To See What Others Miss

by Elisha Agor

“If you see beauty in something, don’t wait for others to agree.” – Sherihan Gamal

The sorceress asks you this, “And to you, the one whose brain works as scrupulous as a machine. What do you wish for in life?” You pause and think of your hardships, hiking those mountains were not easy, and neither was the path you took to get to this famed enchantress. Your eyes, sharp as the dagger you gripped tightly in your left hand, you look the necromancer in the eye; not shying away despite the aura that generated off her. With a smile on your lips, you wish to be born a pirate in your next life. The witch laughs, waves a hand at your request and excuses you from her presence. She thinks it is an amusing wish, you think it is intelligent – for you knew, some treasures do not lie in chests, but in spaces where the world forgets to look.

You awake, not as the glorious pirate, but as a student.

You gain consciousness on a Friday afternoon. You scan your surroundings, the paths were littered with signs of a long-lost bounty, scattered by careless hands and carried by the tide of days. And you realize you are participating in a clean up drive of sorts. The paths were littered with trinkets of the forgotten age – scraps of paper dulled by rain, bottles weathered smooth as sea glass, fragments of things once prized, now drowned and abandoned to the ebb of time. You trace your eyes over it, the truth settles over like a chart unrolled across a captain’s table: this bounty was never meant to be kept, only claimed long enough to return it to where it belonged.

Around you, the crew was already at work; not sailors, but the officers of every club in Isabela National High School (INHS), each bearing the colors of their own advocacies. From artists to athletes, studious to performers, they gather shoulder to shoulder, setting aside titles to serve a shared cause. The clock strikes four, and the afternoon sun drapes the campus in gold. From then until the rung of five, their hands move tirelessly, sweeping through dust and grime, untangling the debris caught between roots and stone, hauling away at the relics of carelessness.

Side by side with the janitors, they scoured every hidden cove and narrow lane of the campus. There was no grumbling, only the quiet pride of a crew who knows voyage will not end here. For when the next Friday comes, and the hour strikes again, they will return to the same paths, ready to defend the vessel they all sail upon.

By the time the sun slipped low, you remembered the wish you’d once asked to the sorceress – to be a pirate in your next life. She tricked you that’s for sure. There was no ship nor sea, no grand fleet nor crew but instead school officers moving as one to mend and fix their beloved vessel, the school and what lay inside it. Treasurers were uncovered between four and five on a Friday afternoon. Yet the bargain felt fair; gold never the prize, but the quiet art of finding worth where others see none.

To see what others miss.