"Hey, Annie," Connie greeted Annie when the latter stepped out of the shower area with a towel wrapped around herself.
The redhead was already dressed. Annie had not seen her in the shower so she must have just toweled herself dry and sprayed on some perfume.
"Hi, Connie," Annie replied evenly. She walked between the rows of lockers.
Connie followed after Annie. She leaned close as the little girl opened her locker, allowing Annie to confirm that the redhead had definitely sprayed on some perfume.
"Very brave of you today to shower," the redhead whispered in her ear.
Annie was not sure what the redhead was trying to imply. So she simply hummed uncertainly, "Mm-hmm." She removed her towel and reached into her locker for her clothes.
Connie's eyes nearly popped out of her head. She studied Annie from head to toe.
Annie turned to her classmate. "What?"
"N-nothing," Connie stammered without taking her eyes off Annie.
The little girl was puzzled by Connie's and the other girls' reactions. Surely they were familiar with a girl's body so there was not anything to be shy about.
Then Annie recalled her argument with her sister that morning. This was probably the first time they had a good look at her body measurements! Well, what little of them she had. The girls had been checking her out!
Annie suddenly felt self-conscious. She hurriedly put on her clothes.
***
"I don't know."
Annie had been repeating that phrase many times that morning. The history teacher had chided her for that. Her teacher in the previous period had understood her situation and had been more lenient. And right now, she had been presented with yet another question that she could not answer.
"You mean you don't know how you fell off the bridge?"
That question had been asked by Keith McDowell, 'Reporter-In-Training', from the Journalism Club. He had come to her classroom during the morning break to interview her about her return from the grave -oops, no- from the hospital.
"I don't know." She felt like returning to the grave -oops, no- like hiding back in the hospital. Repeating that phrase over and over made her feel very ignorant, like a foolish little girl who knew nothing.
Keith scribbled something on his little notepad. "Could it be that whatever happened was so traumatizing that you can't remember anything?"
"I..."- Annie bit back the 'don't know' -"guess so."
"Interesting, interesting." Scribble, scribble. "So how are you catching up with the work that you've missed?"
Annie gave him a hard stare, which he did not notice as he was still busy scribbling. "Well... I've already got lots of homework and I'm sure the classes after this will give even more."
Thankfully, the morning break was short and the interview was soon over, saving Annie from more uncomfortable questions. Unfortunately, as she had feared, each class after that brought their own special serving of questions with a side order of catchup homework. Make that a double helping of catchup homework.
***
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