July, 2021
Nazma lay on her side on a thin, blue-gray patterned mattress spread directly across the floor.
The fabric was somewhat faded, with blurred lines and squares that bore the marks of long use.
One hand propped up her head, while the other held a green brochure with folded corners.
The bedroom light fell perfectly onto the pages, illuminating photos of school buildings and neatly arranged text.
Her eyes moved slowly, following line after line.
It looks nice, going to school here.
She paused for a moment, then reread the scholarship section. Her eyes sparkled. Her brows lifted slightly.
If other students pay in full, the top rank only pays 40%.
She pressed the brochure to her chest for a moment, her breath expanding slowly. In her mind, her father's face appeared—tired, but always saying, "It's okay."
Nazma lowered the brochure again; this time, her gaze was sharper, more alive.
I have to chase the top rank again. To help Dad with the school fees.
In that simple room, atop a mattress that creaked softly, Nazma's resolve grew silently—green and strong—much like the color of the brochure in her hand.
The room was narrow and quiet. The walls were painted a pale, uneven color, peeling in places and leaving dark stains like old shadows that never truly faded. A few children's drawings and paper flower decorations were taped up haphazardly, lining up crookedly, held by little green stickers.
The wooden door in the corner stood halfway open, revealing another room with warmer yellow light and a different floor. A gentle afternoon breeze wafted in from that direction, bringing the faint sounds of the house. Near the wall, a low table held a small green fan, silent, as if it had forgotten the last time it was turned on.
Nazma stayed where she was on that thin mattress, as if the entire room had stopped just to accompany her as she read the brochure, which now felt heavier than the paper itself.
She stared at the rows of writing, but her thoughts gradually blurred, caught between anxiety and hope for her new school.
After being rooted there for a few moments, she snapped out of it. She needed to check something in the group chat.
Her hand instinctively felt the surface of the mattress. Empty. Nazma turned to her pillow, then to the folds of the blanket at the foot of her bed. Her soft, thin eyebrows began to knit together, creating a fragile look of confusion on her face. She remembered having her phone in her hand just a moment ago, but now it seemed to have vanished.
"Where is it?" she murmured softly to herself.
She began to shift her position, scanning every inch of the thin mattress with an increasingly frantic gaze. She stood up, shook the pillow, and even peered into the gap between the bed and the wall. Nothing.
The line of her eyebrows, which dipped slightly at the ends, made her expression look as if she wanted to give up on her confusion.
Nazma jolted from her reverie. A creeping sense of panic set in as she realized the one thing she desperately needed was out of reach. Her soft eyebrows moved just a fraction—enough to show a fragile bewilderment without any trace of anger—even though her voice now broke the silence of the room.
"Mom, where's my phone?" Nazma called out, her voice tinged with anxiety.
From the kitchen came an equally loud reply. "As usual!" her mother shouted back.
Amidst the shouting, the sounds from the kitchen filled Nazma's ears. Sranggg! The sound of a spatula clashing against an iron wok rang out, followed by the hiss of hot oil sautéing spices—sssttt!—spreading the aroma of cooking into her room.
She also heard the clinking of stacked plates—klentang-klentung—indicating her mother was busy amidst the riot of cooking utensils.
Nazma stood frozen on her thin mattress. She wanted to shout back, but she more often kept her words to herself.
With an expression that seemed to hold a thousand questions, she began to move slowly, trying to search amidst the busy sounds of the kitchen.
Nazma began to move frantically, though her movements remained awkward and slow. She bent over, scouring the box of books in the corner of the room until a thin layer of dust clung to her fingertips. She crawled to look under her dark desk, then moved quickly to her parents' room, checking the wooden table piled high with papers.
Her thin eyebrows knitted closer together, casting a soft, fragile shadow over her eyes. She felt completely lost.
She moved on to the dining room, opening the sideboard drawers one by one with slightly trembling hands—finding only spoons, forks, and a few old napkins.
She even went down on her knees, inspecting the floor under the chairs, hoping the rectangular object was lying there. Still, nothing.
In the background, the kitchen was still noisy. Tuk, tuk, tuk! The sound of a knife hitting the wooden cutting board rhythmically as vegetables were chopped. Sreeet! The sound of a chair dragging across the kitchen floor answered Nazma's mounting confusion.
Nazma stood frozen in the middle of the room. She looked down, staring at her empty palms. The soft line of her eyebrows dipping at the ends made her look as if she wanted to cry.
She returned to her room with heavy steps, her breath short from the peaking panic. She once again scrambled through her thin mattress, lifting the pillow repeatedly as if the phone could magically appear there.
"Where is it..." she whispered, barely audible.
Could someone have taken it?
Her thin, soft eyebrows dipped further at the corners, making her face look so desolate, as if losing her phone was the end of her small world. Reaching a dead end, she dragged her feet back out of the room. Her feet led her back to the glass table belonging to her parents—the very place she had checked thoroughly before.
And there it was. Lying right there on the clear glass surface, as if mocking her futile search.
Even though Nazma had stared at this table just a few minutes ago, for some reason, her eyes had refused to see the presence of the rectangular object.
Nazma froze in front of the table.
She frowned in confusion, realizing how ridiculous it was to miss a black phone on a black table.
Her thin lips pressed tightly together, then one corner was pulled slightly to the side, forming a stiff, slanted line—a forced, bitter smile to mock her own clumsiness.
Occasionally, she sucked her lower lip inward, as if holding back a frustrated murmur. Her lips only trembled faintly. The expression made her look forlorn, as if she were apologizing to the empty air for being so forgetful.
"Ugh, how could I..." she whispered almost inaudibly, while her lips remained held in a hesitant, thin pout, before she finally let out a long sigh and grabbed the phone.
Sreeet! The sound of her mother pulling a napkin in the kitchen startled her.
"Did you find it yet?" her mother shouted amidst the klentang-klentung of rinsing plates.
Nazma didn't answer with a shout.
She simply gripped the phone with slightly weak hands, then let out a long sigh as she walked back to her room.
She sat back down on the thin mattress, hugging her phone as if it had just returned from a long journey.
Nazma stared at the large phone screen with rounded corners. The body was wide and felt heavy in her hand, forcing her to hold it with both hands.
On the screen, the parent group for the entire 2021/2022 batch kept moving without pause. Too many messages were coming in, piling on top of each other, making it difficult for her to read them one by one.
Siti was preoccupied with her own phone when she muttered, "Hey, the homeroom teacher is funny, she sent the class rules right away."
Nazma jolted. "Rules? What rules?"
She immediately scrolled through her phone screen quickly. However, the message she was looking for was buried under a barrage of new incoming chats.