#141: Study

There comes a point in one’s life when you just need to take things seriously. And for Matilda, it was the weekend before her exams. She’d spent all the time planning for schoolies and finding herself a summer job. There was literally nothing left to do but take her upcoming exams seriously.

The local library, at ten o’clock on a Saturday morning, was empty. One lone man sat reading the newspaper. In the kid’s section, a brother and sister sat next to each other sorting through a pile of books. There was some system, with the girl being the one deciding. They were both dressed in the same shirt, and except for her blood red hair being longer, Matilda assumed them to be twins. Off in the fiction section, she glimpsed someone with the same hair colour, but she couldn’t tell if it was the mother or the father.

Matilda placed her bag in the open locker, taking out her English folder.

She placed her earphones in, played some music without words, and flipped through her notes from the year. There were more notes to Cindy than actual notes that might help her on Monday’s exam.

A woman, as old as her parents, sat down next to her. The parachute of a dress sank beneath the weight of the woman. To show that every part of her had settled, the woman gave off an audible groan of relief.

Matilda looked at her phone. Over an hour had passed, and she’d been studying the whole time! Time for a coffee.

Where her bag had been was now a bicycle helmet. She had been learning about irony in its application of the novel, but now recognised it in real life. Prior to becoming a studious student, she couldn’t have paid someone to steal her bag.