Valkyrie - the Vampire Princess by Pet Torres Page B

anything around me.
    Timidity had always been one of my weak points. I hardly leaned my bum against my chair when Mirta came around making complaints about the strange boy’s conduct.
    “He is ill-mannered!” she said low. “I greeted him and he made no move.”
    “Who are you talking about?” I asked, not knowing exactly who she was referring to.
    “Our new schoolmate,” she said.
    Have you gone to talk to him?” I asked, dubious as I thought I would never have that courage.
     
     
    “Yes, I have. I always seek to make friends,” she said and I went silent again.
     
    At the end of the final class, I was the first person that left my classroom. Not even I understood why I was in a hurry, for at my home I would not have anything interesting to do.
    As I walked by the school gangway I slowed my steps, Mirta was at my side and both of us walked in silence.
    After a few minutes, I stopped, paralyzed, listening to a different and strange voice trying to talk to me.
    “Hey! Wait!”
    I turned around, trying to see who the voice’s owner was. Mirta had the same reaction to mine, that is, we stopped motionless.
    It was the strange boy from my classroom.
    “I think you lost this,” he said while he put out his hand to me, trying to give me back my brooch.
    It was the brooch that my grandmother gave me when I was child. I always kept that brooch in my things.
    I held the object as I was amazed at it, avoiding the boy’s face. He began to walk on, moving like lightning, eliminating my chances to thank him.
    “He talked to you!” Mirta said surprised.
    “How does he know that this brooch belongs to me?” I asked looking at my brooch. I was shocked. 
    “He might have seen it falling out of your purse,” she deduced, shaking her shoulders at me.
    “That has never happened. I always leave it inside my purse,” I confessed as I could not believe what had happened.
     
    As soon as I arrived home, I noticed that my mother was not there. Her car was not in the garage.
    “She might have gone to the supermarket,” I murmured to myself as I put my things on the couch in the living room.
     
    I went into my room and sat down on my bed, looking down at the brooch in my hand. I carressed it with my fingers,  fearing I might  lose it again.
    It crossed my mind that the strange boy had touched it. There were his vestiges on my brooch. Then I thought that if he was not an honest person it is likely he would not have returned my jewel. But he was concerned enough to return it to me without asking anything in exchange, not even my gratitude. 
    I rose from my bed as I was uneasy. I felt badly at myself all because I had no opportunity to thank him.  The word ‘THANKS...!’ remained lodged in my throat, the whole day and the whole night, interrupting my sleep.
     
    The next day, I went to school in the hope of having an opportunity to thank him and try to take away my aguish. This sensation seemed to feel even worse than if I had really lost my brooch.
    In school, I spent all the time trying to imagine a manner of approaching the strange boy and thanking him for everything that he had done for me. It seemed, however, that I had bad luck. Between classes I had no chance to approach him. It all seemed so hard, even though he was just adjacent to me.
    Every time I tried to approach, I was prevented by my own fear as I was thinking I was doing the wrong thing. Maybe I was behaving like an idiot.
    I broke out in a cold sweat, accompanied by constant pangs inside me. That had been a reflex caused by my nerves.
     
    Before returning home, I had decided to go to the school library to try to look for an interesting book to read.
    Reading has always been part of my life. It’s all thanks to my mother who always influenced me to read ever since I was a child.
    She always said, ‘Those who read, speak and write very well.’
    The library had several divisions, with enormous bookshelves that were filled up with books. I walked slowly