AFOWIS

     "Hello," Stepha heard a female voice say.  Stepha looked up from the novel he was reading and saw a girl standing at the other side of the table. "Can I sit here with you?" she asked.

     "Uh... yeah sure." He closed the book and turned so he could actually sit on the bench properly. The girl set her retro tin lunchbox down on the table as she zipped up her snow white parka a bit more.

     "You're in my biology class, right? Stepha Wills?" the girl asked, then sat down.

     "Uh, yeah... what's your name again?"

     "Genevive Oiseau." Stepha's eyebrows raised.

     "Can I just call you Vive?" he asked. He did not want to say that mouthful.

     "Yeah," Genevive smiled. "Are you new here also?"

     "Yeah, my family moved here a few weeks ago. How 'bout you?"

     "I just came here yesterday." Stepha wondered why Genevive was wearing the parka.

     "Why are you wearing the hood and everything?" he asked, gesturing to his head and shoulders.

     "Oh," Genevive laughed a bit, "let's just say it's for medical reaasons. It's really cold here compared to where I used to live. Brr..." she pretended to shiver. It was obvious that she wasn't cold because of her bad acting.

     "But... why are you wearing the hood?"

     "I already told you," she laughed, "It's for medical reasons!"  Stepha thought Genevive would be offended by his curiosity, but he noticed that she was actually smiling.

     "Oh... sorry," Stepha muttered and looked to the floor. Genevive opened her lunchbox and pulled out a fluffer-nutter sandwich.

     "So, what classes are you talking besides biology?" Genevive asked him.

     "Oh you know... normal stuff. Algebra, English, Tech, History. Then Photography, Sign Language, and Guitar." Stepha nervously stroked the back of his neck.

     "You take Guitar? And Photography? And Sign Language?"  Genevive was a little surprised.

     "Yeah, why?" Stepha finally mustered a partial smile.

     "I didn't expect you to take those classes.  Do you have any of your photos with you?"

     "Yeah," Stepha slipped some photos out of the jacket of his book.  "Here."  He handed her the pictures.  Many of them depicted bright green leaves sprinkled with dew.

     "Wow," Genevive said as she flipped through them.  She found Stepha's shaking hand reach across the table.

     "Let me show you my favorite."  Genevive let him take the pile to flip to the last photo.  "See?"  He pointed to one particular part of it.

     "Woah! What computer program did you use?" asked Genevive. In the picture was Stepha's face in front of some trees, but an edge of his face was faded and she could clearly see the background.

     "I didn't. It's a trick of the light, or something..." Genevive held up the picture as if to see it better.

     "That's really cool." She put it down and handed the pile to Stepha. "It's like you're a ghost or something." Genevive's comment made him laugh.

     "No, I'm still alive..." he said smiling as he slid the photos back into the book jacket and put the book into his backpack. Stepha folded his arms over the table as he sighed and watched Genevive eat her sandwich. She suddenly looked perplexed.

     "Don't you have a lunch?" she asked him after she swallowed. Stepha realized something and hit above his ear with his palm.

     "Oh! Duh, I almost forgot..." Reaching back into his backpack, he pulled out a brown paper bag. He silently bit through a pear as he tried to think of something to say. He wanted to learn more about this mysterious girl, but didn't want to seem nosey. Something about her was strange, almost as if she was hiding something. One thing Stepha knew she was hiding was her hair. He glanced at her forehead to see what color her eyebrows were, but to his surprise, they were hidden too. Wrapped above Genevive's eyes was a bandana that was camoflaged into the hood of her parka. The bandana lead Stepha's eyes to Genevive's, which were an unusual gold color.

     "Do... do you wear contacts?" he asked nervously. She looked away from whatever she was looking at and focussed on him.

     "Nope, never. Why?" she answered, sounding like she didn't know that her irises were an uncommon hue.

     "It's just that... your eyes are like, yellow... er, gold, really..." Stepha awkwardly said.

     "Oh... everyone in my family has them, so I guess it's not as strange to me as it is to you," she replied.

     "That's cool..." he said.

     "Thanks!" Genevive answered.  "This is sort of random, but do you do any after-school activity stuff?"

     "Uh, yeah. I have this 'other school' thing..." he answered.

     "Really?  So do I!" Genevive seemed very happy.

     "Yeah? What's the school called?"

     Genevive looked around as if to see if anyone was watching, then leaned towards Stepha before she said, "It's called the AFOWIS."

     "Really?? I'm actually staring there today." Stepha seemed surprised.

     "Seriously?!" Genevive accidentally said very loudly. "That's awesome! You gotta explain to me why later!"

     "I will! I kinda have to..." he smiled, but for the first time, Genevive noticed how white and perfectly aligned his teeth were, which made his smile even nicer than it already was.  Stepha was about to ask her how the Academy was, but the bell to end lunch rang, making tons of students stand up and rush to the doors. Genevive glanced up to look at the clock on the wall as she quickly shut her lunchbox. She stood up before she said, "See you later, Stepha!" She threw out her trash and walked away.

     "See ya," he half-waved. He shoved the leftovers of his lunch into his backpack, stood up, and swung the backpack straps around his shoulders as he wondered what the Academy might be like.

 

*       *       *       *

 

"Stepha, honey!" a sweet voice called up the stairs, "It's time to go!"  He turned from his desk to pause his homework.

"Coming!"  He grabbed his messenger bag filled with new notebooks and various school supplies.  He very swiftly hurried down the stairs and found his mother waiting for him at the bottom.

"You're going to like it here.  Your father and I read that it is a very good school."  His mother's fingers ran through his brown hair, which always seemed to feel like a summer breeze to him.

"Hopefully I'll fit in better there than at my day school."  Stepha rubbed one of his arms.

"Of course you will."  His mother pulled him towards her for a hug, cradling the back of his head.  "You dad called the headmaster and she told him that even though they usually have only pure-bloods, they are happy to accept you."

"Good, I was worried they wouldn't.  I need to learn my half-heritage from proffessionals, no offence mom," he answered.  His mother let go of him and smiled.

"It's okay, you know I'm terrible at history.  And besides, the Acadamy is a good environment, and it's in the depths of a forest.  You know what that means..."

"Trees!" they said in unison.  Stepha's father walked up next to them holding a pair of sunglasses.

"Let's go, sport," he said.  "You don't want to be late."  Stepha's mother kissed his forehead before he and his father walked out to the garage.

Stepha strapped on his helmet as his dad brought out the red tandem bicycle.

"I'll sit in front, I know where the Acadamy is," his dad said as he strapped his helmet on.  Stepha admired his father's impecable memory.  They both climbed onto the bike and rode until they reached a forest.

As they rode through the woods, Stepha could smell the soil and the tall trees.  He loved the pure, earthy aroma of the bark and the leaves.  He became anxious when they came to a very heavily wooded area of the forest.

"I'm not allowed to go any farther than this," his dad stopped the bike, "but if you keep going straight, you'll get to the Acadamy.  Please, don't go too fast or get too crazy.  You know what happened last time, it took us two hours to get you out of that ancient maple tree."  Stepha unhooked his helmet and stepped off the bike.

"I know, but that was at the park, and it was dark outside," he said as he took off his helmet and clipped it around his seat of the bicycle.

"Still, it is dangerous.  Just be careful, please," his father answered.  "See you later!  I'll pick you up right here."

"Okay.  Bye dad," Stepha waved, then waited for his dad to ride away.  Once his father left, he spun around on his heels and zigzagged through the woods in a white blur.  He hadn't seen so many trees in a while; it was comforting for him to be in the forest.  He stopped, took his father's words into consideration, and slowed down his pace, resisting the urge to be with the trees.  He eventually got to a fairly large building labeled, "AFOWIS".

Inside, he found two very small women who he thought at first were little people.

"ID please," the woman with grey hair said, but then added, "oh, you must be new here.  Go straight through those double doors and take a seat on the stage."  The woman pointed to the two doors behind her.  Stepha realized by the woman's accent and how they both dressed that the women were dwarves.

"Uh, thanks," he said as he walked towards the doors.  He grabbed the door's handle, pulled it open, and stepped inside.

Author's Note

Not finished yet, if you haven't noticed :) I'm going to continue it sometime.