Chapter Nine

Tomas is on top of the slide and he’s surrounded by children from different batches, while Alberto’s at the bottom of the slide collecting P5.00 coins from those who wanted to attend the show. Instead of making an environment awareness poster, Tomas made one that said, “LITLE ATHEYIST.” He didn’t spell it correctly, but I didn’t bother to correct him because he was very proud of his contribution to our “corporation.”

“Boys and girls,” he begins, “Today you are about to meet one of the most scariest people to ever exist in the whole entire wide world. He doesn’t believe in G-O-D, and he’s not afraid of H-E-L…”

There’s a big gasp in the crowd and they’re looking around like something disallowed is currently going on – they look a little scared, like if they listen to Tomas some more they’ll be in trouble. The kids keep coming and Alberto keeps on collecting coins.

“He is an atheist!” Tomas continues, “And today he will tell us about his strange view of the universe and why he doesn’t believe in the B-A-B-L-E!”

“What’s a Bable?” asks one of the older kids.

“What he meant was Bible,” says Alberto.

“I don’t know what the big deal is. I mean, I don’t believe in the Bible either,” Aaqil says from the back row.

“You can speak in English?” asks Tomas.

“The Mindanawi can speak in English!” Alberto announces.

I go over to Aaqil to ask him if he’s an atheist. He says, “No, we’re Muslim. We believe the Koran. Our God is Allah. And we don’t eat pig.”

“I don’t believe in the Bible either,” another voice from the back says. “We have many different gods and we don’t eat cow.”

It’s Aladdin. That’s not his real name. We just call him that because he looks Arab. But he isn’t Arab either. He says he’s Indian. But he doesn’t look Indian at all. From what I know about Indians, they’re supposed to have a Mohawk, red paint on their faces, and feathers on their hair to show their tribe rank.

Grandpa told me all about it a few years ago. The Indian boy who looks like an Arab boy is fine with us calling him Aladdin because no one can really pronounce his real name correctly.

The kids are starting to argue about who’s going to hell and about who’s going to be saved and it’s getting noisy.

“Wait! Settle down! We’re here because of the atheist. Yes, Aladdin has several gods and Aaqil has his own God too, but our speaker today – he believes that these gods are not real.”

There’s a gasp again, followed by silence.

“Oh. He’s going to hell,” says Aaqil.

Aladdin agrees with Aaqil and everyone’s nodding. Tomas decides that this is the perfect time to introduce me.

“Ladies and gentlemen! The little atheist boy!” screamed Tomas and Alberto and him pointed at me.

There’s no applause. It’s very quiet and awkward.

"You?" asks Aaqil.

“That’s not an atheist,” says Aladdin. “That’s just Loki. I want my money back.”

“But I am an atheist,” I say, “sort of.”

“But you don’t look like an atheist,” says Aaqil.

“What’s an atheist supposed to look like?” I ask.

“I don’t know. I’ve never met one. But from what I hear, atheists are supposed to look real mean,” says Aaqil.

I shrug.

“So, are you going to hell?” asks Aladdin.

“I’m not sure. But based on what I’ve been hearing from you guys, it seems that we’re all going to hell,” I say.

“Wait, what? Even us? How’d you figure that?” asks Tomas.

“Well, according to Aaqil, Allah would send non-Muslims to hell. According to Alberto, Jesus would send non-Christians to hell. Since, all of us here are either non-Christian or non-Muslim, I guess that means we’re all going to hell, it’s just a matter of who’s sending us there,” I say.

A girl from first grade started to cry.

“We’re all going to hell!” Alberto screams. Then everyone starts screaming and running in all directions. I get confused from all the running that I start screaming and running too. And the teachers got out of the faculty room to chase after everyone and figure out what’s going on.