The History Series: Book 4

Chapter 7

New Amsterdam - 1652

I was running around the settlement, trying to find my friend Mathew's house. I had never realized how much of a maze this place was before. I passed house after house, eventually I found Mathew's house. The only reason I knew it was Mathew's house was because he was sitting on the doorstep.

Mathew was a 27 year old man, with brown hair and bright blue eyes. He basically wore the exact same out fit as mine. He looked puzzled as he stared off into the distance.
"Mathew? You okay?" I asked skeptically.
He hummed in response, "Oh, yeah... uh... you know about it right?"
I raise a brow.
Mathew sighed seeing that I was completely oblivious to whatever he was talking about, "You know how the English and Dutch have been rivals?"
I nodded.
"Yeah well, tension is breaking between the two. The English have been claiming that they've been here sense 1498, don't know how much I believe that though..."

That interested me. The English claiming to have settled here first? If it were true how come I'd never come across any of their settlements here. I mean I've seen some of their colonies, but they're not apart of an area around New Amsterdam. I sighed, I wonder how vader was taking this whole... situation.

Mathew got up and looked around. I looked around where Mathew was. I soon realized what he was looking for. People. There was no one out, which is strange considering the large and diverse population of this colony. Now I was worried. Mathew tapped on my shoulder and motioned me inside. I nodded and followed.

I took a seat at his table which sat right in the middle of the room. I watched as Mathew started slowly pacing around the room.
"I don't see why you're so worried about all of this. The most concerning thing that's happened today is the ghost town outside..." I stated, trying to ease Mathew's worry.
It didn't seem to have worked as much as I had wanted. Mathew just ended up shooting me a look that read 'are you serious'.
I sighed. I knew no matter how hard I tried to calm him down, my chances of success were just around impossible.

'I bet if America was here he'd know what to do...' I thought silently to myself. I shook myself out of my thoughts as I realized I was about to go into a debate with myself over Virginia's idea. Virginia's idea being America being my real father. I have found that my mind keeps going back to this. It's strange, a part of my wants to believe it and does believe it, but another part just won't allow me to accept that entirely. At least not yet... maybe someday though.

I looked back at Mathew, who's face was still written with concern. I thought for a second, trying to think of something that might calm him down. Perhaps if we went out somewhere?
"Mathew, why don't we go down to the tavern down nearby?" I asked.
He looked back at me and seemed to have relaxed just a little bit.
We both then got up and I watched as Mathew walked over to a nearby shelf and grab a little pouch of coins. I pay my pants pocket and soon felt  my pouch of money that I had taken with me.

We walked for a bit, the tavern was quite close to Mathew's house though, so it didn't take too long. We sat down at a table in the tavern. I looked around at some of the men in the tavern that were eating and drinking. They all looked completely different compared to each other, but there was one thing they all had in common:

They all looked worried...

I guess taking him here wasn't any better a solution, because the moment we both realized this both of our expressions soured. Mathew wasn't lying, this situation was getting bad, wasn't it?