Chapter 6: I Love These People

Joanna's POV

"Damn, am loving that smile." Harmony winked at her as she walked past us.

"I could swear that smile was for me." Tony scoffed.

"Nah, it wasn't." Harmony smirked.

"It was." Tony beamed, with a mischievous smile on his face. 

I could see what he was doing, trying to rile Harmony up. I need to stop this before fists start flying, and trust me, it will. If you've been around these two for a while you would know am not joking. 

"Guys," I called, no answer. 

"Hey Guys," I tried to get their attention, but none gave me a listening ear as they were both busy arguing over a girl who didn't know they existed.

"Shut up children!" I yelled and offered them both a smack upside the head to get their attention, and from the way, they were both glaring at me, I guess I succeeded.

"What the---

"Children?" They both queried at the same time, scary expressions being sent my way.

*Shit am in trouble* I thought as I could see smoke rising from their ears. I did not think this through.

"How can you call this children?" Tony screeched, gesturing to himself, again.

*Why the hell does he always do that* I speculated rolling me eyes

"Babe, does this look like a child's body to you?" Harmony grunted. "Did you take a good look at this face, look at this face before saying such."

I moaned, already tired of their blabbering, "Alright, alright am sorry men, can we please go to class now?"

************

I have this class alone, no Harmony or crazy Tony, but at least I could rest my brain a bit, their arguments were actually beginning to get on my nerves.

I shook my head and walked to class, which I was already late for by the way because of those two morons.

As I walked into the class, I noticed, it was almost full except for one empty seat beside the new girl and in case you haven't figured am very nervous around new people because I don't know how they would react to my presence, remember when I sneezed in Tony's face on my first day, yeah that's a definition of how nervous I can be. 

"Well, here goes nothing," I muttered, summoning courage and headed to the empty seat. 

"Excuse me," I said to the new girl with a small smile. "Anyone here?"

"Nah, no one, you can have a seat." She gleamed.

I felt warmed to her already. "Thanks." I smiled and sat down.

The teacher immediately gave us work to do, which I loved, by the way, note the sarcasm, who even brought the idea of maths anyway, I just wished I could meet him or her and give that fool a piece of my mind.

I was done with mine in less than 5 minutes, cue the hair flip, I glanced by my side to see the new girl already done with hers, *wow she is smart too* I thought, amazed. 

She twirled and caught me staring. *Great, now she'll think am crazy* I wondered, internally face-palming. Presently, you see what I mean when I said am not good at meeting new people.

She cleared her throat and gave me a look, "What's your name cutie?"

Surprised she wanted to know my name, I choked on my own saliva which had me coughing and at the same time scrambling for my bag to get the water bottle I carried around with me for this sort of emergencies.

"Are, are you okay?" She asked, bestowing on everyone a look to continue with what they were doing, even the teacher seemed, caught in the act, before proceeding with her lesson and didn't spare us another glance.

Still busy drinking the bottle of water, I nodded. After I had felt I had enough, I screwed back the cap of the water bottle and smiled at her as I answered.

"Joanna, Joanna Alex."

"Nice name." She smirked. "Pretty unusual though, I don't think I've met someone with that name before, by the way, am Tenda, Tenda Black."

"Same with yours." I giggled.  "I didn't even know such a name exists."

"Yeah, I get that a lot." She chuckled, "my mom wanted a unique name and she said I was very little when I was born, I mean more little than normal and I looked so fragile."

"She wanted to name me Fragile though but Dad didn't agree so he suggested another relative word like Tender and Mom agreed to it so instead of it being Tender, I was named Tenda which actually sounds the same but just different last letters," She ended.

"Wow, that's an amazing story." I smiled, and at that moment the bell rang for lunch, I handed in my work and glanced at Tenda.

"See you around," I waved, and headed out of class.

"Nope, you ain't ditching me like that, am stuck with you for as long as we both are in this school," She told, blocking me afterward with a serious expression.

"Okay then, let's go to the cafeteria and meet my crazy friends." I blurted and showed her the way.

We stepped into the noisy room called the cafeteria which became silent upon our arrival with all eyes focused on us.

"Is it always like this?" Tenda whispered in my ear sounding amused. 

"Not really, it's always like this on your first day though, plus they are just shocked to see you with me," I replied in a shrug as we ignored everyone and strode straight to get our food.

We then wandered to my usual table to see Harmony already eating or should I say swallowing his food because his mouth wasn't moving as he did so, just opened it, throws food in, swallowed it, and the cycle continues.

He perked up when he heard our footsteps and broke into a smile that was kind of disgusting because I could see the scrunched up food in his mouth which revealed he was chewing the food.

"Hey ladies," he spoke, food crumbs falling off his mouth.

"Hey hun," I gagged, taking my seat, to smirk at him as he granted me a glare.

"Hy." Tenda waved and set her food on the table. 

"What's your name baby." Harmony winked, this made me gag, again.

"The name's Tenda, and no I don't wanna hook up with you," She responded, smiling. 

"Cough_Burn_Cough," I smirked as he put on an angry expression.

When I thought things were moving well as the three of us were laughing and enjoying our food the horses appeared and yes I called them that, you'll see why.

"Hey cuties, Harmony," Tony greeted and sent us all smile as he took a seat, in which Ifeanyi and Blake followed suit which gathered attention to our table.

"Why." I groaned gazing upwards as Tony wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"So what are you folks doing?"  Ifeanyi quizzed, stealing a biscuit crumb from my plate that earned him a glare from me.

"You know, what they call eating?" I answered sarcastically, in a question.

"Feisty partner." Ifeanyi scoffed and sniggered at me.

"She is indeed feisty." Tony nodded in confirmation.

"Stop it, children," Blake mocked giving them both a warning stare. He is the quiet and thoughtful one in their midst and the one I was  cool with.

Tenda chuckled beside me as she was currently being entertained by the drama playing before her.

I suddenly remembered she was actually there because for a moment I forgot she was by my side. 

"Guys this is Tenda," I introduced while I munched on my food and glared at Ifeanyi as he made another attempt to take something from my plate.

"Hya people." She blushed, as Tony lent her a wink.

*Is that-- does she? well, that's cute* I thought and peeked at them strangely as I felt a tiny twinge of jealousy.

"Well, well, if it isn't Joanna," a voice squeaked behind me that had me sighing. I could recognize that voice even from a nine-mile radius because it had the ability to destroy your eardrums and it belonged to none other than the chief robot Stephanie Greene.

Her name suited her personality though hence she turned a dark shade of green whenever she was angry and by the way, Green is my nickname for her.

"Hello there Green." I gave a fake smile and waved. 

"Do not call me that!" She screeched, *see? she hated it* This generated a snigger from me as I was sure it angered her more.

"Tony boo what are you Blake and Ifeanyi doing here sitting with these lowlifes?" She challenged, attempting to sound sweet but failed by the way because she sounded like a raccoon giving birth.

"Well let's see." Tony sighed. "One you ain't my girlfriend so don't call me that."

"Two, you ain't my mum which means I don't care what you say," Ifeanyi continued, with a smirk. 

"And three you are turning green, Green," I added with a smirk.

"Burn!" Harmony shouted and high-fived me as the whole cafeteria burst out laughing.

"Lastly, no one loves you baby." Tenda laughed, together with Tony.

"Bye green." I waved at her and beamed when she screamed and stormed off with her fellow robots on her heels.

*Mehn... I love these people* I thought.

Okay guys, a brief authors note before the main one comes after chapter 10 or 11.

My name is Onyeanuna Ogechi Suzan

I'm currently 19 years of age and an undergraduate at the Federal Polythecnic Nekede Owerri here In Imo State, Nigeria.

So this book has a kind of Nigerian setting so don't be confused.

I know some of you are wondering what these signs < > and this * * stand for. 

Well I use this < > when people outside of the main characters are speaking or when there are background voices.

I use this * * to indicate a thought. 

I hope you do understand.

Thanks for choosing my book. It is well appreciated.