I woke up to the sound of the village bell; it rang at 6:00 every morning to wake up the citizens of the town. I yawned and rubbed my eyes, clearing all traces of tiredness or sleep. I stretched my arms, still lying down. I had rolled over during the night, I was facing Kahn now. He was restless, he groaned. He disliked school. All of a sudden he sat up abruptly as if he remembered something important. His smiled brightly and his eyes lit up.
"Time to feed the animals", said Kahn. Feeding the animals was necessary every morning, Kahn loved it. I enjoyed the task I was required to do too, as a girl I was required to gather water, milk the cow, collect the eggs, gather fruit from the orchard on the other side of town, Vegetables from our small vegetable patch. Kahn had to feed the animals, collect the grains, make the cow manure on the vegetable patch by riding the cow. In our village the kids did most of the work outside. My grandmother had less energy, she spent time cleaning up the inside of the house, cooking and making clothes to sell.
We both stood up then and went downstairs. Grandmother was still preparing porridge for breakfast, we had a little time to do our tasks outside, I put on a raincoat so I didn't dirty my nightgown, I put on some old gumboots and walked outside, Kahn following me in his raincoat and his gumboots. I picked up a bucket and a stool from the verandah and Kahn picked up his whip.
I sighed. We couldn't both use the cow at the same time, I put down my bucket and stool and picked up another bucket and a tray with many tiny little holes in it. We called this a dirt strainer. We used it to clean the water. I headed off towards the stream; I saw many other girls and ladies at the stream already at work. I saw my friend Kallina sitting down cleaning the water and putting the clean water in her bucket, I bent over next to her to start my work.
Kallina is a girl at school, she moved here 3 years ago, her family migrated from China and still had an echo of Chinese accent to her words. She spoke English but still Chinese. She was nice, smart and funny. She was a good friend of mine. I heard someone crouch next to me. I looked at the person, she had blonde hair that went to her waist, very long and very straight, and the slight wind whipped it against her. Her blue eyes were pale and innocent, yet they had a strong warning saying 'I can fight you with one hand'.
It was Bridget, one of my other friends. Her father is a doctor in the village, the only one who knew everything there is to know about anything in the doctor world. Bridget intended on being a doctor too when she grew old enough, Bridget was the kind of girl who can lure you then attack you. She loved to win, whatever the cost. Her father is very rich, they always got the best toys, clothes, food and basically the best lifestyle in the Village. Bridget's mother left her and her father, and then they decided to move to a small village. To get away from the lights and disasters, to live a quiet life in a small village was her fathers dream in life.
Once I had finished gathering water, 4 buckets full of clean water, taking an hour. I took off my gumboots at the door and walked upstairs, I could see Kahn was not done yet, so I took his absence to get changed. It was school photos today, a rare day once in a year that a professional photographer would take photos for you and the whole school, your class and give the Polaroid's to your family. I didn't like it very much, you had to pick the perfect smile for the camera, but I knew this opportunity was rare so I took advantage of it.
I put on my dark green sassafras roots pants, a white button up blouse and my dark leather shoes. I tied my hair up with a blood red colour ribbon, tying it in a bow at the top. My black hair was at my chest, it was silky smooth and easy to run your fingers through it. I heard the front door slam and I skipped down the stairs from my room. My grandmother was serving oats into bowls on the table; my brother was hanging his raincoat up. I walked to the table and sat down, Kahn followed my motion by sitting in the seat beside me.
After breakfast I helped grams clean up whilst my brother got dressed, after 30 minutes my brother came down the stairs wearing a button up shirt, a dark blue sweater and grey sassafras root pants. His hair was sleeked down with chicken fat gel. It smelt dreadful, but made his hair look neat and tidy. Grams gave us two tokens for the bus, a kiss on the cheek and a warning to keep clean or no playing outside with our friends for a week. Our gram was tough and unfair, but she took care of us and we owed her for that. Kahn and I grabbed our rucksacks and walked out the door, dodging mud puddles and waiting on the wet grass, Kahn was leaning against the wooden pole that signified a bus stop. I waited patiently for the bus to slug to our stop.
After 5 minutes of Kahn's annoying whistling the bus slugged its way to our stop as predicted, I backed away from the expected mud being slurred up under the bus tires, pulling Kahn instinctually backwards with me. The bus driver stopped the bus and the door wheezed open, we hopped inside and gave him our tokens then I went to sit 4 seats behind the bus driver, Kahn moved towards the back whistling loudly. We were the first ones on the bus today.
7 people and 9 stops later we were coming into the school. I saw through the foggy window, Kallina walking with her twin older sisters towards the school, she was wearing a black knee-length skirt that ruffled with the rhythm of her knees when she walked, a pale yellow-cream coloured button up blouse and a black cardigan, unbuttoned up. She smiled at me and continued looking at her feet as she dragged along in the mud.
Once we reached the school, I hopped out. I was walking next to Kahn when we both noticed his friends Christopher and Edward playing in the mud, dirtying their good clothes. I held Kahn back when he was about to run, I stood in front of him and glared him in the eye; my warning face.
I stood tall and spook clearly and slow enough for him to know I was serious. "You better not dirty these clothes. No playing in the dirt. You're going to stay on the steel seats, nothing more than that. You have to stay clean or so help me, I will tell Grams and you will be grounded inside, except school and jobs for a month".
He gulped and shrugged. He frowned and sighed heavily as if to emphasize it. He looked down "Fine". He said stubbornly.
Bridget was just getting out of her dads car, she was one of the few people in the village with an actual car, imported petrol once a year, enough to survive a whole year. Bridget was of course wearing a beautiful dress, white cotton, puffy sleeves and a lace hem at the bottom of the dress, she was wearing white stockings and white shoes that a princess might wear. Her long beautiful blonde hair was hanging down to her ribs, in ringlet curls. She came over to me smiling brightly.
Bridget tied her arms around me, barely giving me space to breathe properly, tightening her grip around me, laughing as her ringlet curls bounced with her body movement, once she let go her face was bright red with happiness.
Kallina also followed her smiling as brightly as she could manage and shrugged her arms around me gently and shyly. She smiled slightly again. Kallina was a shy girl and hugged me with less in enthusiasm that Bridget, but the message was still friendly...just precautious.
"School photos today!" Bridget yelled enthusiastically, I looked around; a little embarrassed to see that all the kids within a 10 meter radius turned to look at Bridget with a worried look on their face. I looked down as a few people looked at me instead.
Just then I saw from the corner of my eye, Mrs. Geoff -the lady who works in the administration office- come out of the small dirty stone building and ring the bell outside the door loudly 3 times in honor of the usual regime of a informal assembly.
All the kids started walking, some sighed some laughed and some screamed enthusiastically. Bridget linked her arm around me and Kallina and started skipping towards the meeting area.
We sat in our usual wooden logs, Kallina looked down at the grass with a glum look on her face. Bridget was smiling brightly and was sitting up straight, looking happily at our principal Mr.Grewler. I wanted to ask Kallina what was wrong but the humming sound of the megaphone interrupted my chances of asking.
It was the usual as any other year. They made us sit behind the school building, waiting for the time to go around the corner and get our picture taken. We got the whole group picture taken last and the individual pictures taken first.
I waited, growing tired of Bridget's enthusiasm, I sat as glum as Kallina and waited like the rest of us. When it was finally my moment to get my picture taken, Bridget had put tiny plaits in my hair and pinned them back so it looked pretty. My ribbon was taken out and made into a bow shape, then pinned to my left side of my hair. The rest of my hair fell down in front. I walked with fake enthusiasm to the chair and sat down. I pasted a smile on my face, showing perfectly white teeth and sparkly eyes. He gave me the Polaroid to take care of. I put it in my rucksack and walked over to my brother, whom already had his picture taken. He was sitting with his friends. I cleared my throat and he looked up at me.
"Where's your picture?" I asked, in an oddly impolite manner.
He scavenged through his bag and pulled out a slightly crumpled Polaroid picture. It was decent enough, it could have been better quality. I snatched the picture and told him I would take care of it for the day, I started turning around when I started feeling bad for being so impolite. I turned to face him again.
I smiled. "We'll walk home today" I winked. I had 50 cents in my bag, enough to get some lollies from Mr. Hulmatrins lolly shop.
The rest of the day was boring; on the way home we stopped by the lolly shop and bought 2 red licorice strips and 4 fruit chews. I ate one of my red licorice strips on the way home and saved the rest for later. Kahn ate his all at once, it sometimes surprised me the way he resembled a pig.