Chapter 11: Truth Told Through A Song

GEODIE

Prejudice.

It was not often spoken in this almost perfect institution. It was not often talked about. It was, honestly, an undefined word to us. And if Hamlet Creek University had its own dictionary, prejudice would surely be the only thing that cannot be found in it. But that didn’t mean we don’t have it in us. 

Just like Clarens’ case, Keiciara was transferred with no definite reason. Abrupt and unceremonious. That’s how I would describe their eviction from the Star Section, knowing that they both suffered from the same fate. But really, what were the rules that they violated?

 

As I sat on the armchair next to the bow windows of the music room located at the second floor of the Star Sections’ Building, I shot my eyes like arrows off a crossbow to the third floor of the four-storey building parallel to where I was. The view was clear to me. I need no telescope only to see Keiciara’s face crumpled because of nonstop weeping, while beside her were two unfamiliar girls trying to take the sting out of her. 

I felt her pain. Being moved out as unexpected and blistering as that would really feel very agonizing. Now, there’s no way she could come back to us anymore. The decision was final, and she had to deal with it whether she wanted it or not. After all, it was only the penalty she had to go through after doing something ungrateful—which was still a secret up until its third hour now. 

I ate the remaining spoonful of my lunch; rice and bacon. When I’m done, I quaffed a quarter from my pineapple juice. My eyes were still unmoved, one blink per minute, even until when I placed my storage container back into my lunchbox. 

A minute had passed. And then another one more. And then another one. And then another one. And then on the fifth minute, the time when I unconsciously looked down on the pavement that connected the two buildings was also the time when I saw a group of Star Section Sophomore girls walked past a group of First Section Senior girls. There was a lot to digest from that picture. There was a lot to compare. The longer they stayed in my horizon, the more I understood the concept of prejudice in this institution. And the more I understood it, the clearer I saw the imaginary line that separated the star sections from the others.

 If I was to translate it in Mathematics, the star sections would be the numerator, the lower sections would be the denominator, and this University would be the fraction bar. We would always stay on the top, and they would always stay at the bottom. I know. They, the denominators, should have higher value than us, the numerators. But that rule doesn’t work here. Because as long as the bar between us remains the Hamlet Creek University, we will forever be an improper fraction. Other than the change itself, this will also be a constant thing in the world.

I focused to the two group of girls. Their uniforms showed how clearly different they were to each other. The star sectioners’ blouse was fit and clean white, with a ribbon of black and brown stripes across the neck. It also had two small pockets in the front, and the buttons were wrapped by a thin cloth that went with the same color as the ribbon. Their skirt, which was only above the knee long, also had the same color and details as well. Overall, they looked like a bunch of stewardesses of a private plane that only catered celebrities and popular icons. Meanwhile, the lower sectioners uniforms were completely the opposite. Their blouse was plain, loose, and not as bright white as the star sections’. They don’t have pockets in the front, and the buttons were big and inappropriate. It was very itchy in the eyes. As per their undergarment, they wore black leggings instead of skirts. 

Staring at them was like staring at a diamond and a stone put together inside the same jewelry box. The value was clear; one was over the odds, and one was cost next to nothing. But how did these barriers, and prejudices, and separations, and unfair treatments started? 

No one knew. However, I was able to absorb at least a pinch of the atrocious facts about this school. How do you make it in the Star Section? Simple. You just have to be either smart, or talented, or good-looking, or sports-minded, or gifted in particular in order to get a scholarship. But if you have money, just like Janvic and the twins, you don’t have to worry about not having any of the mentioned requirements. You just have to go to the Principal’s Office, talk to the Principal, negotiate, and once it’s done, proceed to the Finance to pay. The next day, you can walk off the Hamlet Creek’s ground like you own it. And once you make it in, the rest will be very worthwhile. Trust me. In star section, we have an entire building exclusive only for us. We have our different uniforms, our own cafeteria, our very own gym, a whole wide sports arena, a music club, a theatre, and a private school bus that drives us to and from the Hamlet Creek University. 

But there will always be a set of rules to balance the agreement. Though the life we have as star sectioners was indeed easy, the set of rules we had to follow was tyranically hard. For the smart ones, they had to maintain their best grades. For us athletes, we had to be consistent gold medalists and defending champions. For those who were great singers, and writers, and dancers, and actors and actresses, they had to win different contests from the Qualifying Round up to the Nationals. And for those who were nothing but only beautiful lambs, they had to ace the world of pageantry. But again, you could just skip the pressure of any of these by paying a reasonable amount of money. 

Money. Talent. Skill. Something that the lower sectioners never had. Something that brought them to where they truly belong. 

In addition to the strict rules of the Star Sections that I condemned very much, we were also forbidden to do several things; We were not allowed to hang out with the lower sectioners, we were not allowed to initiate conversations with them (the very reason why I never talked to Clarens a while ago. I was afraid someone from the star section might have seen us), we were not allowed to be gay (yes, the Star Sections’ Board was tolerating homophobia), we were not allowed to fail given tasks (which explained why I was here, in the music room, waiting for Jermaine and Chuck to brainstorm ideas about the song we’ll perform for the funeral service), and above all, we were not allowed to do silly things that would damage the school’s reputation and the star sections’ itself. 

Before I finished enumerating all the negative habits and exposed all the wrong doings in this make-believe never-never land, I heard a clicking sound coming from the unbolting of the flush door of the music room. It opened eighty degrees, followed by the entering of a guy and a girl, both of which were coming from the star section. When they walked past the drum set few steps from the right side of the door, it’s when they began talking. 

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” said Jermaine, the popstar princess of the University. Jermaine was a short girl with a short hair, but had an amazing nose bridge. Her teeth were whiter than the sclera of her eyes, while her cheeks  were pink and glossy. Her lips were tinted red, and her ears had decorations of two black pearls on each side. She was the only girl singer in the class that didn’t belong in a band. However, despite being a solo artist, she had spent a very undeniably big career. She was known for playing the piano while singing. She was the grand champion of the Nationals, and already had a lot of offers from different studios out of the country. She was sweet and charming, but loved singing and writing songs about love and breakups. Every time she would sing them, she could bring people into tears. That’s why there was no wondering when people would call her, ‘The Sweet Heartbreaker.’ 

The guy walked towards the nearest table and placed his matte black guitar. He went back to us and asked, “Have you eaten your lunch yet?” His name was Chuck. Chuck Furrow. He was half American and half Japanese, and that made his visual very unique in a good way. His face was as smooth as a porcelain, and his jaw was  bony and surprisingly sharp. Although he wasn’t as toned and as muscular as the other guys  in our class, he was still hot (I couldn’t believe I said that), in his own features. He had long, black hair that was only long enough to be tied at the center of his head. In terms of fashion, Chuck was a little out of place. He was a total sucker in dressing up unlike Vhynz and Travis, and he was so simple to an extent that a pair of white, plain shirt and a skinny jeans would be good to him. He played as the main vocalist of a band called The Black Chain, and that explained why all of them in the band, including him, had these chain accessories—from ear piercings, down to necklaces, down to bracelets, and down to anklets—that were all colored in sophisticated black. 

Together, they moved two monoblock chairs closer to me and sat on it. Jermaine took a harmonica out of her pink knapsack and placed it on her lap. “I don’t know if we could use this, but this sounds pretty good! I learned playing this last night and now I can’t stop using it!” she said, making a blow out of the instrument. It produced a beautiful melody which convinced me that just like what she said, it really sounded nice. 

“I doubt if that’ll blend well with my guitar, but yeah! We’ll gotta make use of that,” Chuck replied in his American accent. 

I pulled out my notebook inserted between my P.E. uniform and my pad of paper. I turned it to the fourth page, and showed them my untitled song composition. “Here’s what I wrote,” I said, “If you think like it’s too short for a song, feel free to add something to it.” 

“Let’s give it a look, shall we?” Jermaine suggested. 

And so, to begin the brainstorming, we formed our chairs into a triangle position—Jermaine was on the right, Chuck was on the center, while I was on the left.

Normally, based on what I observed from The Black Chain every time they composed a song here inside the music room, Chuck would often position himself on the drum set and prompt a beat out of the instruments. He would write the chords, take down the keys to be used, and if the result seemed to be good in the ears, they would then try to fit it with the lyrics. He would sing the lines together with the beat, and if something sounded a little off, he would either add something or remove something from the composition. They repeated the process over and over until it’s fine and ready to be recorded. 

But as of the moment, I couldn’t see any of those aspects of expertise within the Chuck that I and Jermaine was with. He was only staring at the pages of my notebook as if nothing was written on it, and that convinced Jermaine that something might have happened. 

“Is there anything wrong, Chuck?” she asked. The amount of concern in her voice was overwhelmingly high. 

Chuck leaned forward, his elbows locked on his knees as he clasped his hands to put them under his chin. From that position, I was able to comprehend that he was trying to think deep—very deep. After a while, he then recovered himself back into sitting straight and said, “Nothing. I just—I have this crazy idea in my mind.” 

“If that’s about the song, go ahead! Share it!” 

After listening to Jermaine, Chuck moved his head to face me. We had this short, awkward eye to eye contact for a while, but thankfully it ended after he began explaining something. “Umm, hey, Geodie. Listen, I like the song, really! It’s great! I love how it’s beautifully written, I love how you peotically tackle the concept of paradise after death, and I love how you mention that Mrs. Magada is not dead, that she’s just living another life. It’s very peaceful, calm, and hopeful from beginning until the end.”

“But?” Jermaine and I said in unison.

“But I don’t think that’s something the family needs to hear. It’s—I dunno! To me, it’s like we’re saying it’s okay that Mrs. Magada is gone. That we have nothing to worry about because she’s now in a safer place with God. I, well, I think it’s just unfair.” Chuck’s eyes shrunk, and his thin eyebrows moved closer to each other. “Her death was not peaceful. Do you get what I mean? She was murdered. She lose half of her leg. She bathed on her own blood. She died with her eyes opened. She must have surely seen her suspect but she had no chance to tell it to anyone. She was deprived of longer life. She was deprived of her own justice. That’s why we cannot just sing her a hopeful song because we all know that hope was never hers. She needs justice. And in order to serve that, we need to start it with this song,” Chuck explained.

“We hear you, Chuck. Now, tell us. What should we do?”

“We are writing another song,” Chuck answered with bravery and compassion, “Don’t worry. I now have the title in my mind. It’s quite long, but I’ll tell you in advance, it will wake up everyone.” He smirked. There was no reason for him to do that, but still, he did it.

“And what is it?”

Chuck took a deep breather. “The title is, ‘Kill Me Again. Maybe This Time I Get Jusctice.’”