Duran had the most boring teacher in the whole world. His teacher's voice went on and on and on. Duran switched off and stared out of the class room window. Everyone was copying words from the white-board. He had already stored them in the first chamber of his memory.
"And what makes you so special, that you don't have to take notes?" Mr. Thompson yelled.
Duran glared up at Mr. Thompson. He reminded him of a fat walrus with his hairy eyebrows and moustache.
"To the front of the class, now! And tell us what you know about the centre of gravity."
Most of the class sniggered as Duran walked to the front of the large room, but his friend Brian was trying to turn his notes so that he could see them.
At the front of the class, Duran looked at Mr. Thompson, who was leaning against the back wall, his grey flannel legs crossed, his bulging eyes glaring at him.
"The centre of gravity is the central point in an object about which its mass is evenly balanced. It . . ." As Duran spoke he looked at the startled faces in front of him and the shocked one at the back. His words were in the exact same order as those on the white board, which was out of his sight, behind him.
The end of class bell went and the silence broke like glass, as everyone bellowed and banged through the room and out the door. Duran glanced back as he left.
Mr. Thompson stood in front of the white board reading the notes he had copied from a textbook. He was trying to repeat them with his eyes closed. He couldn't.
Duran ran across the playground and threw himself down on the grass next to Brian. They both laughed. Other students from his class sat around in clusters. Some stared and pointed at him.
"You've stirred old Thompson up again, Duran. How did you learn all that stuff about gravity so fast?"
Duran stopped laughing. "I've just got a good memory, that's all." Duran explained even though it wasn't really true. He felt strange when he was telling the class about gravity. Like someone else was saying it, like someone else was inside his head. And he didn't have a good memory . . . in fact he thought there were a lot of things he should remember . . . about his home, and where he came from before he came to Sydney. But all of that was a blur. He'd spoken to his grandmother about it and she said he was just tired adjusting to Australia and lots of new things. Duran shrugged, she was probably right. He took a big bite of his sandwich, which Brian nearly knocked out of his mouth.
"Hey look over there Duran. Kiri and Sarah are staring at us!"
Duran looked across at them. Kiri was very tanned with lots of curly black hair tied back off her face. She had the greenest eyes. She was very different to the not-a-hair-out-of-place blonde and blue eyed Sarah. Sarah giggled as she caught Brian and Duran staring at them. Kiri smiled. Brian, twice Duran's size, was so excited, he almost winded Duran as he punched Duran in the ribs with excitement.
"Sarah smiled at me. Did you see that? We've got to ask them out, Duran!"
"What do you mean?"
"Look I know you're half Swedish and all that, but you know! She's a girl . . . and we're . . . nearly fourteen and we don't have girlfriends. Everyone else has a girlfriend! We should go out with them! Sarah is so beautiful.
Duran pushed a strand of his straight blonde hair off his white face, and laughed. He didn't feel like laughing, but he did.
In their Art class after lunch, Duran noticed Mr. Thompson talking to Miss Jackson, their art teacher. They both turned and looked at him. Mr. Thompson, one side of his face twitching, muttered something about a book and shuffled out, giving Duran a sideways glare, as he passed.
"Okay Class, please continue with the pictures you started yesterday," Miss Jackson, in blue jeans and pink tee shirt, said quietly as she sat down at her desk.
By the time everyone had unpegged their pictures from the lines at the back of the classroom, laughed and jostled each other about their work, Duran had just about completed his. There was something quite urgent about it . . .like it held a clue, but a clue to what? He wasn't sure.
Duran pushed the silver, black and green felts rapidly across the page. A silver bird with emerald green eyes stared back from the page at him. Duran's throat suddenly felt tight and dry and tears were threatening to form in his eyes. He had an overwhelming feeling of loss and sadness. He clenched his teeth and the tears disappeared.
"Where are the feathers then?" Jason cooed flapping his arms up and down like a bird with its feet stuck in concrete, trying to lift off.
Miss Jackson walked over and Jason returned to his seat. She leaned over Duran's shoulder and stared at the emerald green eyes of the bird.
"That's wonderful Duran, but goodness what will I do with you? You'll have the whole year's work finished before everyone has completed their first project," she sad patting him on the shoulder before moving onto the next student.
Duran turned the picture of the bird upside down so he couldn't see it. Again his hand moved rapidly across the blank page. Lots of triangular silver spaceships appeared and moved rapidly on their own across the page. Duran stared in amazement. Then the spaceships slowed down and formed a large circle in the centre of the page. Suddenly, as if a bolt of lightning was passing through his body, Duran lurched forward and screwed up the drawing. He put it quickly in his school bag.
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