9 Chapter 9: Poisoned with Banana

"Sally, did you cover the cake with chocolate syrup?" I giggle.

"Yes, boss!" Sally mock salutes me.

"Children, today we are going to share our lunch together as we discussed in class earlier before." the teacher says and the class echoes with 'yes'.

I nudge Sally in her stomach, she looks hesitantly at me for a moment but moves to her target. "Umm... Would you like to share lunch with me?" she smiles at him very, very fondly and innocently.

"Why not, sure Sally!" the brat turns to look at me and sticks out his tongue like I'd die eating lunch alone today.

Hah! stupid brat. He doesn't know where he has gotten himself into. MUWAHAHA!

To his amusement, I give him a sad smile.

Sally puts forward her lunch while brat does the same with his. Brat moves his hands towards Sally's lunch box.

He uncaps the lunch box and grins looking at the chocolate covered cake inside her lunch box.

He slowly scoops a bite into his mouth. And...

Gulps.

He takes another spoon full and soon he starts devouring the cake without a care in the world.

No effect? That wasn't supposed to happen!

"This is good Sally did you make it?" he asks Sally.

"No, my mommy makes me lunch."

"Your mommy is a good cook." he compliments.

This is weird. Why isn't it working? We spent 3 hours making this cake with the help of Sally's mother! It should work!

"It isn't entirely chocolate?"

he asks, tasting the contents in his mouth, slipping it from left to right.

Wow, the brat is too dumb to even notice his own weakness?

He suddenly stiffens.

"Is something wrong?" Sally asks him with concern.

"No... I... It's fine."

"Then have some more of it." she holds her lunch box to him.

"No... I think I am fine."

"You didn't actually like it." Sally pouts, watching him.

"No, no... It's just-" He cups his mouth with his hands and his eyes widen at Sally. "Was there banana in this cake?"

"I guess there was...." Sally's eyes also widen as she pretends to realize that he was actually allergic to bananas.

"Oh sorry, have this biscuit for the change of the taste." Sally hands him a biscuit after she digs it out of her small backpack. He takes it almost immediately and eats it in one bite.

Alright, here it goes again. MUWAHAHA!

He stiffens again and clutches his own neck as if to stop whatever was stuck down his throat. "BAN-"pause "-NA-"pause "-NA." he managed to say between chokes. Sally notices the wrapper of the biscuit which clearly said 'banana flavor'.

"Oh my! I'm really sorry! Here drink this!" Sally hands him a bottle of milk, he snatches it from her hold and drinks it like a maniac. He shoves down all the content of the bottle into his mouth without a third thought.

If I were you, I wouldn't do that. Perhaps this could be... Banana milkshake inside the milk bottle, who knows? MUWAHAHAHA-

Wait, it's getting kind of creepy to laugh like that inside my head... Never mind.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and immediately stiffens again with his hand in mid-air. He stands up from his seat and runs to the washroom without asking the teacher for her permission, keeping his mouth covered with his hands along the way.

The teacher doesn't notice anyone leaving the class as she was very busy tasting other kids lunch.

I cover my mouth with my hands, preventing myself from laughing.

Sarah-2 and Brat-1.

"I think we went way too far." Sally comes, facing me with her hands on her sides.

"Sally you don't have to empathize with him. You know what he did to me last time. The teacher punished me and I had to clean the classroom, all alone." I say, frowning at her, keeping my hands on my hips.

"Alright, I'm sorry. I am on your side anyway." my face softens and I smile at her with satisfaction and we laugh together for what we did just now.

The school's over, I got to see the priceless face of the brat today and I'm still smiling while thinking of it.

Oh, how much of an evil kid I've become. Heh! who cares.

Okay, so what to do now? Sally's gone home, Maria probably wouldn't want to play right now. She is a lazy kid who sleeps and eats most of the time so I'm left on my own to play.

Let's go to the pond today! Yay!

I came cycling all the way from the school to the pond just to see the fishes'. I sit down at the edge of the pond on the grass and see my own reflection on the water surface. I watch as some golden fishes circle around my reflection.

"Hi fishy! How are you today? Would you like to be my first pet?"

"I will take you home with me and we will have so much fun together there, always! Would you like to come with me? I think you said yes!" I dip my hand under water.

"NO!" I turn back to the owner of the voice and find three kids standing with their hands crossed to their chest. All three were tall but the middle one was fat while the other two were very thin.

"Why?" I smile at them, nervously.

"Because it is our pond!" said the fat kid.

"How come it is your pond? It's of the fishes!" I exclaim.

"The fishes come with the pond." the fat kid moves closer to me and I immediately stand up, trying to level him but he was taller than me.

"How come they are yours? They belong to nature." The fat kid gives me a frustrated look and pushes me a little by his hand and I stagger a bit but gain my balance just before the edge of the pond.

"You ask a lot of questions. If I said it is ours so it's ours, go back to your mama and never return here again!"

"Hey! You can't do that!" I try to push him away but he wouldn't budge.

"You want me to show you what I can do to you little girl?" he steps forward and grabs me by the arm and I try to back away from him but his grip was too strong.

"Hey! Leave the girl you chickens!" called a voice behind us and all the head turns to the voice.

You got to be kidding me, brat.

"Oh so we have a prince here who came to save his damsel in distress?" the fat kid releases my arm and I caress the place he just held. The kid turned his back to me and faces the brat.

"Call it whatever but you guys are so chicken to mess with a girl." he gives a half smirk.

And how different are you? Idiot!

"Who in the world you think you are!?" the fat kid gets angry and clenches his fist. He moves towards the brat and brings his fist up and then everything went in slow motion....

His fist is flying in the air, very near to the brat's face. I cover my mouth with my hands, afraid to already acknowledge the consequence.

I gasped along with the other two kids.

The brat catches the fat kid's fist in his hand in mid-air.

OH MY ALMIGHTY!

I thought this was only possible in story books but I just saw it in real!

I could hear a faint winner's music behind the back of my mind and I couldn't help but feel a little proud.

The other two kids take a step back out of fear.

Yay! Go brat! Go brat! Go brat!

Brat-1, fat kid-0. On your faces!

Wait, what? Am I cheering for him?

An eye war starts between them both, throwing daggers at one another. Jaws clenched, both leveled in height... but wait!

The fat kid throws a punch from the other free hand straight to the jaw of the brat. Ooww...

I got pulled out of my slow motion and the music that played inside my head, instantly stopped.

Brat-1, fat kid-1. Sigh.

Brat falls on the ground, holding his jaw in his hands and groans in pain. From the corner of my eye, I watch the other two kids whose chest were raised with pride.

"Charlie? Where are you?" comes a female voice from behind the big bushes. The three of them look at each other with panic written all over their faces without looking anywhere else they run out from the bushes.

I run towards the lying brat, straightening him up on his back. After he is in a sitting position, he brings up his hand to his jaw and moves it left and right to make sure if it's broken or not.

"You know you could have avenged yourself by not interfering," I say, looking at him with a feeling of guilt flushing all over me.

"I know but that would have been no fun because I want it to be me only and not others to tease you." he chuckles.

"But just today I did the same to you and you came here and... got hit because of me." I say, pointing a finger at the place where he got hit. "That's not fair to me."

"So you want me to punch you to make it equal?" he says, grinning widely. "That would avenge me I guess because I really hate banana and you made me eat it, lick it and even drink," he says the last words, pouting.

I lower my eyes with guilt "I'm sorry. I really went way too far this time. I'm really sorry."

"I'm sorry too. I also went way too far yesterday. You were about to cry when the teacher scolded you and the class started laughing." he said lowering his head with maybe... guilt? "And you got punished-"

"I DID NOT CRY!" I shout at him when it dawned upon me what he just implied, my cheeks flushing pink.

"I said you were about to cry and that's different. Don't get me wrong." he corrects himself.

"Oh.. Um.. How did you know I was here?" I ask, curiously.

"Of course, I didn't know. I was just coming to the pond and by the way, I live a few houses away from here if you remember?" He arches an eyebrow at me.

"Oh." silence crept between us. I hesitate for a moment but did the bravest thing I could do for him in order to compensate for all the wrongs that I ever did to him.

"Will you be my friend?" I ask, extending my hand to him. He looked at my hand for a mere second but soon we were shaking hands with broad grins on our faces.

~~~

I wake up from the noise of the alarm at my bedside. I throw the alarm clock on the floor and plopped a pillow over my head to prevent any noise.

I jolt up.

As the realization hit me, I suddenly move my body to get fresh and to start a new day at work. It's past 8 o'clock in the morning and I have to reach the cafe at sharp 9.

As soon I'm refreshed, I rush downstairs, greet Aunt Anna who is also preparing to leave for work. She asks me to have breakfast but I don't want to be any late than this, I bid her goodbye and leave home, running to my job. I keep praying on my way to let them have a good impression of me on my first day.

"I'm here!" I shout, standing in the doorway of the cafe with no one to greet me. "Hello anybody here?" I call out for someone to hear me.

How weird is it going to be? A day before, the place was crowded enough to cause suffocation and now I can only hear the echo of my own voice.

"Oh hey, Sarah! We're just opening up." Sabrina comes forward from the back door kitchen "You're early that's good." she greets me with a smile.

What I'm early? I glance at the large wall clock and it was only 8:30.

Wow, I'm here all done just in fifteen minutes? That was unexpected from me.

"Go greet the boss. He's here in the office which is to your left." she points me the direction and I nod.

Okay, I'm going to greet the boss. No need to get nervous you already got this job, Aunt Anna let you have it so no worries, all is good. Yes.

I take a deep breath and twist the doorknob to enter the door. As soon as the door opens, sweet aroma of coffee greets me and I suddenly feel the grumbling of my stomach.

I should have not missed my breakfast at least.

I see a large rolling chair which was behind a large desk and was turned to me so I couldn't see the face of the person who was sitting on it.

"Umm... Hello sir. I'm Sarah Harris, first day in here. It's a pleasure to be working at your cafe." I stand there with my hands folded in front of me. The chair turned and I face the person in front of me.

I gasp.

"Not you again!" I groan in exasperation.