“Hey! Look at my brand new I-phone Six Plus!” Natalie boasted arrogantly to all her classmates near her, raising her phone in the air. The mobile gadget glinted under the fluorescent light.
Recess had just ended and the class was waiting for the teacher to arrive. Everyone crowded around Natalie like bees around a beehive. “You lucky girl!” one gushed, green with envy. “It must have cost a fortune!” another blurted.
“It’s nothing. It’s just a phone!” Natalie, the pimply adolescent, replied nonchalantly, with a snobbish smirk.
“No way! My parents would never buy that for me. Not even in my dreams!” another girl grumbled.
All were green with envy over Natalie’s new phone. All except Wenhui who stayed seated at her desk.
“It is just a phone!” she mumbled to herself but it was overheard by Natalie who immediately turned red in anger.
“What do you mean by ‘it is just a phone’? You have one too?” Natalie retorted.
“Yes! I do have a phone too!” Wenhui replied calmly. She took out her treasured second-hand Nokia phone which her parents had just bought for her on her recent birthday
“What! A trash phone! Even my maid has a better phone than this!” Natalie sniggered in a derisive tone.
That instantaneously ignited Wenhui’s anger. “How dare you look down on others?” Wenhui blustered indignantly. “Stop being mean, you snob!”
That infuriated Natalie who stormed towards Wenhui and snatched her Nokia phone from her. Like a shotput athlete, she threw the phone against the white board. A dent instantly appeared on the shiny surface and the phone shattered into pieces. A ripple of horror swept across the classroom.
“My phone!” Wenhui cried. Tears streaked down her eyes for she knew her parents had to work their fingers to the bone just to afford that for her. She turned and glowered at Natalie menacingly with her bloodshot eyes, her diminutive fists clenched so tightly that the knuckles turned white.
The air was choked with malice. Smoke could almost be seen spurting out of the girls’ nostrils as they let out vindictive words at each other. With the war of words in full swing, everyone turned as silent as a spine-chilling graveyard.
“Button your mouths now!” a voice bellowed loudly. The girls spun around instantaneously and spotted the elephantine disciplinary mistress, Mrs Lee, glaring at them with her bulging eyes and arms akimbo. The girls instantly turned into meek lambs. The cowering duo were summoned to her office and given a long lecture on kindness.
In the end, the parents were notified and Natalie’s parents turned out to be unassuming and kind despite their immense wealth. They felt so apologetic towards Wenhui and gave her a brand new phone to compensate her for the damage. As for Natalie, they unleased her the mother of all dressing-downs and made her apologise to Wenhui. Her phone was confiscated and she got a Nokia phone instead.
Natalie realized how ugly it was to be a snob and decided to mend her ways. In fact, her transformation has been so complete that Wenhui has drawn close to her and they have become close buddies as a result.
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