white boys (river phoenix)

1

Chapter One

Robin didn't mention it before, but she had dogs, and cats, and a snake. She had two dogs, two cats, and a pet snake. Her mother was raised on a vegetable farm with another family, so they had plenty of animals. Some just visited, she told a then child Robin, and some they adopted after finding them off the streets. She'd grown to love animals and had attempted to be a steady vegetarian, but dad always seemed to forget that whenever he'd cook the meals for the family at dinnertime. Her mother was no longer vegetarian.

They were a settled family, they never wasted each others' time with nonsense- they always got straight to the point and tried their best to avoid falling into the dark vortex of negative feelings, unless something was drastically wrong. There were no gender roles in this household - her dad wasn't the boss and her mother certainly wasn't a pathetic housewife, slaving away at the stove and cleaning up messes she didn't even make. And lastly, their house was safe. No matter what was happening at school, at work, or any place outside of home, if any of them were to come home into each other's arms, they were guaranteed that they would not be dropped.

Anyway, Robin was sitting in her room beginning to lay her things out on her bed- like her clothes and stuff - when her mom came into her room holding a handful of papers.

"You're going to have to fill out some paperwork. They want to know which classes you want to take," Robin's mother told her, placing the papers she needed on her nightstand.

"Uh, great, thanks mom," She said distractedly.

"You start school next week," her mom said, before walking out.

Robin stopped what she was doing and turned to look at the papers, grabbing a pencil out from one of the drawers. This should be easy, all they were asking for was some personal information and what classes she wanted to take. Robin started to fill in her name, her new address, her new home number and all that. She then got to the part where they asked about electives she wanted to take and regular classes.

For Language, she chose Italian, then chose Music and Creative Writing for her two electives. For her math, Robin was able to choose since she was an Honors student in her math classes back in Georgia, so she chose AP Calculus.

She hated math, she really did, but she was somehow blessed with the talent to be able to do it quickly, easily and correctly, so there really was no reason to hate it, except because everyone had ruined math class for her with their snide comments each time she'd raise her hand during class. Robin shuddered, filling in the checkbox and moving onto the last question, which asked about what career path she wanted to take and what college she wanted to go to, and what she would study when she got there.

Robin knew she wanted to live a life of music being a singer who got to tour the world and sing her heart out to audiences while being effortlessly sexy yet timelessly classy. But at the same time, she really did love writing, and wanted to be an author or an English teacher - just to show all those little white boys back in Georgia that she was capable of using words beyond the African American Vernacular English. Even though AAVE which, if used, did not determine intelligence, Robin just wished all the ignorant people out there would realize it. In the meantime, Robin had her eyes set on majoring in music and minoring in creative writing when she went to college. So she wrote out, quite eloquently, what she wanted to do when she went to college and the reasons behind it, leaving out all the race details.

The next morning (Monday), she woke to the smell of French toast, bacon and the sound of eggs sizzling on the frying pan. She wasn't quite a fan of mornings, and much rather preferred being in the dark or it being night time, but if there was one reason for her to get up, it was because of her dad's homemade breakfast. He cooked something different each morning, something new or something traditional. Mom on the other hand handled lunch on free days where they were all home because she didn't do so well cooking the big meals of the day. But when she did cook lunch, she made the best grilled cheese with salmon sandwiches, a traditional sandwich. Other times she'd make cheeseburgers with eggs sliding down the middle.