Sacred Oaths

EPISODE 6: FEELINGS.

#SACRED_OATHS

Author: Samuel Frederick

Episode 6: FEELINGS.

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I slapped him hard. It was an impulsive action, one that I didn't really mean to; but hell, I knew I really did slap him very hard!

He held his right cheek in shock as the whole cafeteria went mute. Everyone's eyes were now on us to probably see his reaction, but he did nothing rash. All he did was dip his hands into his pockets, and smiled.

Quickly, I left the cafeteria without saying another word and then I took a bike home after I'd gotten out of the campus' main gate. Mimi called my phone persistently, as I'd predicted, but I didn't pick her calls at all.

Shortly after I returned home, she arrived in the company of Oluchi and some other lady who I wasn't even familiar with.

"So this is your true color?" Oluchi exclaimed with a tone of mockery, and folded her hands challengingly, but I disregarded her.

She came closer to me and pulled my phone away from my hands violently.

"I'm talking to you!" She snarled, shooting a very vicious look at my face, as she flung my phone to the bed. "Say something!"

I just kept calm, pretending not to notice anyone beside me. This act of mine angered them even more.

"Fifi, what exactly is your problem?" Mimi asked as she sat beside me on the foam. I ignored the question and made to get up but, with a very swift and completely unexpected push from nowhere, I fell back with great force.

"Answer the question first!" Oluchi raved like a very mad woman. I still ignored her and tried to stand up again, but she pushed me even harder, back to the foam.

"Oluchi, mind yourself!" I warned her bluntly, still managing to keep my temper in check. "Seriously!"

"Or else what'll happen? You'd slap me like you did to Boma, right?"

"Just mind yourself." I cautioned her very calmly, as best as I could.

"Girls, take it easy," the third lady among us finally talked. "We can settle this amicably. Let's behave like the mature young adults that we actually are. Please?"

The room became quiet that very instant. Although Oluchi kept cutting glances at me in a rather abrasive manner, I ignored her, in order to avoid any more trouble from her.

"I believe we are all civilized here," she continued speaking, consistently shifting glances between our faces, "and I know that no one approves of what Fifi did, right? But two wrongs wouldn't make things right. Let us behave ourselves, please."

One would think that the lady's little thought-provoking speech would tame Oluchi's stubbornness, but it didn't. Frustrated, she pleaded with Oluchi to have a sit, which she refused rudely. After much plea from both Mimi and the third lady, Oluchi finally adhered by sitting on the bed, keeping a moderate distance away from me.

"I am Jovita by name, Kingsley's girlfriend." She introduced formally as she sat down too, sighing with relief. "Oluchi knows me already. We scheduled a meeting at the cafeteria today to discuss something important, only for me to arrive and meet you guys in the middle of this huge mess. How did it happen?"

"She started it!" Oluchi piped in abruptly. "The she-devil!"

"Calm down." Jovita reprimanded her immediately. "Let her talk."

Oluchi hissed and rolled her eyes. "Hmph!"

I heaved a sigh and blurted out my candid reasons to them. I told them how it seemed like I was the major topic of their discussion earlier on at the cafeteria, which also led to Boma's unlikely words that eventually made me hit him on impulse.

They all told me what I did was wrong and I genuinely accepted that I was at fault.

To say the least, we later came to a conclusion that we'd all go back to school and plead on my behalf. When we got back to campus, the guys were nowhere to be found. They had long gone.

Oluchi and Jovita kept dialing their numbers repeatedly but they didn't answer their calls. So, eventually, we all dispersed with a resolution to meet up the next day and sort out our issues amicably.

After papers the following day, Mimi, Oluchi and I met at the cafeteria as planned. We had hoped to meet the guys there, but they weren't. Jovita also called to inform us that she couldn't make it, but that she'd recently discovered from a trusted friend of hers that the guys usually hanged out under a certain mango tree somewhere around our sports complex.

We followed her directions and, true to her words, we found them there.

They were ten guys in total, all sitting in different awkward positions: some on the small bench, some on the tree's branches and some on the bare ground. They all had bottles of beer with them, and some of them were smoking with reckless abandon, as though they weren't bounded by the school rules.

"Good afternoon." Mimi gestured with both hands as we approached them.

"If it's Boma you're looking for, I'll suggest you all go back to the Faculty of Social Sciences, and check upstairs at the library. They should be there," a skinny guy among them answered, exhaling the smoke from his cigarette into the air. It was obvious that they'd been expecting us, judging from his statement.

However, we thanked them and left their presence in haste. When we got to the library, Simon, Kingsley and Boma were coincidentally coming out-towards us.

Simon hissed and passed us without saying anything, while Kingsley and Boma stayed behind.

"Boma, can we have a moment with you, please?" Oluchi asked, intertwining both hands out of courtesy.

"If she has anything to say, let her say it here, in front of everyone." Boma answered quite calmly, to my utmost surprise.

The girls instantly looked at me and urged me to go on.

"I'm sorry." I managed to say, avoiding his eyes.

"Is that all?"

I was taken aback by his question, hence I looked up at his face and said, "What else were you expecting me to say?"

"Where I come from, you don't just apologize to someone you wronged while standing. It's either you kneel or give them a big, great hug," he said, spreading his arms out.

I felt reluctant and a little bit shy about it at first until the girls pushed me to him.

"I forgive you," he said softly as we embraced each other like long term friends.

To say the least, I ended up reconciling with everyone that fateful day. I couldn't take my eyes off Boma throughout the time we spent at the cafeteria later on, neither could he resist me, judging from the soul-piercing stares he consistently rained on me.

We both caught each other's stares many times but we would just smile at each other, practically dying in silence and unnecessary pretense. Nobody seemed to be willing to make the first move between us, to my utmost dismay.