Hey guys. So this is kind of like a recount of my volunteering at a local library from 2/12 to 4/12. For easier reference, I'll be coming up names for the people I faced. I don't own anything.
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"Urgh... When the hell can they just start bringing us up...?" Nico muttered as she waited impatiently for someone to come out from the lift lobby. She was waiting with other volunteers at an area where people could roam around. Before she could say anything else, a woman had came out from the lift lobby.
"Oh hello, all of you are here for the event right?" The woman asked, a chorus of 'yes' soon being heard.
'What a stupid question... Why does she think we're here anyway?!' Nico thought to herself as she got up to gather around the woman.
"Okay, I'll be bringing you up to the Pod. Please enter the lift as I tap you up." The woman said as she tapped her identity card on to a black scanner, opening the lift doors.
"Finally." Nico muttered to herself as she entered the lift with the other volunteers. Many of the volunteers were talking among themselves, some were even laughing away in the lift. 'I bet most of them know each other, must be volunteering as friends...'
"We're here. You can all sit down at the chairs provided while we wait for Akira to be ready. I'll be going down to pick up the other volunteers." The woman entered the lift and went back to the first level. Seeing as there was nothing to do other than admiring the scenery, Nico went over to a chair and sat down. Another volunteer was sitting opposite of Nico but Nico didn't care, that was the table that was surrounded by the least number of people and Nico had issues with being sociable.
"Hey there! Can I sit here?" A byzantium haired teenager with her hair tied into two low twin tails asked the two of them. That volunteer said 'Sure' while Nico silently nodded, going back to her phone.
"So... Which school are you from?" The teenager struck a conversation with the volunteer, the two of them soon chatting away as though they were best friends. The teenager did try to strike a conversation with Nico but with Nico emitting an aura that said 'I'm not in the mood', she backed off.
"Okay, can everybody here gather here? You can sit anywhere on the floor." Another woman announced, gathering all of the volunteers to the floor including Nico. "So I'm Akira and I'm going to brief all of you about what to expect for this camp so bear with me for around 20 minutes?"
"God, finally that's over..." Nico muttered to herself once the briefing was over. To her, the briefing was an utter waste of time since she attended the very same one a few days ago.
"You should all know your groups when you registered after signing in so you can go over to the box where the group numbers are pasted." The woman said, eyes focusing on the boxes around them. In front of Nico was a box labelled 'Group 6' and in it were vanguard sheets, stationery notepads and whatnot. Beside the box was a stack of T-shirts that had a fox logo printed on it.
"Got i- Wait, what group?!" Nico asked herself, remembering that she didn't sign in and expected to do so once she was at the Pod. Many volunteers also had the same reaction as Nico and they were asking each other whether they were really given their group numbers.
"Hey uh, I didn't sign in just now. So where should I go to sign in?" Nico approached once of the staff for the camp.
"Oh, they're at the first floor. You'll need one of us to tap you down." The staff member said, her name tag reading 'Alice'.
"Great, thanks." Nico replied, cheerfully going over to the lift as she waited for more people to take the lift with her. Mentally however, she was angry at the turn of events.
'What the heck is this?! Shouldn't they place one of 'em early in the morning?! Now we have to go down from sixteen to one! God damn it!' Nico's thoughts were broken after stepping inside the lift, deciding to pretend that she was excited at the scenery outside of the lift. Once the group was at the counter, a man facing a laptop was there to greet them.
"Oh hello. Are you here to sign in?" The man asked, his name tag reading 'Chris'. They all nodded and crowded around Chris to point out their identities to him.
"Number 11." Nico said and pointed to box number 11 in the Mircrosoft spreadsheet.
"Nico Yazawa? You're in group 6." Chris said and Nico stepped aside, marvelling at the coincidence that she was previously sitting in front of her assigned group. Soon, all of the volunteers that didn't sign in were back at the Pod, waiting for the first few kids to arrive.
"Oh, are you in group 6? I'm Christmas, I'll be your mentor. Take a seat." A rather large woman with a braid said as Nico approached the box. Seated beside the box was a teenager with blue hair that was wearing a shirt that read 'Pyon Pyon!'.
"Hey, so what's that you're holding?" Nico asked the blue-haired teenager, noticing the clipboard in her hands.
"Oh this is the list of children in our group. Here, have a look." Nico was given the clipboard to look through, nine names appearing on the list.
"Yikes, this girl have a lot of issues." Nico commented, pointing to a name. "Look."
"That's true." The name Nico had pointed was a girl called 'Tiara', with bad eye conditions and an allergy to paracetamol. The teenager nodded in agreement, after all it was rare to have a child with extremely bad eye conditions.
"Okay, go over to them." Christmas said to a girl with a pink bag. Nico recognised the girl from the lift lobby but said nothing.
"Your name?" The teenager asked, holding up a pencil to mark down the girl's attendance.
"Caroline." The girl replied, placing down her bag beside her. Soon, more people appeared and went over to their assigned groups.
"Okay, who have we not got?" Nico asked, counting the kids present. So far, they had seven kids and they were expecting nine. One of the seven kids was Akira's son, who was named Daniel.
"Tiara and Charmaine."
"Damn it, it's already 9.06..."
"Some may be caught in the jam you know..."
"Meh. Oh right, what's your name?"
"Umi Sonoda."
"What?!"
"Umi Sonoda."
"You know what? I can't pronounce your name so I'll just call you Pyon Pyon!" Nico proudly pointed to Umi's shirt where the two words were found. Umi sighed in resignation and asked for Nico's name instead.
"I give up. What's yours?"
"Smile."
"Huh?!"
Only one hour into the day and the two volunteers are already having a hard time with each other's names...
XXXXXX
"We're going to play a game that I like to play. It's called the Name Game!" Christmas said to the eight kids present. After 9.15 am, they have decided to forget about the missing child and move on to introductions.
"So the most problematic girl isn't here... Figures." Nico uttered to Umi, who simply nodded her head.
"What's your name?" A girl with dirty blond hair asked Nico.
"Smile." Nico said after searching for the child's name tag. 'Okay so her name's Key...'
"Is that really your real name?!" Key asked, not believing for a second that Nico's name was as stupid as the name given.
"Duh. When I came into this world, I was smiling, That's why I'm called 'Smile'." Nico said proudly, nearly shedding tears. Tears for being so damn proud of her lie that is.
"Okay then. I'm Key and I'm seven this year! How old are you Smile?"
"11 years old."
"You're lying again."
"Hey, I hit my growth spurt pretty early." Umi sighed at the exchange in front of her, unable to believe that Nico was lying to a kid. "What's yours kid?"
"Y-Yumi..." The girl who was now the centre of Nico's attention replied, tugging on her rainbow jacket.
"Ah I see. How about yours?" Nico turned to a boy opposite her, a smile on his face.
"Jun, I'm seven this year!" The boy beamed, crawling over to Nico. "Why didja wanna know our names Smile?"
"You guys are gonna play that name thingy later. I'm helping you guys out." While she was speaking, Daniel was making a racket with the remaining group member not yet introduced. "Hey you, shut up for a sec will you?!"
"Nahahaha! My mom's the head of this camp! You can't tell me what to do!" Daniel replied, ignoring Nico's outburst.
"Keep this PG rated okay? We can't have them learning all the bad words." Christmas said, appearing out of nowhere after disappearing right after she mentioned about the game.
"Fine. Pyon Pyon, how you doing so far?"
"Good actually. Hey little girl, what's your name?" Umi asked a girl beside her, the latter not responding.
"Okay, her name's... Mari... something? That's a heck lot of words." Nico read the tag of the girl, the tag reading 'Marianna'.
"Language." Christmas warned. Nico didn't understood what was wrong with 'heck' but decided to listen.
"Got it. Okie dokie, I know your name's Daniel. What about you uh..." Nico faced the last girl, already knowing her name but deciding to just pretend to be the idiot volunteer that volunteers of her time loved to do.
"Charmaine, but you already knew that don't you?" The girl asked, a bored look on her face.
"Hey, we're actually missing one girl..." Umi said, pointing to the clipboard.
"I'm here." The girl in question said, her front teeth missing which left a gaping hole.
"Okay... Who are you and where did you go?"
"Kana, I went to the toilet."
"Hey! Hey Smile!" Key charged towards Nico, a smile on her face.
"Yeah?"
"I'm gonna call ya Clown! Cause I'm 'fraid of 'em!"
"Wait what?!"
XXXXXX
"How are they Smile? You seem to have all their attention." Umi asked, standing up to leave.
"Somehow that was unsettling. They're pretty quiet so far, where are you going anyway?" Nico asked, noticing that Umi was about to leave.
"Just some TRA stuff."
"What's that?"
"Teaching Reading Assistant."
"Uh..." Before Umi could say anything else, Key bounced over to Nico.
"We're gonna choose our group name! I want Smiggle!"
"We want Yokai!" Jun and Daniel said simultaneously. Nico pressed a finger to her temple while Umi left the scene. Or at least, tried to.
"Oh no, you're staying until we've settled the name."
"Let's do a vote. Everyone will say a group name and we'll vote." Christmas suggested, in which everyone nodded to the suggestion.
"I WANT SMIGGLE!" Key shouted. which earned her a finger up in the air.
"You know what this means, lower your volume." Nico said, glaring at everyone to make them place their own fingers into the air.
"Um... Heroic Earth?" Marianna suggested, with Nico noting down the name on a piece of paper.
"Smiggle!" Key said, her volume notably lower than before.
"Yokai!" Daniel said, Jun nodding along.
"Um... Uh... I forget!" Yumi replied, unable to remember the name she was thinking of.
"Okay then. We have Smiggle, Heroic Earth, Yokai and I Forget! Let's start the vote! Anyone up for Smiggle?" Three hands went up into air and Nico made three strokes, one for each vote.
"How about Heroic Earth?" Umi asked, pointing to the sole person who voted for the name.
"Okay then, Yokai?" Three hands went up into the air, leaving just one more option to be asked.
"Then who chose I Forget?" Key asked. Umi's and Nico's hand went up into the air, shit-eating grins on their faces as they took in the sight of the kids facepalming.
"What about you Charmaine? You didn't vote yet." Christmas asked Charmaine.
"I don't want to vote." Charmaine defiantly said, irritating Nico.
"If you don't vote, then we can't move on. And if we can't move on, we're going to be here until four." Charmaine grumbled before making her decision.
"Fine. Smiggle then."
"ALL RIGHT! IN YOUR FACE!" Key got up and screamed her head off.
"What did I tell you about volume one?!"
XXXXXX
"Okay now that Pyon Pyon is gone... I'm screwed..." Nico said as she brought the group to the restroom. The one child who didn't need the restroom, Kana, stayed behind with Christmas while Nico brought the other seven.
"Ahahaha!" The children laughed as they ran into the restroom, not caring whether they'll slip. Nico sighed and decided to use the restroom too. After all, might as well use it since she was there right? So she entered a cubicle and relieved herself. Once she was done, she was about to pull up her pants when she heard the children laughing.
"Hey! What's so funny?!" Nico asked, startled by the sudden laughter.
"I have no idea." A voice came from the cubicle beside hers. Nico decided to simply exit the cubicle and questioned the girls who laughed for no apparent reason.
"Okay you two, what's so funny?" Nico asked Key and Yumi, who were the two girls laughing away. Nico simply expected them to tell her a joke that they shared while she was still using the restroom. Never did she once expect that the joke... was on her.
"We looked under the toilet!" Key started off, making Nico pale with embarrassment.
"W-What?!" The two girls nodded gleefully and proceeded.
"We saw your privates!" Yumi said, bursting into laughter once again. Currently, Nico was in shock. She had never expected to be peeped on, especially by two seven year olds.
"Your underwear is white!" They said in unison before running out of the restroom. Nico stood there in embarrassment, horror and fury while the the voice came out from the cubicle.
"Uh... So what was so funny?" Charmaine asked, being the one who just came out from the cubicle.
"Grr... They peeped on me! What kind of people-"
"Perverts."
"They're seven! They'll get it from Christmas! Come along, the rest are waiting for you." Nico led Charmaine out of the restroom, expecting to see six more children waiting for them. When they got outside however, they only saw Caroline waiting for them. "Where are the rest?!"
"They went back." Caroline responded, a bored look on her face as she went towards Charmaine.
"What the hell?! I thought I told them to stay here damn it!" Nico groaned as she led the two kids to the group where sure enough, the six children were with Christmas and Kana.
"Christmas! Those two brats peeped on me!" Nico pointed an accusing finger at Key and Yumi, who replied with shit-eating grins.
"That's not very nice you two. Apologise to her." Christmas said, giving a disapproving look. Key and Yumi continued to smile and ran off to play as Nico fumed mentally.
'What the hell?! They peeped on me and were let off just like that?! Damn it, if they can do this when they are seven then they could possibly rape someone ten years later! GAAAAAH!'
"Also Nico, please refrain from shouting or using bad words. This is a camp meant for kids, they are at an impressionable age." Christmas turned to a fuming Nico, who would explode if it wasn't due to the fact that the former was way older than Nico.
"... Yes..." Nico gritted out, clenching her fists until indents could be seen. 'That fatso... If they were really impressionable then I'll be raping them by now...'
"Let's play Smile!" Yumi said, bouncing over to Nico along with her assigned partner, Jun.
"Yeah let's play!" Jun agreed, a smile on his face.
"No, no play. Sit." Nico firmly said, pointing to the floor.
"Nooooo~"
"Sit sit sit sit sit!" Nico retracted her finger an pointed it to the floor every time she said the word 'sit'. Eventually the two of them sat down, entertaining themselves.
"Okay, we'll move on to the game stations. Let's go." Christmas said and motioned for the group to stand up. Nico went to the back and ensured that the group didn't go out of line. Coincidentally, the two kids at the back with Nico are the kids who wanted to play with her a few minutes ago.
"Alright, we'll have fun with Smile!"
"Yeah!" Nico's face paled as she struggled to quieten them down.
'Somebody help me...'
XXXXXX
"God save me Pyon Pyon..." Nico went over to Umi and collapsed in her arms, surprising Umi.
"What did they do?" Umi pushed Nico away and brought out two hula hoops for the two teams present to play the game.
"They peeped under the damn cubicle. And they even have the guts to tell me my underwear colour!"
"Seriously?! That's like so wrong!" Umi replied, shocked that the kids actually did what Nico had told her.
"Plus they're only seven! Gaaaaaaah!" Umi chuckled, albeit slightly. After all, it's still a serious issue at hand.
"Let's play the game first. Okay everyone, hold each other's hands and let's start!" Umi said, holding up the hula hoops and passing one to each group.
"Yes~" A chorus of 'yes' were heard from the two groups, soon engaging in the game happily.
"Hurry hurry hurry!" The opposing team chanted to their teammate, who was slower than Kana.
"YES!" Key jumped up and down once the group had completed the game successfully.
"Okay, what is the name of the fairy tale that has a glass slipper?" Another volunteer asked Kana, the last person of the human chain.
"Cinderella." Kana replied, not batting an eyelash.
"And that's right! One point to group 6! Let's play another round!" The volunteer announced, going over to the other end of the human chains. After a tense few minutes, group 6 had successfully completed the game.
"Wow you guys are good. Okay then... lemme choose a question." Umi said and flipped through her set of provided questions. "You think this is hard enough?"
"Oi, don't tell me you're making Smiggle's life difficult!" Nico asked, the two volunteers turning away from Nico as that was exactly what they were trying to do.
"Nǐ xiǎng tài duō le. (You think too much)" Umi replied as she continued flipping through the questions. "Okay, I've got one."
"Okay guys! You know Frozen right? What fairy tale is it based on?" Both groups look at the volunteer in confusion, they have no idea what it was based on. So was Nico, if she didn't knew about 'The Snow Queen' last year.
"Uh..." Marianna hesitated, she didn't know the answer and was afraid of being mauled by her own teammates.
"We'll give you two hints. First one, what is the female version of the king?" Umi asked, trying her best to help Marianna.
"Um... Uh..." Nico facepalmed at the sheer simplicity of the question. After all, who didn't know that the female version was called a queen?
"Oh come on, I'm sure you know it!" Key said, trying her best to encourage Marianna.
"Actually I don't..." Apparently Marianna doesn't know, infuriating the temperamental Nico.
"Starts with 'q'..." Nico added, speeding up the process.
"Queen!" The group heaved a sigh of relief, finally able to move on to the second hint.
"Okay, what's at the top of a mountain on a freezing day?" Marianna's eyes lit up as she said her answer.
"Snow!"
"Well uh yeah, but there should be something else right?"
"Like I said, snow!" Umi shook her head, insisting that there was something else besides snow.
"It's snow. Look, I know the story title Pyon Pyon." Nico said, placing a hand on the child's shoulder. The volunteer resisted a chuckle as Umi blushed furiously at the nickname.
"There really is something else..."
"I read enough books to be able to come up with multiple options for quizzes on the spot Pyon Pyon."
"How is that related...?"
"Lysander and Demetrius, A Midsummer's Night Dream. Malvolio and Orlando, Twelfth Night. Bassanio and Antonio, The Merchant in Venice."
"Uh... We kinda need the word from the answer..."
"Like I've just said, there's only snow!"
XXXXXX
"Ice. What the hell. There's no such story as 'The Ice Queen'." Nico grumbled, waiting for lunch to arrive.
"Smiiiiiiiile... I'm thirsty..." Yumi whined. After a few games, the group has gotten very comfortable with Nico. So comfortable to the point that Yumi and Jun squeezed Nico into a gap between the lift bars which caused great pain after Nico had told the group to squeeze in when another group entered the lift.
"Go up and get their water bottles for them." Christmas informed Nico, noticing that the whole group was thirsty. "Akira, tap her up will you? Thanks."
"No problem, follow me." Akira then brought Nico to the lift lobby and tapped her card on the scanner. Once the lift arrived, Nico entered the lift while Akira scanned her card on the lift's scanner.
"Okay... Just grab all their bottles. Easy." Nico muttered to herself once she reached the Pod. She approached the box and grabbed all the bottles surrounding it. Once she was done, she went towards the lift only for the door to open.
"Oh hey there! You need some help with that?" The same byzantium haired volunteer from the morning offered Nico, a smile on her face.
"Nah, I'm good. See ya around." Nico entered the lift and pressed the button to go down. Once she was down, she entered the room where the groups were having their lunch.
"Yaaaaaay! Clown's back!" Key announced as she went over to Nico's side.
"Okay, here are your bottles. Oh god damn it, I've forgotten mine."
"Smile just said a bad word!" Jun said, pointing a finger at Nico.
"Shit." Nico muttered before hastily clamping a palm over her mouth.
"Another one!" Yumi said.
"The hell, stop pointing at me."
"Not again!" Marianna leapt to her feet and pointed at the petite teen.
"Ahhh damn it!"
"Smile just said it again!"
XXXXXX
"So... how were they?" Umi asked, opening her packet lunch.
"Terrible, they're brats god damn it." Nico replied, opening her own lunch. "Ew, today's lunch looks horrible."
"Yeah... I think I'm only gonna eat this!" Daniel said as he consumed a spoonful of rice.
"At least try out the potatoes and fish..." Nico took a bite out of the fish, her face soon contorting into many different expressions. "Yeeeeeah you can just leave that fish alone..."
"Why don't you guys like the food? It's so yummy!" Yumi happily ate her food, unable to understand why people would dislike that day's lunch.
"It's a yuck Yumi. Since you want it, you have it." Three boxes of lunch were passed to Yumi, the latter shaking her head.
"I'll be full after eating my own!"
"Then take what you want to eat. Hey Pyon Pyon!"
"Yes?" Umi looked up from her lunch, halfway done with it.
"Wanna have ours?" Nico offered, pointing to the three boxes of lunch surrounding Yumi.
"No thanks. Give it to the others..." Umi said, going back to her food. "Okay, maybe I can understand why you don't want the potatoes..."
"Meh. Hey you, how do I pronounce your name?" Nico turned to Marianna, who was also halfway through her food.
"Ma. Ree. Ah. Nah." Marianna slowly pronounced her own name, in hopes that Nico could finally pronounce her name properly.
"I still don't get it. I'll just call you Maria for short."
"I'm not a maid!" Marianna retorted, unwittingly stereotyping all maids.
"Hm? Charmaine, why are you eating only beans?" Umi asked, noticing that Charmaine was eating only beans. It was rather peculiar, Umi thought, for kids are mostly picky eaters and would least likely be willing to consume their veggies.
'Rice is survival food! As long as there's rice, anyone can survive even the toughest of camps!' Nico's declaration sounded through Umi's head. If a grown picky eater has given the stamp of approval for rice, why won't a picky child eat rice?
"Cause the rest of the food will make me fat." Nico and Umi heard the reply, trying their hardest to not roll their eyes as they compared her size to her words.
"Riiiiiiiight... Guys, if you're done with the food, just close 'em and stack 'em up." Nico said and stacked up the boxes. The kids nodded and stacked their boxes one after another.
"Oh hey, we'll clear them up for you. Would you like a pear?" Another volunteer asked, holding up a box full of pears. The group nodded and the fruit was given out, one for everyone.
"Smile, you can have this." Jun told Nico after a few minutes.
"Huh? But they are sweet!" Nico said, munching on hers.
"I'm full." Jun simply replied, placing his pear on Nico's lap.
"Geez... Fine fine, I'll take it off your hands."
"Clown! I'm full too!"
"Me too!"
"Pears make me fat!"
"I'll help you..." Kana said as she reached out for an unwanted pear.
"I don't want mine anymore!"
"The maid wants you to eat my pear!"
"Help us eat them! Pleeeeeease?" Yumi made a puppy face, trying her best to make Nico's heart melt. It failed though.
"Why the heck did you take them if you don't want them?!"
"Eat them or else we'll tell fatso of your language." Nico facepalmed, three hours into the camp and there she was getting herself blackmailed.
"Help me eat them too Smile~" Umi grinned, a teasing smile on her face.
"Pyon Pyon, you better help me eat them. Damn it, only Kana is the good kid here..." Nico grumbled as she picked up another pear.
XXXXXX
"When can we go down to paint?" Marianna asked, eating a packet of fried noodles. Marianna was at the Pod with Nico and Key, the other kid who was still eating something.
"Right after the two of you are done with this poster." Nico replied, holding up a pen. Nico was tasked to ensure that the poster was finished with the two girls help while Christmas and Umi brought the other six down to make their crafts.
"Really? Let's start!" Key said, her lollipop in her mouth. What they didn't know was that Nico's actual task was to use them and hide the fact that they couldn't go down to make their crafts.
'Who asked you two to eat... And didn't Maria said that she was full?! Why is she still eating...?' Nico thought to herself as Marianna was gobbling down the food.
"So what are we supposed to do?" Marianna asked, pointing her fork at Nico.
"Do this damn poster. You two will do it and use the books that you borrowed for reference." Nico replied, taking out the four books the group had borrowed an hour ago.
"What the heck are these?" Marianna asked, holding up a book about underground animals.
"You are one of the five who borrowed them... Just do it. The faster you finish, the faster I can bring you down." Nico lied, putting on her signature poker face.
"Okay..." Nico left them to do their work while surveying the progress of other groups. After ten minutes, Marianna tugged on Nico's pants.
"Done already?"
"No. We don't know where do rabbits live..." Nico groaned and flipped through the book labelled 'Rabbits'.
"Oh my god, why the heck did you borrow this book?!"
"I'm not the one who borrowed that!"
"Gaaaaah! Fine, what about the other book?" Nico grabbed the book labelled 'Underground Animals'. "You guys borrowed a book that doesn't have the burrowing owl or rabbits!"
"That was borrowed by Daniel!"
"wǒ bú gàn le! (I quit)" Nico groaned, cradling her head in her hands.
"wǒ yé bú gàn le! (I quit too)" Marianna declared, folding her arms.
"How come you know Mandarin?!"
"My father's from North Africa and my mama's Chinese!" Nico nodded, looks could be deceiving.
"My papa's from Australia and my mama is Malay!" Key said, butting into the conversation.
"Uh..." Nico was speechless at the sudden turn of the conversation. "Just give me the pen, I'll write it..."
"But you don't know where they live?"
"Australia! I've seen them there!" Key said, writing down the country on the lines provided.
"I'll use my phone..." Nico said and took her phone out. After a few minutes, Nico reached out for the pen and wrote in her ugliest handwriting.
"I can write better than that." Marianna scoffed at Nico, the latter ignoring the comment.
"Shut it. I'll do the rest so you hurry up and finish that food." Nico said, completing the poster within three minutes.
"I'm full... Help me eat finish?" Nico would have willingly helped Marianna if it wasn't due to the fact that the food was something she disliked.
"No. You go throw that away." Marianna nodded and placed her pack... beside the byzantium haired teenager Nico had met twice that day.
"Oh, can't finish them?" The teen asked, holding up the packet of fried noodles.
"No. You eat them. Bye!" Marianna ran back to Nico and Key, Nico facepalming at what just happened.
"Seriously? You gave it to her?!" Before Marianna could reply, Key asked her question.
"We're done! When can we go down to paint?!" At this point of time, a smirk appeared on Nico's face.
"Sorry~ You two can't go down as the time you used to eat is too long~"
"You lied to us!" The two girls shouted in unison.
"Life isn't fair y'know." Nico shrugged her shoulders. 'Boy, the feeling of crushing their hopes feels damn good...'
"Come now, we'll play with you." The teen came over to Nico and the girls, a smile on her face.
"What about your own team?" Nico asked, checking the poster for any mistakes. Key then snatched the correction tape from the table and attempted to erase something.
"They all went down. I'm Nozomi, you?" Nozomi said, looking over at Key.
"Smile. Nice to- Hey hey hey! Put that damn tape down!" Nico pointed to the table, in which Key blew a raspberry at the shorter teen.
"It's stuck! Don't worry, I'll fix it!" Marianna said and attempted to fix it, making it worse.
"You sure have your hands full with them." Nozomi commented, sitting on the floor.
"No no no! I'll fix it!" Key snatched the tape back and attempted to make it better.
"Yeah right, try getting yourself pressed on to the lift bar while two kids are squeezing your sides..." Nico dryly replied, turning to face the duo only to gape in horror. "Key... What have you done?!"
"I've fixed it!" Key proudly said, holding up the correction tape which was already beyond repair.
"That's not mine! Oh my god..." Nozomi patted Nico's shoulder as she tried to comfort a panicking Marianna. It was at that time that Nico's group returned to the spot where their belongings were.
"My correction tape!" Caroline gasped at the state of her stationery. Two fingers pointed to Key while Nozomi laughed awkwardly.
"Nuh uh! Maria had a part too!" Key defended, pointing to Marianna.
"No! You were the one who last damaged it!" Soon, the two girls got into a squabble that Christmas had to stop later.
"You two sure have your hands full with them." Nozomi turned to Umi, who simply sighed.
"Nope, only Smile has it rough."
"Smile, is your back better?" Kana asked, worrying for Nico after what had happened in the lift right after lunch.
"... Yeah... Is it time for you to go...?" Nico mumbled, standing up from her seat.
"Yeah! See ya tomorrow Smile! Make sure you come!" Yumi said as she ran to her mother, who came up with the other parents.
"Yeah! If not we..." Nico stopped Jun's sentence by holding up her hand, pushing him to his father.
"Urgh... I'm dead beat..." Nico groaned as she sent her group off to find their parents.
XXXXXX
"Congratulations for surviving the first day!" Umi said to Nico, the latter nodding her head wearily.
"By the way, is your name really Smile?" Nozomi asked, holding up her drink.
"No, it's really Nico but I gave them the name I use more often." Nico replied, gulping down her water.
"You had it rough. Getting splashed by water, peeped on, squeezed on, dried on, I'm so lucky that I'm not you." Umi chuckled, patting Nico's shoulder. "They were whining about your absence. Except Daniel and Kana, Kana was worried about you."
"They are the better kids..."
"All right, can everybody gather around?" Akira asked, motioning for everyone to gather closer. Once everyone was gathered closer, she started a ten minute briefing that ended on a good note.
"I may not be coming tomorrow." Umi told Nico, Nico giving her a look of betrayal. "I said may!"
"You plan to leave me to the wolves Pyon Pyon..."
"Hey c'mon, I have to come back too!" Nozomi said, scratching her head. "Though my group ain't as bloodthirsty as yours."
"Meh, at least I'll only get to see them for three hours tomorrow..."
"It's like Five Nights at Freddy's!" Nozomi continued, a smile on her face.
"Except it's Three Days with Smiggle." Umi said, a grin on her face.
"I will whack you on the third day Pyon Pyon."
XXXXXX
First day down, two more days to go! Like I said, this is a recount of mine so what I write here is 99 percent true. My life is always pretty hilarious when it comes to kids. Oh and I didn't tell them that my name's Smile, I told them it was 'Plant'. Key called me peanut instead. (She's actually allergic to them...) Anyway, I hope my (shitty) life makes you guys laugh even it's just a little. See you on the next chapter!
Oh and I forgot, the pod I kept mentioning is level 16 at Singapore's National Library. (In case readers still don't get the link)