It was sweltering hot and there was not even a hint of wind blowing.

“I’m so excited!” said Sara’s best friend, Aaniya.

Sara pushed back a strand of silky black hair and wiped the sweat off her forehead. “The bus better have the AC working,” she said, “or we’ll be baked to death!”

It was grade eighth’s school trip to a lake nearby. Everyone was really excited, especially Aaniya, who was bouncing and squealing with joy. Sara, however, wasn’t so sure. It wasn’t that she didn’t like school trips, but she had a feeling that something would go wrong. Finally, the students started boarding the bus.

The students became cramped in the bus, and she and Aaniya were squeezed together so tightly that Sara thought they would be stuck to each other permanently by the time they reached their destination.

“Children, we are sorry for the inconvenience, but the AC is unfortunately not working,” the announcement made by the driver was met by many groans and shouts of protest by the students and teachers alike.

“Hey, that’s not fair!” Sara exclaimed.

“We’ll be lucky if we survive, let alone have fun, on this bus!” groaned Mariam, a classmate.

“I know what we can do to cheer us up! I’ll play some music on my phone!” Miss Leenah said. But, as soon as she got her phone out of her bag, it slipped from her sweaty hands and fell to the floor.

“No! My brand new phone!” cried Miss Leenah. “Curse this stupid bus!”

This really did cheer everyone up, and the students started laughing. At last, the bus arrived at the lake. Sara got off the bus and stretched. A pleasant breeze was blowing outside.

Sara and Aaniya refreshed themselves and felt much better. Maybe the rest of the trip wasn’t going to be as bad as the journey, Sara thought. She walked over to the lake, a serene, majestic body of shimmering turquoise water. The breeze created ripples in the water and the trees around the lake swayed gently, their leaves rustling in the cool breeze.

Sometime later, Sara had just finished her sandwich and was sitting under the shade of the trees, chatting with her friends, when someone screamed.

“What happened?” Sara exclaimed. She and Aaniya ran over to the lake, where many people had gathered to see what was happening.

“Mariam has got into the deeper side of the lake!” a girl cried out. There were frightened murmurs everywhere. Everyone knew that Mariam didn’t know how to swim and that she was really scared of deep water.

“Oh no, Mariam’s going to drown!” Aaniya cried.

Suddenly, Sara remembered her swimming classes. “I know how to swim!” she exclaimed, almost laughing with relief, and before anyone could say anything, she had jumped into the lake and was swimming over to Mariam.

Mariam was panicking and trying with all her might to move her arms and legs, in a bid to swim but her efforts just made the situation worse, with her arms flailing wildly in the water. As soon as she saw Sara, she reached out and held on to her. Sara carried her safely towards the shore and to safety.

“Three cheers for Sara! Hip, hip, hooray!” everyone clapped and cheered for Sara. She was dubbed as the hero of the trip.

Published in Dawn, Young World, March 19th, 2022