Chapter 1: Noelle
I swear it's not my fault this time. I mean, I'm not the one that decided to move us to New Jersey. What was my dad thinking? It's too warm here and I hate being warm! So of course I'm going to be miserable! To make matters worse, I was forced to spend the morning of my summer break in school to make up for my grades in order to advance to the Seventh grade! I'm not exactly worried about sleeping in, but I'm not exactly popular and I'd rather not be near people.
I don't remember the exact date, just that this event takes place in the middle of June. I'm in this hot and humid classroom listening to this teacher drone on and on about something. I know I need to pay attention, but it's too warm to concentrate. It should be illegal to keep us in this room and I plan to write a letter to the administration as soon as the words stop swimming. The kid behind me is drawing stupid comics about my friend Maron and I. Apparently this girl, Jessica, is still stuck in that weird mindframe where girls and boys can't be friends. I blame bad parenting for her behavior quite frankly.
I'm getting off topic again, but in my defense it's Jessica's parents who started her behavior in that direction. Focus Lyarra, focus…. Getting back to this annoyingly hot day. I have had just about enough of this nonsense and I planned on telling Jessica off once and for all. So one incredibly long hour later, we are thankfully allowed to take a 15 minute break outside. Jessica decides to start in on me.
"Have you and Maron set the date yet?" Jessica asked sweetly.
"What date pray tell? Dinner, death, or wedding? You need to be specific with these sorts of things." I replied, hoping I sounded innocent.
"Wedding of course! I'm hoping to be able to attend, but I'll probably have better things to do." Jessica replied with a tone that said she wanted a rise out of me.
"No, because we aren't even dating. It's very rude to say those things." I pointed out to her.
"You're with him all the time, so I assumed you couldn't get anyone else. I mean, it's not like anyone else wants to talk to a loner like you. Have you tried wearing brighter colors?" Jessica continues.
"You're always around Tiffany, are you planning on setting a date for your wedding to her?" I asked, trying to use a different tactic to get Jessica to drop this. I can feel my anger rising though and I'm not sure if it's Jessica, the heat, or being confined here.
"It doesn't work that way Noelle, I honestly thought you and your dad would go back to whatever frozen rock you crawled out of by now. Seeing as you hate it here." Jessica retorted.
I'm not proud of what happened next. I swear I didn't mean for any of this. One minute I'm ready to deck Jessica in her misinformed face and the next minute there's snow everywhere. I'm not talking about flurries or a nice snow shower on a cold January afternoon, I mean a full out blizzard. In New Jersey and in the middle of summer. Jessica and her friend Tiffany scream and run for the school. I can hear other students yelling and carrying on. I'm in such a state of shock, wonder, and kind of happy that I just stood there. It was amazing.
The next thing I know, Maron is standing right in front of me and calling my name. I must have been dazed because I didn't hear or see him coming. He looked really worried too, like this was something very bad.
"Noelle, you need to focus. This blizzard is getting more powerful and you need to focus." Maron said while trying to sound calm. I tried to close my eyes and focus, but the next thing I knew, I was staring at Maron's feet and they did not look like how they did yesterday.
"Why do you have hooves?" I asked him, while the blizzard raged around us.
"There's a blizzard in the middle of June and you're asking about my feet?!" Maron yelled. "I promise I'll explain, but we need to stop this first." He said and I had to agree with him on that. This was a bit more important. I closed my eyes and concentrated.
I thought about the feel of the A/C in the house. How my dad would make snow cones for us when it was a hard day for school for either of us. I thought about the mountains we traveled to last summer before we moved. I could feel the heat slowly return until the ground below me started to go from a pile of snow to muddy grass.
"We need to leave for your house now." Maron said and grabbed my hand. From there we raced back to my house. He told me to pack a bag for at least a week. I called my dad and told him what happened, he didn't seem happy. The most frustrating thing was what my dad said as I hung up the phone. "I knew this day would come."
That was it. No anger, sadness, disappointment, pride. Just acceptance. Like he knew that I could do this and he just accepted that I would have to leave! I know you're wondering, but no I didn't cause a second blizzard. I was shocked to the point where I didn't know what emotion to even feel. All I knew was that my dad knew I was different, I never had to go to that school or see Jessica again, and Maron was worried. So without a second glance, I locked the front door and left that house forever.