Army Of True Salvation

It was the first week of classes and it had made Sheloah quite nervous. It was already her last school year in high school before she will graduate.

She looked at her enrollment form and saw that her section was 4A. She only knew some of the people in her class because some of them were her classmates before in elementary and in her previous years. The school usually reshuffles the class list.

Sheloah looked at the class list on the bulletin board as she browsed some names. She thought who would be her new circle of friends. She hoped to get along well with them.

The flag ceremony had ended and the students already entered their respective classrooms. The moment Sheloah entered 4A, their adviser instructed them to just stand as she already prepared a seat plan for them.

They all went at the back of their classroom as they waited for their names to be called. While Sheloah was waiting for her name to be called, someone had bumped her accidentally.

"Ah, sorry," Sheloah apologized as she showed a shy smile at the person she had bumped.

The girl smiled at her. Sheloah was quite surprised because she thought that she was the tallest girl in the classroom, but it turned out that someone was taller than her! She suddenly felt embarrassed because compared to the girl beside her, Sheloah was already wearing the school's uniform whilst the girl beside her wore casual clothes.

"It's okay. Say, what's your name?" The girl asked Sheloah for an introduction and Sheloah smiled at her.

"Sheloah," she said and spoke again. "And you?"

"Isobel. Nice to meet you."

The both of them then shook hands as an introduction and this was already the start of their friendship.

***

Sheloah was seated on her seat. She was on the fourth column, second to the last row at the back. It was already their Filipino subject so it bore her to death. Despite being a Filipino, this subject was one of her weaknesses other than math. Sheloah performed well in English than in their mother language.

As Sheloah was trying her best to listen to the lecture, a ballpen fell to her right. She picked it up as she passed it to the person at her back.

"Thanks. Sorry for the trouble," her classmate said and Sheloah just smiled, not minding it.

It was a boy who sat behind Sheloah. She looked at him carefully. He gave him a closed mouth smile before he returned his gaze on his notebook. Sheloah then returned her gaze on the window beside her as she gave up on listening to the lecture.

"Gawa kayo ng sarili niyong grupo na apat ang miyembro. Bibigyan ko kayo ng isang papel at isulat niyo kung ano ang wika para sa inyo. Isang representative ang magbabasa ng mga sagot niyo mamaya pag tapos na ang evaluation. Maliwanag ba?"

Since the subject is Filipino, the subject's medium of instruction was in their language. Their teacher had instructed them to make their own group having only four members. She will then give them one paper for them to write what language is all about. Then, they will choose one representative per group to share their answers.

The students in the class had already formed their groups of four. The students were too lazy to roam around so what they did was since each column had two lines with eight rows each, they had chosen those near them as their members. Like for Sheloah's group, she had chosen to group with her seatmate and the two boys behind her.

She was the only female in the group. Even though that all of her groupmates were male, all of them were cooperative so she had no complains about it. The boys were telling their opinion about what language is to them as Sheloah wrote these opinions on the paper that their teacher gave them.

It was already the third day of classes. She only knew one person in their group, Dean. Dean was Sheloah's classmate in her sixth grade, second year, and third year of high school. Now, he was still her classmate in their final year of high.

Sheloah's seatmate was named Tristan. She just knew his name now despite sitting with him for three days already. They have one more group member, but she hadn't known his name yet. She was shy to ask since the boy looked serious and unapproachable.

Sheloah looked at her team members. "Who would report our answers later," she asked and none of them spoke.

Sheloah sighed. She knew that they contributed their answers on purpose for them not to represent the group. Sheloah didn't want to volunteer either that was why she had the initiative of being the group's secretary.

"I'll report," one of their groupmates suddenly spoke and Dean reacted suddenly.

"Good then! And now, I'll sleep," he said as he rested his head on his armchair. As for Tristan, he slouched his back as he started to doodle on his notebook.

"Thank you, umm…" Sheloah did not know how to call him. He did not know his name.

The boy laughed slightly as he realized that he didn't introduce himself to his groupmates. Sheloah laughed a little as well.

"Sorry, I'm Veon," he said and they both smiled at each other.

'So his name is Veon.'