someone that total passive, so I can take control.
“You have choice to pick one by yourself, or I’ll be the one pick the person for you”
This time her smile changed into the most evil and sinister one. If god exists, please allow me to attain my freedom from this burden. At least make this woman forget about everything, because that would work too. Socializing with these people is going to be problematic, I need to start everything from the very start, getting to know them it’s useless, we are going to forget each other sooner or later anyways.
“I know your skill and ability, and for once I never doubt what you capable of, If you were bad, all other lecture won’t let you do everything all alone”
Her face softened, looking at me with a sympathetic smile and eyes. I feel tugging in my heart, do I look that pitiful? Is being in solitude cursed? Why can't people stop seeing me with those eyes? I want you to stop, I want to make you close your eyes to eternity and zip that mouth into the abyss. Hurt, it felt hurt, every beat is hurt now, wipe that smile! Wipe it!
“Human have their limit, do not force yourself too hard, when you reach to the point of no return, there is nothing you can do”
But I am, already here, am I? Am I not inside the point of no return? If I’m not, what is this pain called? People meddling on other business way too often and too deep, thinking they are having special privilege to doing so. Everything makes me sick.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The class starts and continues just any other day, the boy gives it all, all his attention and focus to the class. Trying to subdue the feeling that was just burned a few moments ago. But sometimes his mind can help but drifted to the part of his mind where he just floated into the darkness. But he is not the type of person that likes to make people disappointed either, at this point he is no better than pushover and hypocrite himself.
He always makes decisions where he will be less involved, in that way people can have whatever they want without having their ripple of action affect him. Why now? He is already in the middle of his university year, and by the end of next year everything will be over after all. Why does Mrs. Yuen insist? If he is already in the middle of something, aren’t most people should get the hint and let him do it his own way? Then something must be going on between the closed doors.
There is another way to recruit whoever he sees fits, but it will be a matter of the ending. With a massive coding program there is no way that person can catch up with him, and his façade will blow up, that will jeopardize his score. However, letting strangers just get into his work is not a good idea either, in fact it’s not sitting well at all in his mind.
A solution needs to be found at the end of this period, before all this whole “friendship” thing burns and causes trouble all over the place. He can’t ruin everything, at least not now, he is already so far and beyond. Any move will send him two or maybe ten steps behind, and he can’t have that.
I’m not born natural smart, if anything I need to work my ass off to catch up with everything in this place. I’ve been working this hard, I can’t have any flaw beyond this or everything going to be in vain. I can’t let that happen, whatever people around me think otherwise. To have other distractions is the least thing that I want to have right now.
It took me a lot of effort to keep my mind on the track, with everything coming flying inside, it’s hard to keep the train of thought in one lane. However, by the end of the day, it seems I can understand the lecture just fine, it shouldn’t be a problem then.
Without care with time, it passed just like sand. Mrs. Yuen starts explaining her assignment and demands to have the group name by tonight in her email, other students start to speak to one another, some walking to their designated partner. She is busy answering questions from other students that surround her, probably asking for the details about the assignment.
I start cleaning up my table, thinking this is the good time to slip from her eyes, I need to make my way fast before she is aware of what is happening. I walk swiftly to the door, while praying inside my heart that she is not aware of my presence that gone, until she called my name and made me stop on my track.
“Joshua! Where are you going? Come here, I have someone to introduce you with”
I cursed under my breath, took a big inhale of breath and exhaled it right away. I change my aura and composure, trying to fix my face before turning myself to face her. I smile and walk in her direction, I’m aware now that there are no longer a bunch of students circling her, only one tall figure standing there, he looks rough, and his aura is the one you described as “do not mess with me” kind of thing.
His black hair shining with a hint of blue, a thin sideburn for each side, his clean shaven beard can be seen that he is proud of them. His figure is tall, despite his clothes wrapping around his body, I can see tattoos crawling under that shirt to his neck. His right ear pierced with some kind of chain ornament. His eyes looking at me at the same time Mrs. Yuen called my name, I can feel that sharp eyes burn into me each time I got closer to them.
“Why so hurry Joshua? I’m not Hell Gate guardian, shouldn’t be scare with me”
Her smile once again became wide and it almost cut her face in half.
“Yes you are, if anything, you much worse than them”
A sharp voice comes from my left, he got some nerve to call her out like that.
“Hush! Do not be rude!”
She quickly put her finger on the surface of her lips, signaling the man to keep silent.
The man only rolling his eyes and hanging his head to the back, gesturing how bored he is right now facing her, with that kind of attitude I do not think I can’t get along with him, if my hunch is right, he is… definitely my partner, what a luck.
“This is Daniel, he is also alone and doesn’t have anyone to join him to do the assignment. As you can see his appearance get best of him and made people reject him”
Mrs. Yuen makes a signature hand by opening both of palm and showing me the man just like a lady in an infomercial introduction product. I just took a glance at him and fixed my focus to her again, waiting for whatever coming.
“Your habits that always embarrassed me in the front of people also not yet died down Yuen”
My eyes widening, did he just refer to her by her first name? I just stood there in awe, and disappointment, because not only Yuen put me in the tight position but with this kind of person working for assignment.
Mrs. Yuen put both her palms under her chin and pouted.
“But it’s fun~! People that do not know you will always got the wrong idea”
All I can do now is pinching the bridge of my nose and trying to heal my headache, this is a lot to take in. This “Daniel” man is way too intimidating, it will be hell to get him to agree on something.
“Your way of introducing people, if it’s not rude, then it’s totally out of pocket”
“Come on~ you are always coming back at me” now she is just a baby.
She was still pouting hard, but then she changed her facial expression when she looked in my direction. She is a good actress if she wanted to be one, and won't doubt her skill at all.
“Oh well, I called you and Joshua here because I just thought that you guys will be good partners to do this assignment, it is good being together don’t you think so, Joshua? Daniel?”
“I refuse”
Surprisingly both I and Daniel speak at the same time, we immediately look at each other frowning. Up to the great start. This won’t lead us anywhere, if anything, I can feel the bad luck will keep coming,
The woman that sits at the front of us just laughing hard and doesn’t feel any remorse by throwing everybody here into chaos, is she even have a heart? The most shocking thing is she even looks like very enjoying it, like this is some kind of show for her.
“Look at you both! Already in the same though what a good sync!”
“We aren’t!”
And both of us frowned at each other once again, getting annoyed with every second ticking, but most importantly getting annoyed with this lecturer. And she laughed even harder, I can see from her face that she felt that she achieved something, whatever that is, but this is getting ridiculous.
“Well you both can refuse and do this assignment alone though….”
And just that Mrs. Yuen true faces surfaces and bring chill to the entire and almost empty class
“You both failed no matter how good both of you doing the assignment are”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We both get out from the class with empty eyes, the fact that she can go as far as threatening her student is unexpected. Neither Daniel has a choice to say no at this point. I do not have choice but to make this work, no matter what. Because failing is not an answer for these classes. I wonder if I can ask him to stay put and let me handle everything, I can give him the summary of how the program works and the function that I used. But before I can open my mouth the other person opens their mouth first.
“Sh*t this getting out of hand, that prick Yuen never changed”
He looks insanely mad toward Mrs. Yuen. I won’t be any differ, I’m just as mad as him.
“You know her? You look really closed with Mrs. Yuen”
The way he speaks like that only leave me with two assumption, one he is plainly rude, but Mrs. Yuen won’t take that kind of behavior lightly, so left only one, he is close with her.
“I know her from a very young age, she is my neighbor. Why? You think I’m being rude to call her name directly like that?”
“No one going to think otherwise, this is not the environment where you can be that casual with lecturer anyways”
I let out a slight laugh to him, of course I will think so. No one in their right mind will just think that you know her, if not because of her casual remark too, I do not think anyone will be aware at all.
“Huh, you got a point there”
He smiles toward me, he is surprisingly not as bad as I thought. Here I thought we would go straight to hanging one another on the ceiling. But let me be honest, I too do not want any trouble with him, I have something better to do.
“but you are the one misjudged me, if I were think you completed asshole, I won’t ask you regarding your relationship with her at all, just straight labeled you whatever worst word that exist”
I folded my arms, looking at him, with a mocking smile. Taunting him might be fun, who knows.
“You are different aren’t you? Aren’t you scared?”
His eyes lighten up something inside
“Oh definitely! Only people not in the right mind will think otherwise”
I just lean to him, taunting him more.
“But we have better thing to do, she didn’t kidding when she said this is going to be massive assignment”
He looks the other way and starts looking like he is thinking of something.
“Indeed, we better learn about it little bit better, let's write some pseudocode first and compare it to one another, we go from there”
I look at him in disbelief, did he just give me decent advice?
“What? Your face like you just seeing a ghost”
“Okay then we shall discuss about our assignment next meeting”
The man extended his big and.
“Daniel Koma, I need you to pass this class”
I took his hand, and in an instant all my hand got covered by his, is this man even human?
“Joshua Kim, likewise”
And we proceed to exchange email to make this assignment progress smoothly. I walked out to my next class, but before far I looked back at him and yelled at him.
“I like your piercing!”
He just showed me his cocky smile and yelled back.
“I like your gust too!”
I’m amused by how this day went, never thought that a lot of unexpected things happened in the early morning, and we are not done yet, the sun is not even set. There is a full day ahead of me.