story excerpt: The Art Lesson

Okay, so here's the story excerpt I promised! I started writing this story back in 2016, I think. Back then I typed only a couple of initial paragraphs and then got stuck. Then after several months I opened the word document and read what I had written. I realized that it was quite good and added more to it.
So here's an excerpt:(even though this is all I have written yet, I am calling this an excerpt because this I intend to add more to it).
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THE ART LESSON

The tap-tap sound of the teacher’s heels announced that she was approaching. Hira’s hands trembled as she sharpened her pencil. The classroom door swung open, and the tap-tap sound grew louder. A sudden gust of wind bought the smell of strong feminine perfume to Hira’s nostrils.

The tap-tap sound finally stopped by the teacher’s desk in the front. “Class! Today we will be drawing a basket of apples,” the teacher’s shrill voice sounded as she picked up a piece of chalk and began drawing one on the blackboard. The teacher turned around to face the class.

“Open your sketchbooks everyone!” she called as she began to colour the apples with red chalk. Each apple was exactly the same size, shape, and colour, and each had a tiny brown stalk coming out of the top, with a single green leaf.

 “All of them are exactly the same,” Hira thought as she opened her sketchbook to a blank page. “Uniform- just the way the school wants us to be like.” She glanced at the board-the teacher was almost done now-she was adding finishing touches to the basket.

“Now start copying this, class,” the teacher spoke in her sharp voice. “Maria!” she called the class monitor. “Please distribute these colour pencils to the children.”  The monitor stood up to follow the teacher’s instructions, while the rest of the class began fumbling about in their schoolbags for their pencil cases. “Remember, you are to draw the apples using pencil, and you are not to use colours other than red, brown and green; red for the apples, brown for the basket and the stalks and green for the leaves.” She gave her last instructions and the class nodded solemnly. “You can start drawing now. You have half an hour for this assignment.”

The whole of the fourth grade bent down laboriously on their sketchbooks, constantly glancing at the blackboard to make sure they were copying exactly what the teacher had drawn; lest any discrepancies between their work and the teacher’s drawing make her angry. There was panic in the air-some children were searching for the exact shade of red in the jar of colour pencils, others were hastily erasing out details in their drawing that did not quite match the one on the board. The teacher - totally unaware of and uninfluenced by the panic her students were surrounded with - was calmly seated, sipping coffee while simultaneously checking her students’ exercise books and keeping an eye on the class.

*       *       *

Hira was finding it impossible to copy the teacher’s drawing anymore. She glanced at the clock on the wall – Oh no! It was nine-fifty already!- only ten more minutes left, Hira , she muttered to herself as she erased a leaf and started drawing it again. She hadn’t finished her drawing yet, and she had to colour it after that, too. It always took Hira a long time to colour using pencils – she would press down too hard on them and the nib would break, and so Hira had to sharp her pencil multiple times before the draeing was done. Hira wished they didn’t have to use pencils. Hira never enjoyed working with pencils – she preferred paint instead – but at school they always had to use colour pencils and only colours the teacher allowed them to. Hira stared at her drawing. She longed fill each apple with a different colour; one red, one pink and one yellow…

“Time’s over, class” the teacher’s razor-sharp voice rang in Hira’s ears, disrupting her series of thoughts. She had started collecting the sketchbooks now. Alarmed, Hira reached for her red colour pencil in an attempt to complete her drawing before she had to turn it in, but it was too late now.

“So you haven’t finished yet, missy?” Hira looked up to see the teacher standing in front of her desk. “It’s high time you stopped dreaming girl. You’re grown up now.” Before Hira could say anything she snatched her sketchbook and moved on to the next child.