"Wake up!" A sudden weight crushed against Kyle's stomach causing him to heave.
"Guh," his eyes sprung awake to see two children energetically jumping on him. "I'm awake. I'm awake! Hey stop jumping!" The two didn't stop and instead laughed joyfully as Kyle tried to pick them off. Too nimble for him to get his hands on the girl and boy ran away as he finally managed to rise from the bed. "Rudy, Lana get back here!" his voice had no merit as the two were already out of the room.
"It's your fault for waking up late," Maila leaned herself against the doorframe. "I thought it would be fun to get help for the occasion."
Kyle shook himself checking the nearby clock. It was already past eight. "Sorry I said I'd make breakfast today."
"It's fine, though this is the first time you haven't woken up on time. Something wrong?"
He blinked and pressed his hands to his eyes, "Just a dream. A long one."
"Must have been a good one for you to sleep so well," Maila straightened herself. "Come have breakfast."
"I'll be there soon." Once she was gone he made sure the door was locked before changing his clothes. It had been quite a long time since he last had the dreams again. With each one he felt them becoming more and more realistic and this one was no exception. It was almost like he had been there hovering over Estile's shoulders. The foreign sight of a strange city and the view of endless water under the night sky. He had only heard the concept of oceans in books or paintings. Stranger still were the people who attended the party. They were people only found in stories. The whole thing made Kyle feel strangely vulnerable. The last dreams he had proved to be at least a little true from what he saw at the Sweeper Camp but everything else seemed so farfetched it couldn't be real. There was no ocean in their world.
Kyle pushed the thoughts away and made his way to the kitchen dining area. Today marked the 14th day of his job as one of the Garden's caretakers. He had learnt a lot since then, especially how some mischievous some of the children could be. At this point he knew the 24 by name and also their personalities. Funnily enough their hair colour matched quite a bit. The more energetic girls had green hair, those with purple hair were cheekier and could be quite sly, the girls with yellow hair were curious and kinder, and then finally the boys who all had blue hair were a bit shy, though quite talkative when they wanted to be. That being said the children were all different and like the shades in their hair, their personalities also differed.
By the time he reached the dining area everyone else had already arrived and were eating breakfast. Many of them were almost done. Kyle served himself a ball of porridge that Maila had made and sat down beside Lillia.
"You're up late," she noted.
"Strange dreams," he replied easily. "Nothing out of the usual though."
"So you always have strange dreams?" she looked at him with a teasing glint.
"Sometimes," he again replied normally.
Unable to find anything to poke at him with Lillia changed the subject, "So how's your studying going, want to practice again later?"
This time Kyle frowned, "It's okay.... I'll just practice on my own."
"You still can't grasp any of it can you?" Lillia looked at him with a piercing focus.
"Fine you got me," he raised his arms. "I still can't use the tiniest bit of mana."
A soundly giggle came from behind him, "Kyle can't you use magic yet?" It was Mina. Her hair was a very light shade of purple compared to Lillia's and twelve years old. "But it's so easy, see!" She threw up her arms and caused a burst of sparkles to spring into the air.
Maila's reprimand quickly followed, "Mina what did I say about magic indoors?"
"I was just showing Mr Kyle," she pouted before looking back towards him. "Why can't you use magic, are you not very smart?"
Her words cut into him a little but he managed to keep his expression even, "It's not that I'm not smart. I'm studying properly but I'm pretty normal."
"Actually most people could at least control mana a little bit," Tai said innocently from the other end of the table. Kyle sent him a slight glare and the boy looked back at his food.
Lillia came to his rescue, "Mina don't you have some cleaning to do? If you don't finish your chores now you'll have to later when we're meant to be having fun."
"Fine," she pouted again and walked away.
"Speaking of which I better help them," Kyle finished off his porridge quickly.
As he stood back up Lillia pinched his sleeve, "Seriously though, if you have any trouble come talk to me."
Seeing her genuine care Kyle's heart shook. Although it had been two weeks since their conversation that night, his honest mind still thought about it. What Lillia wanted, to try falling in love. He didn't know how to make that happen but he had some ideas... ideas that he'd never say out loud.
"Thanks. I-," before he could continue an eruption of soapy bubbles blew out from the laundry room down the corridor. What followed was a pair of girls wet from head to toe.
"I didn't do it!" Mina said as she frantically tried to clean up the mess.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" beside her was the yellow haired Gira.
Maila stood up but Kyle gestured for her to sit back down, "I'll handle this." He walked over to the two shame faced girls as the other children peeked at them from a distance. The inside of the laundry was covered in bubbles and the clothes meant to be washed had been spewed to the floor. "What did you do?"
"Nothing," Mina looked away.
"We thought it would be faster to add more soap... and then the machine acted all weird," Gira replied honestly.
Kyle smiled at them softly. He knew what had went wrong. The washing machines could be quite temperamental and it seemed the girls forgot to open up the side port to stop it building up too much pressure. Add in the extra soap and it burst. The reason he knew was because he had made the same mistake when he first arrived, though at the time the children had been in class and the only witness was Maila.
"It's okay," Kyle patted them on the head. "The machines are new so we're all bound to make mistakes. Remember to read 'all' the instructions and don't skip things okay."
"Yes Mr Kyle," the two responded a little dejected.
He crouched down beside Mina, "Now I know Maila says not to use magic inside but how about you help me blow all these bubbles out of here."
"Really?" the girl perked up excitedly.
"Just don't go too far."
"Okay!" As soon as the laundry door was open Mina raised her arms into the air. A powerful gust of wind suddenly picked up from nowhere and thrust out from the room. The outside yard was soon covered with flying bubbles that spread out into the sky reflecting rainbow light to the ground. The children who were still in the dining room quickly ran outside to enjoy the spectacle and play with the bubbles. It was unfortunate that, as well as the bubbles, the yet to be washed clothes also went with them. Mina really didn't hold back. Seeing her and Gira's smiling face however, he couldn't complain, it just meant that the morning's laundry would take a bit longer than usual.