Chapter 2 TWO

In my blur vision, the white-cloaked people in my surrounding swarmed and walked here and there in a rush with bee-like voices booming in my ears. With A little energy injected into my effort, I finally managed to open my eyes fully and found myself lying powerless and sickly on a bed half-walled by the curtains in a cold place, I always hoped that I would never visit, an emergency room of the hospital.

The headache hit me every time I attempted to recall the incident that had brought me here; my father's face bombarded my remembrance with the brutal rage that he directed at me mercilessly. Only God's miracle could save me from the doom of his despise toward me, his only daughter, the one he should have put under his protection.

All this anguish started with gambling and alcohol as his escape from his hopelessness after losing his previous job. Being a gambler and drunkard caused him to be someone else who was villainous to his family, to me, and my mother.

A doctor's arrival at my bed cut my reverie; his handsomeness with his perfect features of the pointed nose, fair skin, strong jaw, and sharp eyes enchanted me for a while before his soft-toned voice pulled me back to my senses. His peach lips motioned in a question slowly; after a long silence, my mouth sputtered a few words in trembling.

"Where is my mother?" Instead of giving him the answer he wanted to hear to his inquiry about how I felt, I muttered those words as I didn't catch my mother anywhere.

"Your mother will come in a minute. How do you feel now?" He repeated his question and with a sweet smile hanging on his lips, I gave up on telling him that my body was still in pain. "I have prescribed medicine for you that you need to take regularly. And for the pain killer, you can stop it once you get better." I nodded to his advice.

Just as the doctor predicted, my mother emerged through the half-open drape wall wrapped in her shabby colorless dress with nothing she brought but her woeful countenance after the doctor left. Her unkempt long hair would scare the children if she didn't tie it in a high bun, which fortunately she did today to appear neat.

"What did the doctor tell you?" While muttering her query about my health state, she took a stand on the right side of my bed with her eyes on me as if checking my body out just to ensure that her only daughter was not in a serious fatality.

"There is nothing to worry about, Mom. So, calm down."

"How can I calm down after what you have been through? You fell fainted."

"It is even better if I die," My despair struck my mother with a lightning bolt that destroyed her heart into pieces.

"Don't say something stupid, Ilana."

"How do you think you will pay the hospital bill, Mom?"

"That's none of your business. What you need to focus on right now is your recovery. Leave the rest to me."

The silence consumed us afterward, remaining the voices from the health professional's rush steps, the rolling beds, the groans and the moans from the patients, or the sobs from the patients' families.

Unable to endure the heartache of witnessing my mother's agony, I tilted my head to the left while holding back my tears not to stream down my cheeks. My mother was the epitome of woes; bad luck haunted her life after marrying my father who had ruined her hope of ecstasy. However, her obstinacy defeated her affliction; none of those pains killed her no matter how hard the life she had to live.

***

After two days of my inpatient, I started my normal activity, arriving at school early in the morning; my mother didn't permit me to work as I was still in my physical recovery. My appearance in a shabby uniform and full-of-stitch shoes attracted other students ' attention as usual; their gazes even followed me wherever my steps led me. Some of them showed me their pitying stare, while others were caught pinching their nose with my presence because of my odor; living in poverty didn't let me have a perfume let alone the make-up kits to enhance my look. However, I never allow those disdainful eyes to intimidate me; my main priority which was to study and graduate from this school strengthened me.

As a huge private school, Star Senior High School where I studied was equipped with numerous facilities not to mention the lifts that enable teachers and students to have easy mobility. It was not because I didn't like punctuality that drove me to take stairs rather than a lift to get to my classroom; I just avoided dodging to converge with other students inside the lift.

In a hurry of climbing up the stairs, I made a mistake bumping into the most arrogant boy at school, Kevin, the tall white young boy with raven eyes and wavy hair; our bodies collided but luckily didn't land on the rough tiles. Nevertheless, the incident ignited the fire of rage in him to burst out on me who just directed my sight on the blank wall with my hand holding one of my arms.

"It's you, the filthy girl! Can't you watch your steps? You're killing me! Or did you do it on purpose to get my attention?" His mouth yelled his mockery instead of conveying his apology for hitting my body.

"Move aside." I snarled.

"What did you say?"

"I told you to move as you are getting in my way."

"How dare you, the poor girl to give me an order?" Before his hand touched my head, I managed to pull it sidelong; he hissed with his lips curling in disgust. "Do you think I will touch the ugly poor filthy girl like you? My hand is even too precious to lay my finger on someone like you." Turning around, he ran upstairs and disappeared through the door. I was immune to his rude words for I had ever heard the worst; I grinned at his humiliation. With a heavy heart and burden weighing my shoulders, I continued my steps to my class.

The frenzy of the students exploded out from the classroom in the corner of the third floor inside the northern building of the school; it was where I spent hours every day studying and listening to the teacher's lectures. My small body easily slipped inside the half-opened door toward the untaken seat in the back row; I faced the nonchalance of my classmates who never acknowledged my existence in the classroom.

After shoving my small bag which looked more like a shopping bag into the drawer, I buried my cheek on the desk, the habit I did as a lonely creature with no one to talk to. This way, my mind could travel to my imaginary world where I found only happiness.

"Hi...." At first, my ears ignored the greeting from someone which I wasn't sure to whom he spoke. But, my quietness caused him to say it louder in hesitance. "Hi ...Ilana..."

In reluctance, I lifted my head and my eyes squinted to the glassed boy whose visage showcased his awkwardness receiving my gaze. On his name tag, the word "Reno Wijaya" peered at me. "What can I do for you?"

"I just would like to thank you for the pen you lent me in English class." For a while, his small round dark eyes behind his spectacles drowned me in the deep ocean! I struggled to find a way to swim up to the surface of his charm. Despite his nerdy look, he was stupendously handsome with his towering stoic torso, and perfect features of his face, pointed nose ,and porcelain skin tone. "That night, I didn't mean to stalk you."

"No..." I forbade myself to admire this guy in front of me; it would only direct me to bad things.

"What?" My sudden unexpected reaction startled him.

"No, I don't remember anything about you." My random response to his wonder just put me into a clumsiness and made me curse myself for acting weirdly before him.

"I understand. If you don't mind, we can..."

"Can you just go back to your seat? I am not in the mood to talk to anyone right now. Leave me alone." Without a word of protest, he languidly strode to his seat in the front row. Meanwhile, I dove back to my imaginary realm but this time his handsome face followed me which sparked my rage.

***

The sun scorched my fragile skin viciously when I paved through the curb under its light from school; the sweat flooded my body; my thin shirt stuck on it and my nose flared as a response to the odor from that bad-smelled liquid. The hunger and thirst worsened my condition; my hand unconsciously slipped inside my skirt pocket to check the food Reno gave me at recess time.

He might spot me observing the canteen from afar; without money, I could not enter and buy the food there. His kindness led him to purchase a pack of sandwiches for me which I initially refused to accept yet my rumbled tummy forced me to receive his care.

And that sandwich remained in my pocket until the school hours ended for no reason. It was probably the first time I got that food in my whole life or it was special. My head shook for the latter reason; why was it special?

The far distance from school to my house compelled me to keep walking; sometimes in my stride, my lips turned up in a small smile recalling Reno's word, " Would you be my friend?"

No one in this world had the willingness to be my friend except for him, the nerdy yet the smartest student at school and it washed me with feelings I never experienced before. Even the remembrance of his hesitant approach to my desk this morning could erase a little bad memory of my father's torture and encountering that pompous boy, Kevin.

My smile didn't last long as out of nowhere a mob of people jumped in my way with laughter that roared around us. From the way they appeared in front of me, there was no way that they had good intentions for me; I could not discover any chance to escape from their ambush.

"You can't run away from us! Stop trying!"

"You can take my bag but please let me go!" I begged but they took it for granted.

"Who said we wanted your belongings? The poor girl like you, won't have anything to offer to us." He, a lanky bearded man, who seemed to be the leader signaled to the other to catch me but before their plan came into realization, someone intervened.

"Don't dare to touch her!"