The gates of Rajawali High
School didn't just open; they welcomed. Two marble pillars, five meters high,
flanked the entrance like dimensional barriers separating the humble reality of
Sukabumi from a small utopia simply named "The Elite School."
It was 6:45 AM. The Sukabumi
air still held a lingering, cold mist, but in front of the Rajawali gates, the
atmosphere was already heating up with an unwritten display of wealth. This
wasn't just school arrival time; it was an automotive fashion runway.
A glossy black Rubicon turned
in, its massive tires crushing the smooth asphalt with barely a whisper. Behind
it, a pearl-white BMW—the latest series—followed with grace. The school
security guard, Mr. Asep, whose uniform was neater than a traffic cop's, bowed
respectfully, greeting the drivers behind the dark-tinted windows.
And then, there was that
sound.
Sputter... wheeze... BANG!
The sound of an exhaust
coughing like an old man choking on cigarette smoke shattered the symphony of
turbo-powered engines. Thin white smoke billowed from a 2005 Honda Supra X, its
black paint long faded into a dull, melancholy gray.
Sitting atop the bike was
Salim Nur Hidayah. The visor on his standard-issue helmet was so loose that
every time he hit a speed bump, it would drop down and smack him in the nose.
Salim pushed it back up with his index finger—a movement that had become pure
muscle reflex over the last two years.
"Morning, Mr. Asep," Salim
greeted casually as his bike idled beside the guard post, waiting for his turn
to enter, blocked by an Alphard currently dropping off a grand madame.
Mr. Asep chuckled, waving a
hand familiarly. "Morning, Young Master Salim. The 'Battle Hopper' sounds a bit
hoarse today. Hasn't taken its medicine?"
"Same old, Sir. The engine oil
is having mood swings," Salim answered offhandedly. "I'm parking in the usual
VIP spot, right?"
"You mean the corner near the
generator shed? Go ahead, Sir. The red carpet hasn't been washed yet," Mr. Asep
shot back, equally witty.
Salim smirked. He feathered
the throttle gently so the engine wouldn't die on him. He rolled past rows of
cars that probably cost enough to buy an entire district in his hometown. Salim
didn't feel inferior. Honestly, he had passed that phase back in 10th grade.
Now, in 12th grade, he just found it amusing. To him, Rajawali High was a
unique ecosystem, and he was an invasive species surviving on one thing alone:
his brain.
He parked his bike in the
designated two-wheeler area—which, ironically, was mostly filled with 250cc
Ninja sportbikes or Vespa automatics worth thousands of dollars. Salim's bike
looked like a museum artifact amidst an army of futuristic robots.
Just as he took off his helmet
and fixed his wind-blown hair, the deep, heavy roar of an engine vibrated in
his chest. Not the high-pitched whine of a racing bike, but the bass of a
large-capacity engine.
A bright yellow Ford Mustang—a
yellow so bright it could hurt your eyes—stopped right in front of the
motorcycle parking zone, blocking the path. The driver's door swung open.
Out stepped Dani. His hair was
styled with expensive pomade that could probably be smelled from a ten-meter
radius. His uniform was suspiciously wrinkle-free, and the watch on his left
wrist probably cost as much as Salim's kidney.
"Oy! Peasants!" Dani shouted,
spreading his arms wide, a sinless grin plastered on his face.
Salim only rolled his eyes,
slinging his backpack—one strap held together by a safety pin—over his
shoulder. "You're loud, you Double-Door Fridge. Changed cars again?"
Dani laughed heartily, draping
an arm around Salim's shoulder, not caring that his expensive uniform was
brushing against the road dust on Salim's jacket. "You know how it is, Lim. My
old man just won some tender or whatever, I don't get it. This was the prize.
But I swear, the gas mileage is terrible. I suspect this car runs on Holy Water
mixed with premium jet fuel."
"Are you complaining about gas
mileage to a guy whose bike breaks down if the tank has less than half a liter
left?" Salim remarked dryly, though the corner of his lips twitched upward.
Dani was an anomaly. He was
rich—filthy rich, actually. But his brain was—pardon the expression—a bit
loose. Most importantly, he never looked at Salim as the "scholarship kid."
Since junior high, Dani was the first to lend him notebooks, and Salim was the
one who did Dani's homework. A mutual symbiosis that evolved into genuine
friendship.
"Eh, there's Rizki and Maya,"
Dani pointed with his chin.
From the main corridor, two
figures walked over, completing their strange quartet. Rizki, with his upright
posture and a calm face that always looked like he was contemplating the fate
of the nation, walked leisurely. Beside him walked Maya.
Maya was the definition of
"lethal normal beauty." She didn't overdress like the other popular girls, but
the aura of "Old Money" radiated strongly from her. Her school bag was a luxury
brand, yet she carried it as if it were a plastic bag from a convenience store.
"Morning, Lim. Morning, Dan,"
Rizki greeted, his voice a calm baritone. "New car again, Dan? Yellow?
Seriously? Are you trying to be Bumblebee or a New York taxi driver?"
"Damn you, Ki. This is art!"
Dani protested.
Maya didn't speak immediately.
Her eyes went straight to Salim. There was a split-second pause where their
gazes met. Salim, with his poker face, gave a small nod. Maya smiled
thinly—very thinly—but her cheeks flushed a soft pink.
"Hi, Lim. Had breakfast?" Maya
asked softly, completely ignoring Dani's flashy yellow car.
"Not yet. I'll just grab some
fried snacks at the canteen later," Salim answered briefly. He patted his
pocket, ensuring the twenty thousand rupiah—his daily allowance—was still
there.
"Fried snacks again? Consider
your cholesterol, Lim," Maya said quickly, stuttering slightly mid-sentence.
Dani nudged Salim's ribs,
whispering loud enough for everyone to hear. "Major signal, Boss! Major signal!
That's 4G LTE right there!"
"What are you on about," Salim
swatted Dani's hand away, his face remaining flat. "Come on, let's go in. First
period is Mrs. Ratna. If you're late by a minute, she'll make you sweep the
courtyard."
The four of them walked
together toward the main building. The contrast was stark to any outsider. Dani
the loudmouth and Rizki the calm stoic represented the school's bourgeoisie.
Maya, graceful and elegant, was the hidden primadonna. And Salim? He walked in
sneakers with thinning soles, a uniform slightly faded from too much washing,
yet his steps were the steadiest of them all.
Rajawali High might be a place
where money talked the loudest, but inside this small circle, Dani's money,
Rizki's family power, and Maya's social status were worth no more than the dry
jokes coming out of Salim's mouth.
Class XII Science 1. The Elite
Class.
Here, the air pressure felt
heavier. Not because of the central AC set to 18 degrees Celsius, but because
of the ambition evaporating from the heads of the thirty students inside.
Almost everyone here had a target: Top Medical School, Top Engineering University,
or an overseas scholarship.
Salim sat in the third row
from the back, near the window. A strategic position. Far enough to avoid the
teacher's direct attention, but close enough to see the whiteboard. Beside him,
Dani was busy drawing a caricature of the teacher in his notebook.
Mrs. Ratna, the Math teacher
known for being a 'killer' yet fashionable, was writing a trigonometry integral
problem that was as long as a train on the whiteboard.
"Alright," Mrs. Ratna turned
around, scanning the class behind her thick glasses. "Who can solve this in
under three minutes? This is a question from last year's Olympiad level."
The class went silent.
Salim rested his chin on his
left hand, staring at the board with a blank gaze. In his head, he didn't see
the numbers as threats. He saw patterns. The integral was like a messy puzzle
piece to him.
Substitution of u... break the
fractions... then integration by parts... ah, that's a trap in the sin 2x,
Salim thought.
His mind wandered. What should
I eat during the break? If I buy Mr. Man's meatballs, the price went up to 15k.
That leaves 5k for gas. If I buy fritters, 5k gets me 3 pieces, will that make
me full? But Maya said cholesterol. Ah, whatever, cholesterol won't kill me,
hunger will.
"I'll try, Ma'am!"
A loud voice came from the
front row. Nadia.
Salim glanced lazily. Nadia
was his eternal rival in parallel rankings, though Salim never considered her a
rival. Nadia considered Salim a nemesis. She stood up confidently, marker in
hand, and began working on the problem on the board.
Her steps were neat. Her
handwriting was beautiful. Dani nudged Salim. "Lim, is that right?"
Salim narrowed his eyes
slightly. "Third row. She forgot to change the integral limits during the
variable substitution. The final result will be minus, it should be positive."
"You're not gonna correct
her?"
"Why bother? Let her have her
moment," Salim answered indifferently, going back to thinking about fried
snacks. Sometimes Salim's random nature struck at the wrong time. He could care
deeply about trivial things like a hungry stray cat, but be ice-cold towards
academic competition.
Sure enough. Five minutes
later, Nadia finished with a proud face. Mrs. Ratna nodded, then turned to the
class. "Does anyone have a different answer? Or wants to correct Nadia's
answer?"
Silence again. Most students
hadn't even made it halfway through their scratch paper.
"Salim," Mrs. Ratna called
suddenly. It was Dani's heart that dropped, not Salim's.
"Yes, Ma'am?" Salim
straightened his posture.
"You've been daydreaming out
the window. Is Nadia's answer correct?"
Salim sighed softly. He stood
up, shoving his hands into his pockets. He didn't walk to the front. He just
stood by his desk.
"The answer is 14/3, Ma'am,"
Salim said briefly.
Nadia snapped her head around.
"My answer is minus 14/3. You're talking nonsense, Salim."
"Third row, Nad," Salim said,
his tone flat as if giving directions to a parking attendant. "You changed
variable x to u, but your upper limit is still the x limit. It should be pi
over two becoming zero if you plug it into the u = cos x equation."
Nadia froze. Her eyes widened
as she stared at the board. Her face turned red instantly as she realized the
fatal yet trivial mistake.
"You arrogant jerk," Nadia
grumbled softly, but loud enough to hear.
"Not arrogant, just hungry,"
Salim muttered under his breath, sitting back down before Mrs. Ratna could
praise him.
"Precisely, Salim," Mrs. Ratna
said, flashing a rare smile. "Plus points for you. Nadia, be careful with
precision. Please sit down."
Dani slapped Salim's back
hard. "You crazy bastard! Without scratching paper? Where did you calculate
that? In the clouds?"
"In between thinking about
vegetable fritters, Dan," Salim answered honestly.
When the recess bell rang,
Salim was the first to stand up. Not to show off his intelligence, but because
the worms in his stomach were staging a protest for human rights.
However, as he walked out of
the class, he could feel Nadia's glare stabbing his back, and the admiring
looks from his other classmates. In this school, Salim was an anomaly. He was
poor in wealth, but he held the most valuable currency in Rajawali other than
money: Pure Intelligence.
But to Salim, none of that
mattered. What mattered now was whether the canteen still had his favorite
shrimp fritters left. Because for a scholarship kid living paycheck to
paycheck, happiness was simple: a full stomach and a full gas tank.
He didn't know yet, that the
calculation skills he used to budget for fried snacks would soon be the only
thing saving his life from death.