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The following is the first installment of a series called The Cherub. The authenticity of it’s relation towards the real life of the author is left to the reader to speculate.

“Oh shit!” I vociferated, “Not again, not today, Oh God, please not today!” The alarm clock ticks closer to 8 a.m., the sound of the gears ticking grows away louder in my head, as if to signify the impending doom. It was imminent, painfully obvious, I was about to get fucked.

I jumped into the shower, without a moment to lose, to get myself looking presentable for class. Getting ready was no simple task. There was a throbbing pain between my legs, screaming for attention, for the cold air-conditioned room I spent the night in did nothing but boost my virility. I went to the extent of taking a good 2 minutes thinking about my options. Suddenly, it struck me, “You Idiot, you’re already late, and you’re wasting time thinking about satiating yourself!” I hit myself in the head and jumped into the shower, my vivacious friend would just have to wait for evening to come. I assured myself it’s zest for life would be rewarded later. I thought to myself, if only I had such zeal.

It took a good 10 minutes to get myself ready, albeit frantically, everything in a rush. I stared at the alarm clock that stood silently on the shelf next to my bed. This was not the first time I failed to wake up to it’s ring, and I was sure it would not be the last. It seems that without a good 4 hours of sleep, not even an earthquake could wake me from my deep slumber. Needless to say, the time was already 8:15 a.m. and I was late. Not that I am usually punctual nor early, but today, today was not a day I could afford to be late.

I grabbed my backpack, filled it with everything I worked on last night, and rushed out of my room, straight downstairs. In my haste, I forgot that the alarm system of my house was still secured, and instead unlocked the main grill-door and proceeded to move towards the porch. I unlocked the main gate, and turned off the alarm system of my car, and got into the driver seat. I placed the key into the ignition and BAAAAAAAAAAM; A loud siren was ringing, startling me, prompting me to hit my head on the roof of my car.

The alarm system installed in my house was triggered. There was a 20 second grace period allowed for you to input a special code into the terminal to disable the alarm. Naturally I forgot. Having succesfully fighting the urge to pee and defecate all over my pants, I grunted “Fucking hell”, and rushed back inside, with hopes of turning the alarm off, and driving away before it gets my dad, who no-doubt now wide awake, come downstairs and gives me a piece of his mind, before slapping some ‘sense’ into me as he would put it.

I opened the keypad for the alarm console terminal and tried remembering the code, 2….5…..7….9….*. The terminal beeped 3 times to indicate a succesfully entered pin code. I quickly closed the keypad, locked the main door, and ran into the porch. The time was already 8:30 a.m. I was already half an hour late, I had no more time to spare, not after everything that just happened.

I jumped back into the drivers seat of my car and turned the ignition. The car engine roared alive, I floored the clutch, and pushed the gearbox into 1, and hit the accelerator. Again, the engine roared fiercely, and began to take motion, where suddenly with a brief chuckle, died. There was silence, the 2.4 litre V8 died down quietly, without a trace of the full potential of it’s power; but I knew exactly what was wrong, and I was furious. The early dew drops and ambient temperature is not optimal for the engine to function. It’s too cold for internal combustion, well at least for engines without a ‘choke’ function. I sighed, and turned the ignition yet again.

After giving the engine a good 5 minutes to heat up, off I went, towards class. I knew what to expect on the way there, what else, but traffic. My house is located near 4 schools, and on my way towards the highway, I have to pass 2 of them. Naturally, the entire road towards the school is filled with parents trying to get their kids to school on time. Fortunately for me, It was already 8:40, and schools start at 7:30. The roads leading towards the highway was pretty empty, with the occasional car filled with a parent sending their kid to school a tad late. That was the least of my concern, I rushed towards the highway left with two options.

I could, on one hand take a direct connection into the highway, pay a toll of RM 1.50 and face traffic all the way towards my exit, or take an alternative route, that is slightly long-winded, but enters the highway at a further point, without the toll. The cheapskate in me could not be conquered, I rationalized, “Well considering the traffic the entire stretch, it would be better to enter the highway further down.” Off I went, taking the toll-free passage. Went through the usual traffic and about 10 minutes later got into the highway. The highway is my personal play-ground, I can swerve through lanes, overtake using the emergency lane, and do all sort of rash driving without concern for my personal safety, nor the other users of the road. Something about the foolishly young feeling immortal and racer-ish behind their souped-up cars. But no matter, it took all of 20 minutes to manage myself through heavy traffic, making illegal turns, and using illegal lanes, overtaking during any chance I get, to beat rush-hour traffic. Everybody had somewhere to go, but my problem seemed the most important.

When I finally reached my destination, all the good parking spots were taken, naturally, considering the time. I found some backalley, with a row of cars parked, with space for one more. I squeezed the car into the notch and parked it perfectly. I hit the switch to fold my side view mirrors, as to ensure passerby and cars alike do not hit it and have ample room to move. I grabbed my backpack, and rushed for class. I entered campus and was stopped by the guard at his outpost. The same guard that without a doubt, sees me daily, entering campus. It’s not that I was popular, just that I was so striking it was impossible not to notice me. I had a weird hair colour, dressed funny, and was always late.

The guard grunted “Where is your Student ID Card, boy” while his hand traces a shape of a square card in the air. I politely pleaded, “Uncle, I’m very late already, please, I have it somewhere, but I do not have the time to search for it. Please let me through, I’ll show it to you later, okay?”

“Nothing doing, boy! If I let you through with that excuse, then I’ll have to let every other Tom Dick and Harry through. If you do not show me your ID card, you may not pass”, he cruelly dejected. “Fine”, I yelled, losing any and all patience left in me. I scanned by messy backpack for it, hoping it was somewhere there. Thank heavens it was wedged between my books in a corner of my pack. “There, happy!?”, I yelled. “Yes, next time, wear it around your neck, and we won’t have this problem.”, the guard replied, almost as if begging me to lay the smack-eth down on him.

“No matter”, I thought to myself as I hurried towards the staircase. My classroom was on the fourth floor, and I had no time to lose. I climbed the staircase, while looking at my watch. I was doomed, there was no more hope, it was almost 9 a.m., I was an hour late. I rushed towards my room and knocked at the door. Taking a deep breath, while waiting for the teacher to give me any form of acknowledgment to enter the room, I finally entered.

” Ahhh, HypoG, how nice of you to join us, I’m glad you could make it 20 minutes before the class ends ,”…she said with a wicked smile…..

To be continued

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 3rd, 2007 at 6:35 pm and is filed under Life Lessons. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.