Lunch Time

The bell rang to signal lunch break, and the students jumped off gleefully from the desks they had been stuck to for four hours. Grabbing their lunch boxes, they ran out to the field to enjoy their twenty minutes of freedom. 

    Zereen sat by the slide on a small plot of grass, balancing a book on her knees while munching on a bland chicken sandwich. She liked these little moments during the lunch break, when the happy noises of her peers playing and laughing made up the background noise to her otherwise quiet reading sessions. A boy raced after a girl in front of her, both giggling madly and she couldn't help but smile a little herself. 

    With one more bite the sandwich was gone, and fifteen minutes still remained of the break. She turned the page on her book and felt a short pulse of excitement at seeing that she was at the end of another chapter. Ending chapters always meant beginning new ones, and she was eager to see what the next page would bring. 

    A loud dull thud sounded in front of her and she jumped, startled, to find a boy fallen down before her. He dusted himself of quickly, his hair a muddy mess and his white shirt stained with dirt. He looked annoyed and beneath the dust it was possible to make out the flush of embarrassment on his cheeks. A gaggle of laughter could be heard directed in his direction, and he was obviously trying not to let it get to him. 

    "Haha, very funny guys. I'd like to see you try and run in this mud and not fall down."

    This was met by more laughter and an older looking boy stepped forward and yelled "It looks pretty dry to me. Perfect running conditions, unless you've got two left feet, haha!"

    There was no mistaking those pink patches on his cheeks now— the boy was definitely mad at himself and his friends. 

    Zereen quietly got up, gathered her lunch box and her book, and casually walked across before she too, fell down quite painfully. The laughter died abruptly, and the boy turned around to help her get up. 

    "Are you okay?"

    "Yeah, I'm fine. It's quite muddy here, isn't it?" she said just loudly enough for his friends to hear. 

    The boy looked at her confusedly for a few moments, before realising that she knew as well as him that the ground wasn't getting any muddier with their lies. She looked back at him, assurance in her eyes. 

    "Yeah, uhm, I know. You should have been more careful" he said loudly, smiling as he did so, his back to the crowd. 

    She smiled her small quiet smile and bent to gather her possessions. He bent to help her.

    "Oh no, your book. It's ruined."

    Zereen looked at the crumpled mess in his hands and tried not to feel her heart sink or her eyes well up. 

    "Oh, that's okay, I was done reading it anyway."

    The boy stood up, turning the book over in his hands. 

    "My older brother's coming home next week, he lives in 
England. I'll ask him to get a copy of this."

    "Oh, you don't have to do that, really, it's fine!"

    Why wouldn't the tears stop?

    "You didn't have to do that either, you know."

    They smiled at each for a few moments then, thanking each other without saying it. 

    "I'm Zareef, by the way."

    "Zereen."

    They shook hands, and the bell rang to signal the end of lunch break.

    But a new chapter had just begun.

Nifath Karim Chowdhury likes to doodle all over her notebooks, textbooks and life. Send her a virtual high-5 at nifty_nicole@live.com or a wave on instagram @nifathkarim