LAMIAE

CHAPTER FOURTEEN: NIKOLAI

Dagmara followed the students to a place called the common room. There was no such place in her previous school, students who had nowhere to go usually went to the cafeteria or gymnasium, or went outside.

Half an hour is a lot of time and not enough time, depending on the situation. A lot of time, especially when you have to answer questions one after the other. Not enough time to tell about entire life.

Dagmara couldn't remember ever being so relieved to hear the bell ring, signaling the end of class. She managed to hide it, however, as she followed the whining group out into the corridor. They walked across the hall, passing a cascade of roaring students.

At the recess leading to the laboratory classrooms, the groups mixed again, and she could calmly approach Arleta, who was engrossed in asking the girls about the work assigned by the trainee. She looked as if she wasn't sure if she had made a mistake.

"And you say you're sure there will be 'had been' form?" she grunted, grimacing as if she had just been sprayed with insecticide in the face.

"At least that's what I wrote," the black-haired tomboy said in a bold tone that was supposed to immediately suggest her infallibility and omniscience.

The bespectacled girl beside her nodded eagerly.

"What happened?" Dagmara asked, although summing up the girls' behavior, she concluded that they must have had a test.

Arleta gasped, almost tearfully jabbering:

"She made a quiz and I blew it as usual. And she looked so nice..." she muttered under her breath. "Can she even do it, can she test us? I'll dig through the school rules if I have to, trainees aren't teachers, they can't interfere with our grades."

Dagmara smiled reassuringly at Arleta, understanding exactly that no one likes to get a bad grade on the first day of study.

"I remember once when I got the worst grade on the second of September," she began to encourage the girl and to embarrass the two self-confident girls. "My mother said then, don't worry, grades aren't everything. Health is the most important thing and you're healthy. I wouldn't even trade you for a primus. She knew what she was saying, because two years later, despite her studies and excellent work as a doctor, she herself was dead," she finished, not even noticing when her voice stopped being confident and started to be melancholy. She regretted it immediately afterwards, especially when she found compassion and pity in Arleta's eyes.

One of the girls looked down, completely avoiding contact, and the black-haired tomboy suddenly became interested in another topic:

"Arleta, Hannah and I were wondering, how do you know Alan? I don't remember you speaking to him last year, and now you're the only girl he talks to," for some reason Dagmara thought she heard a hint of jealousy coming out of her mouth.

"Casper said that you are like siblings," Dagmara murmured, but judging by the bemused face of Arleta and the shocked faces of Hannah and the tomboy, this news was supposed to be confidential.

"We recently found out that we are kind of related," she muttered too dramatically for Dagmara's opinion.

Three minutes later, just when the break ended, the object of their conversation came to the room - Alan and a friend whom Dagmara met yesterday. They were both so enthusiastic about the lessons that if the whole world consisted only of Alans, the earth would still be flat, people would still die of colds and would regress to prehistory.

The teacher came right behind them, so Dagmara, like other students, began to squeeze into the classroom. However, only when she moved away from Arleta, looking back, she saw the girl calling the alleged "brother" and saying something to him. Unfortunately, she couldn't see any more, pushed by a grown boy who laughed, saying that entering the room was "the coziest part of classes". She was about to say something when she realized in time that it was Alan's friend.

"I'm Nikolai, by the way," he said, giving her a quick wink. As he was the last one to enter, he closed the door behind him, slamming her vantage point on what was going on in the corridor.

"Dagmara," she growled not very pleasantly, but the boy didn't care at all.

She didn't know if he did it on purpose or because they came in almost simultaneously, but he kept pace with her to sit right next to her. She looked at him questioningly, but when he didn't even look at her, she thought with irritation that Arleta would sit next to Nikolai at most. Just like yesterday, the benches were also adapted for four people, only this time she was sitting by the window.

When the teacher started to check attendance, the door opened and, as Dagmara expected, Arleta and Alan entered in turn.

"Arleta Degler..."

"Present," replied the girl just in time, approaching the bench where Dagmara was sitting.

"Nikolai, move, this is my place," demanded Arleta in a whisper. She crossed her arms over her chest, but it didn't help. One glance at the teacher was enough to boldly state that the woman was one step away from settling the class "in her own way", so she resignedly took a place in the middle, between the boys. Now, the only way for the girls to communicate was through notes, though even that wouldn't help much, as Arleta got into a discussion with Alan again. Nikolai glanced at Dagmara as if he expected the same from her – however she was going to start talking to him...

What does he want from me? she thought to herself, pretending to be busy opening a notebook in which she could write something.

"Newerli Alan."

"Present," Dagmara didn't look at the boy only because she was sure that Nikolai was watching her and he might think something stupid. Alan, on the other hand, didn't even look up at the teacher.

"So it was you who moved from Warsaw", Nikolai finally began on his own, seeing that she was not eager to talk.

As she didn't answer him, or at least nodded, he took a different tack.

"You must have a nice record in the previous school, there's no doubt about it since even the teacher reprimands you..."

She mentally counted to ten, knowing that he was only trying to get her to talk with such tricks. She just glared at him, but again said nothing.

He made a questioning face, as if to express his curiosity about what he had done to deserve her indifference. Only after a moment did his face light up, as if he was discussing something with himself.

"You didn't like me," he said, almost cheerfully.

"Steinert Dagmara," called the teacher.

"Present," the girl replied loudly, adding in a lower voice with annoyance:

"Excuse me?"

He belittled her behavior, supporting himself up with his hand on the bench.

"Oh well. I tried to be nice knowing you were new here, although I didn't have to at all, because I'm struggling with the same problem myself. You didn't say anything except for your name. Either you don't like me, or you're ridiculously showing your affection."

"Present," Nikolai shouted, additionally waving his hand towards the chemist when it was his turn in the attendance list.

All this time, Dagmara looked at him as if he had told her theories that Edison invented the Ford car brand, Einstein the Audi and Columbus the Toyota. After a while, however, she realized that he had a right to think what he thought. After all, she was a bit upset by the fact that Arleta was talking to Alan without her presence and she had to take it out on someone. It was unfortunate that it happened to him.