Dream Catchers

I wake up early. To be exact, around 5:00 am. I wake up earlier than all of my friends. I go to the balcony after that. It smells of yellow lemons. Thanks, to all the five brick flower pots of lemons.

Then after examining all the pots vividly, I go to the bathroom to take a shower. I hear the morning birds chirp a song just for me. People think waking up early is weird and unnecessary and not cool, but I personally think that it’s a real beauty. It’s 6:12 by the time I do all my morning chores, so after that, I go to my room and draw. I absolutely love drawing. I have drawing decorations all over my pink-painted room. My room is the only thing that’s pink. The rest of my stuff is purple and blue. I leave my home at 7:30 sharp and head off to school.

At school, I’m not the same person. I’m the mysterious quiet girl. Pari is the only one who knows all of my secrets, and this includes me going to the balcony and checking if the lemon plants are right. Today she is absent so it’s gonna be a lonely day. Also just like how they say when you’re absent all the interesting news happen, a new boy joined are school and Miss Rose made him sit next to me. Obviously, I was the only one sitting alone. Okay, usually I am the girl who’ll look away to avoid human conversations, but somehow, I wanna get to know him too. So I take a glance at him and say hello. And now, it’s no turning back.

“Hey,” he said back.

I don’t know what to say next. I’m a bozo when it comes to conversations.

“I’m Sam, what’s your name?”

Sweat prickles my face. Woah, that question saved my life.

“I’m Mabel...nice to meet you.” I say quickly.

He smiles. “I’m not good with conversations, you know?”

“Oh really? Same! Jeez, yay!” I squeal which I admit, was a bit unnecessary. I kinda sounded like a five-year-old too!

He can't help but laugh at me. Oh dear Mabel, you just humiliated yourself! I just wanna do an ear-deafening scream now. I look at him for the second time. His blond bangs cover one of his blue eyes and he has a habit of desperately trying to shake them off every so often but it keeps going back on his eye. He is wearing a red sweatshirt with blue pants. He has blue converse shoes. Oh, I love converse shoes; I really wanna get them for my birthday.

At lunch, I show him around school since I have nothing else to do. He’s a shy boy. He is like me. I show him the room for Dance and Drama, the Playground, and the Library where we stay till the rest of the time. We both read books. He picks up one from the Sci-fi genre and I’m reading the one I recently issued about Fairies.

“You believe in fairies?” I hear him ask. I take a pause and realise that he noticed what I’m reading.

“Yeah. Do you think it’s weird?”

“No,” he sighs as he walk around the library, “I think it’s beautiful.”

“I know, it’s magnificent, the library right?”

“No, your little fantasy world.”

I feel myself blush. I wanna tell him that it’s not fantasy; it’s real, but I keep quiet about that because it’s a secret. I just smile.

“And, are you into Science?” I say to change the subject.

He looks confused so I point my eye to the book he was holding.

“Oh, well, kinda, yeah,” I watch as he stutters. “But I like fairies too.” He smiles.

“Thanks, Sam,” I get the courage to say, “You make me feel like home.”

“You make me feel like home too, Mabel.”

He’s being so nice to me that I want to kiss him. But obviously, I have a brain and I can wait for my first kiss till I grow up. Also, I don't think Miss Garland wants to watch me kissing anyway. Also, there are cameras in the room. Also, I don't know his feelings for me!

I zoned out completely and the ear-deafening shriek of the fifth period wakes me up from my silly daydream. It’s Maths. I walk to my Higher Maths class and wave at Sam, who is new and not in my Higher Maths class obviously. He would be, if he proves his intelligence by his marks. It was stressful, and I longed to be home.

The next day was a whole different new chapter. Pari came.

I give her a lecture. “How dare you leave me all alone by myself. I never took a single leave from school, and then there’s you, taking leaves and more leaves and practically trying to KILL ME.”

“God, Bel, I was sick.” (Bel’s my nickname)

“But still! Oh, and this new boy called Sam joined us.”

“How does he look?” She gets excited.

I was just about to describe him when he enters the room.

We both look at him.

“Dude, girl, he’s...fine!”

“Shut up, Pari, he’ll listen. If you have the courage, go talk to him.”

Unlike me, Pari does have the courage and she does go and talks to him.

“Hey! I’m Mabel’s best friend? Do you know her?”

I slap my face.

“Yeah, she showed me around school, yesterday.”

“Awe, she must be a lucky girl,” she gushes. I stare at her soul so she adds, “You know, everyone loves showing new people around school.”

“Well, I guess...”

I can see that he is getting uncomfortable. I grab Pari’s hand, practically drag her, and say “Dude, don’t you have to do the...equation thingy?”

She looks confused and I drag her to my seat which got stolen by Rowan, an overweight kid, and he isn’t gonna move.

“Ughhhh!!!!!” I shriek. I see two empty seats at the back and run to get them. Just as I reach them I hear something.

“Yo, yo, what you think you’re doing, man? This is my seat!”