Chapter 1: Inside the Classroom

"My favorites!" Ashe exclaimed as she looked down at her lunch: puffy white rice, broccoli and carrots mixed with black bean sauce, and three fresh eggrolls neatly placed next to the vegetables. And to top it off, a small bag of green grapes was packed next to her lunch box.

Quickly clapping her hands together and murmuring a short prayer, Ashe grabbed her chopsticks and began eating lunch. She closed her eyes again and felt the sweet savor of the black bean sauce mixing with the white rice. It was like as though heaven arrived on earth inside her mouth. Making sure she chewed slowly, Ashe wanted to make sure that she could savor every moment possible whenever eating this lunch. If she wanted to, Ashe could eat this lunch every single day.

After the first few glorious mouthful of lunch, Ashe opened her eyes and looked around. The classroom was entirely empty. Empty desks were neatly arranged in order, the blackboard was recently cleaned away from her previous teacher, and a few posters about subjects which Ashe didn't really care were on the walls. Ashe noticed it was very quiet inside the classroom, but it didn't bother her, the delicious food inside her mouth was like music to her ears. As she was observing a poster about the human anatomy, a sudden slam hit the window beside her. Ashe jumped in surprise as the food she held in her chopsticks dropped.

"Oh no," Ashe murmured to herself as she accidentally dropped an eggroll. She checked and saw that it dropped on the white tile floor. Making sure that it didn't fall first on her school uniform before it landed on the ground, she checked to see if any grease smeared anywhere on her clothes: her white collared shirt with a long dark blue cape looked clean, her large red ribbon on the neck of her shirt looked normal, her dark blue skirt which matched her cape didn't have any smears, and her shiny black shoes and her socks which reached halfway to her ankles looked fine too.

With a napkin which her mother packed with her lunch, Ashe tore a little bit of it and picked up the eggroll. Her bright blue eyes peered closely to see if there had been any damage to the poor food. Other than a few dust particles here and there, the eggroll looked perfectly clean. For a moment, Ashe wanted to clear off the dust and eat it. After all, eggrolls wasn't a common food which Ashe ate everyday and the fact that it came with a perfect combo with warm white rice and broccoli and carrot mixed with black bean sauce. And to top it off, nobody but herself was inside the classroom, so Ashe bet nobody would notice her eating food which she dropped on the floor…

"Would mommy approve this?" Ashe murmured as she turned the eggroll round and around. Gently, her fingers flicked away the dust away from the eggroll until it was completely clean. Her eyes loomed at it hungrily.

Good things happen to those who do good deeds, Ashe heard her mother's light voice whisper in her mind, a quote which Ashe remembered when she was young.

"I know," Ashe said as she felt a slight ping of sadness, "but this isn't a deed, so it doesn't count right?"

After several moments of thinking, Ashe sighed and stood up. Slowly like as though she had been called to go to the principle's office, she walked down her desk row and went to the garbage can. When she finally reached it, she looked down at the eggroll. It was still clean and felt warm in her hand. Closing her eyes, Ashe dropped covered the eggroll with the napkin and dropped it until it made a soft thud inside the trash. Looking away before she changed her mind, Ashe looked up and felt a small satisfaction inside her.

"At least I did a good deed today," Ashe sang. Her mood felt much better as she skipped toward the bright window. Hands on the window counter, she looked down at the large green field to find what caused the loud sound.

Peering down from the window, Ashe saw her classmates scattered around the field. Several of them were sitting on the grass eating lunch while talking and laughing about things. Some were laying underneath the shadows of the trees, enjoying the cool Fall weather. Several yordles were running around the field, chasing and laughing like little kids. At further distance north from the field, Ashe saw a baseball game going on while some students were on the bleachers cheering and booing for the batter. She imagined everybody laughing, everybody talking, everybody having so much fun…

Feeling a burden inside her, Ashe sighed and looked away from the window. Her curiosity to find the cause of the loud sound suddenly disappeared as she walked back to her desk. Looking down at the half-eaten lunch, Ashe suddenly had no desire to finish the rest of it. Quietly she leaned on the counter, crossed her arms, and began thinking. She heard the ticking from the classroom clock and her left foot tapped with its rhythm.

Tap…tap…tap…

"It has been two weeks since school started," Ashe murmured to herself, as her eyes looked down at the square tiles on the floor, "I promised myself that I would make a lot of friends. In junior high school I was always a lonely person, therefore I never made new friends either. My elementary and preschool years weren't different either." Ashe adjusted her hood closely to her head.

Tap…tap…tap…

"But," Ashe said, her foot stopped tapping and surprised with the determination in her voice, "but I don't want that to happen in high school. I want to make new friends! I want to know what it's like having fun with everybody else. I…I just want to make mommy proud." Looking up to see that there was five more minutes before lunch period ends, Ashe decided to slowly pack up her lunch and get ready for math class.

WHAM!

"Oh!" Ashe jumped in surprise. Her hood almost fell off of her head, and she quickly readjusted it as she turned around to see what the loud sound was. Standing behind the window was a bird. Its feathers were smoothly white and clean, while its feet and its beak were light pink. The bird was no bigger than a baseball, and its beady black eyes looked at Ashe with curiosity.

Could this have been the origin of the sound earlier? Ashe thought as she looked at the bird. Its head veered left and then looked up at Ashe. Then it again veered its head to the left and looked up at her again. Frowning, Ashe looked around to see what the bird was looking at. Despite that all of the eggrolls have been eaten and that half of the main course had been devoured, Ashe saw that there was one last green grape inside the plastic bag.

"Oh it's hungry," Ashe said. She rarely understood the psychological mind of birds other than flying away when she walked near them, but she knew that green, oval colored fruit must've looked yummy from the bird's eyes. Snatching the grape with her thumb and forefinger, she lifted it and brought it to the bird waiting outside of the window. Almost immediately the bird pecked on it until it opened the grape's thin layer and began eating its inner juicier aspect.

Ashe watched quietly at the bird eating the grape. She had her hands folded and rested her head atop of them. Her eyes looked at the bird pulling out some of the grape and chewing and munching on it. For a moment Ashe wondered if this bird was lonely like her, but she immediately shrugged it away. This bird probably had a hundred friends out at the spacious field. Besides birds always fly and play together every day, so there was no possible way that this bird would have no friend.

Such a small creature can make such loud noise, Ashe thought, smiling as she stared at the bird eating its delicious meal.

A loud ringing permeated inside the classroom, and Ashe realized in surprise that lunch period was over. Completely forgetting about packing her lunch away, she hastily grabbed her lunch and utensils and quickly stashed them away. As she was cleaning her desk, she heard loud footsteps and talking from the hallways which she knew that students would be entering their classrooms soon. Folding her handkerchief away and reaching into her schoolbag for her mathematics textbook and notebook Ashe felt an odd urging that she forgotten something. As she placed her notebook and textbook on her desk, Ashe realized what she had forgotten!

"The bird!" Ashe gasped as she stood to turn the window. Looking at the window, Ashe saw the dried skin of the grape, but the white bird was nowhere to be seen.