"Woah, Gumi! Be careful!"
"Oops!"
Miku grabbed Gumi's arm and drew her back just as a truck zoomed past the duo at the foot of the road junction. As Gumi was hurriedly pulled aback, the top of the snow cone she held in her hand slid right off and plopped onto the road. It began to melt into a diluted puddle of flavoured colouring. There went the day's cooling treat for the hot and humid weather. She looked at it pitifully, her tongue aching to be cooled.
"Watch the road properly now," Miku warned her friend as they were about to cross the road.
Although Miku had eaten half of her own blueberry-flavoured ice dish, beads of perspiration continued to form on her brow and trickily down her face. The shredded ice also began to turn watery, losing its coolness quickly. She momentarily placed her bag down on a bench by the path side and clamped the base of the paper cone with her teeth to take off her school blazer.
"You already took off your councillor's tie," Gumi commented as she, too, followed suit.
"I know, but it's too hot today," Miku replied after stuffing her blazer unceremoniously in frustration into her bag.
She waited for Gumi to finish, then resumed to walk to the bus stop where Gumi had to wait to catch the bus home.
"The bus should be very cooling when it comes," Miku said bitterly.
When they had reached the station, they parted ways with goodbyes, with Gumi staying behind and Miku turning downwards to the right where her home was a stone's throw away. Gumi positioned herself underneath the fan located at the corner of the stop, sipping down the rest of her refreshment as weak gusts of hot wind blew into her flushed face. There was not another soul in the area. The sky began to transform into a tinge of yellowish orange as the sun began to descend.
Whilst she waited for her bus, she tossed her paper cone into the dustbin nearby and saw down on the bench to rearrange her bag. As she folded her blazer, she spotted worksheets sticking out of her file. She was going to have to burn the midnight oil completing them. She wondered how her other friends, IA and Rin, were going to finish theirs on time. They would probably come home late from community service, with no spurt of energy left in them. She still had house chores to carry out.
Suddenly, an uneasy shudder went down her spine. She froze, hunched up, hands poised over her bag's zipper. The thought of someone hiding somewhere in a distance, watching her was under her impression. It did not feel good.
Before she could think of what she should do, there was a stampede of footsteps, getting louder behind her. Gumi opened her mouth to shout, but a rough pair of hands was clapped shut around it and the smell of rubber filled her nostrils. They muffled her shouts of help and made her want to gag. Tears were stinging in her eyes but she could not wipe them off, for they were proficiently tied up together by nimble, thin and smooth fingers. She fought to shake her head about, in anxiety to catch view of her captor. She attempted get onto her feet but when she did so, her hands plummeted down- something heavy was tied to them. It made her shoulders snap. Her joints wailed painfully and sonorously. The lack of oxygen exhausted her, breathing shallowly and seeing black spots blot her vision. She felt her feet swooped up by yet another pair of different hands bigger than the other two.
"Hurry up and go!" someone with a hoarse and deep voice barked out.
Her body was jostled up and down as she was carried downhill by the three strangers. Everything was in a blur. She could hear the familiar roar of the bus as it screeched to a deafening halt.
She desperately hoped that the bus driver would stop these people and help her. She wondered about her possessions. What became of them then?
Upon the sound of the bus stopping, she felt speed picking up. Shortly, the person carrying her legs stumbled over a hump on the path.
"Aw man!" a female voice sounded in hurt.
They were probably in front of Miku's house. Gumi yearned for her friend to look out of the window, see her, and run after her, calling the police on her handphone.
But nothing of the sort happened.
They continued to move downhill and hastened to an abrupt halt. She heard a door of a vehicle open and was hustled inside She felt herself lying on a three seater when the driver gear up the vehicle and drove away.