"Lovissa! I need you to go out and feed the animals. It's your turn this week." My mother called up to me. I grumbled as I opened my eyes to look at the clock. Six A.M. I love our animals, but sometimes I wish they knew how to feed themselves. You could say I'm not a morning person. I much rather sleep in as long as I can, but half the day would be gone and I'd be bored during the night with no one to do stuff with. So basicly the latest I've slept into is about 8 in the morning.
I live with my family on Brownie Ranch. Renee is my little sister, she's younger than me by a year. Somedays she tends to act more like an older sister than I do. My mother and father, Hanna and Cain, own this ranch. My father is the expert on all things animals. We have about 4 cows, 5 hens, and 2 horses. One of which is mine. Well, it's not officially mine, but I always go out to feed it and I already gave him a name. He was born a few weeks and ago and isn't quite ready to leave his mother's side. I named him Blue, because when he's out in the sunlight, his dark coat looks almost blue.
I groggily get out of the comfort of my bed and grab one of my many t-shirts from my closet and put on some jean shorts. I walk downstairs to be greeted by the smell of my mothers famous pancakes and bacon. "Mmm, that smells fantastic! I am starving!" I exclaim. I take a seat next to my sister at the kitchen table and my mother hands me a plate with fresh pancakes. I grab the jar of peanut butter, my favorite for waffles and pancakes, and smother my food with it. "Put anymore peanut butter on those pancakes and you might turn into it." My father laughs. "I can't help it, dad. I love peanut butter." I say with a piece of pancake in my mouth.
Once breakfast is over, I grab my rubber boots and my jacket from the coat rack and head outside. The mornings are cold in the springtime, but later on they tend to warm up, almost too warm for any jackets or sweaters. I make my way over to the barn and the smell of hay reminds me why I love living on a ranch. "Good morning everyone!" I sing. The barn isn't very large but It's big enough to hold all our animals. First up is Molly. She's your average cow; fat, black and white, and healthy. "Good morning, Miss Molly."I pat her head and she gives a loud moo in response. I greet all our animals as I make my way to the fodder storage.
I fill each empty trough and whistle once they are all filled. Next up was the hens' house. I don't really care for chickens, but as long as they don't bother me, I don't bother them. All the hens are sleeping as I enter the small place they call home. I lay down some chicken feed and quietly make my way outside. It's probably about 11 when I finish all my chores. Time to go fishing!
I run inside our house and change into a loose t-shirt and some sneakers. I open our hall closet to grab my fishing pole, but it turns out to be missing. "Where did it go!" I grumble. "MOM!" I go into the kitchen to find my mother hard at work making a pie. "Yes, Lovissa?" She says, not even looking up at me. " Mom, I can't find my fishing pole. I swear I left it in the hall closet."
"When was the last time you had it?" She says.
"I had it a few days ago, when I went fishing with...OH!"A smile crosses my face as I realize where it could be."I know where it is. I'll be back later mom!" I quickly leave the house and head towards the Ganache Mine District.
The sun is almost at it's peak of the day and I shade my eyes as it bares down on me. I see Bo hard at work outside of the Carpenter's Shop. I jog up to him, despite the heat from the sun. "Hey Bo, what's up?" I smile at him as I say this. I'm not crazy about Bo. He's nice to me, so I just return the same. He doesn't talk much, but he's still a hard worker. "Oh, just getting some planks ready for when we need them." He says. I watch him smooth the planks of wood for a bit before speaking again. "Have you seen Luke? I need to get my fishing pole back." I say.
"Last time I saw him he was walking towards Praline Woods."
"Thanks!" I quickly walk over towards the woods. Luckily enough, I hear the sounds of someone chopping tree stumps. "There you are, mister. I've been looking for you." I say with a smirk on my face. Luke doesn't notice I've arrived and keeps chopping away at the stump. I walk up closer to him and he finally realizes I'm there and smiles. "Oh hey, Vissa. I didn't know you were there."
"Oh please." I roll my eyes but I can't help but smile. "Hey, are you done with my fishing pole. I kinda wanted to go fishing today."
"Oh yea! Actually, I never used it once you let me borrow it." He scratches the back of his head. "Thanks for letting me borrow it though." He gives me a thumbs up as he turns towards the path to his house. "I'll go get it." I follow him out of the woods and up to the shop. "One second." He says and heads on inside. I stand in the shade of the house, and a small ladybug catches my eye as it crawls along the wood frames on the house. When the bug flies away, I start to get impatient. I walk up to the door and open it, only to hit something in the process. "Owch!" I hear someone say. I peak my head in to see Luke on the floor, a broken fishing pole snapped in half on either side of him. "Oh, no! Your fishing pole! It broke! I'm so sorry, Vissa! I'll make you a new one I promise!" I feel anger rising up inside of me, but it's not towards him.
"Oh, Luke. It's not your fault. I shouldn't have opened the door like that. This was my bad." I say to him. He looks at me as he gets up and grabs the pieces of pole and walks over to his workbench. "I bet tape will fix it!" he says. I watch as he tries to tape the pole back together, but it doesn't work out like he hoped. I watch as disappointment consumes his face and I go up and give him a hug from behind. "It's okay, Luke. It was old and I couldn't catch any fish with it anyways." I say to him, trying to make him smile.
"You just got this pole for your birthday 2 years ago, Viss. It's not that old." He says to me. I just shrug it off and grab the now taped pole and look at it. "Well, I'm sure you can make me an even better one. Maybe add some cool touches to it. Make it awesome."
This makes him smile. "Yea, maybe I can carve fish into it!" I giggle at his enthusiasm. "How about we just keep it simple, Luke." No offense to him, but I don't see him as artistically gifted. Most of the wood carvings are made by his father or Bo. For my birthday one year, Dale, Luke's father, made me a bookcase and carved sunflowers on the sides. It was beautiful. Ever since, I've used it to store all my books in.
"Hey, why don't we go to the river and try catching fish with our hands, like those guys on TV!" he says. It's not something I would really do, but I bet it would be entertaining to watch Luke try to catch fish with his bare hands. "Okay, let's do it!" I say with a smirk on my face.
We would've walked down to Caramel River, but Luke decided to make it a race, and well he won. "Good job, Luke. I'm not surprised you beat me. You usually always do." I say once I catch my breath.
"Aww, Lovissa, you gave up too early. You gotta push yourself!" He says while doing victory jumps around the field. I watch him and laugh until my eyes notice a large patch of field near the beach. I stare at it and take in the view. "It's beautiful." I think out loud.
"What is?" Luke looks over in the direction I'm facing and snorts. "The ocean? Vissa, you've lived here your whole life and you just now notice how pretty it is?"
"No, Luke. Not the ocean. The patch of land near it." I jog slowly over to it and stop when I come to a large gap between where I am standing and the land. "Aww, I wanted to explore it." I mumble.
"Well pops told me to find a project to do when we're not super busy. I can build you a bridge! Then you can explore this spot all you want!" Luke says with delight. I turn around and give him a huge hug. "That'd be awesome, Luke! I'm so glad we're friends!" We both fall to the ground and just lay there laughing.
Later on, we eventually got to the river and Luke tried catching some fish. I gave up after an hour of missing, but Luke never wanted to back down. He always found a way to make small things into competitions. I loved his competitive spirit and endless energy. I bet the boy slept well at night.
"Hey Lovissa. Hey... Luke?" I hear a voice along with footsteps coming up behind me. I turn around to find Toby with his fishing pole, which is always with him. "Hey, Toby." I smile at him and he smiles back but then looks towards the river with a confused look on his face. "What are you guys doing?" He asks.
"Luke's catching fish." I say with a neutral tone. Toby stands there for a minute, no facial expression apparent on his face. Toby usually is always smiling or whistling. For some reason this wasn't something he was happy about. "Luke, get out of the water now! You're scaring all the fish!" He yells. I've never heard Toby yell before, or seen him so serious.
"I CAUGHT ONE!" Luke yells. He jumps out of the water, soaking wet, and runs over to us to show off the carp he caught. The fish keeps wiggling in Luke's hand but he pays no attention to it. "Isn't it awesome!" He grins.
Toby stays quiet and I just keep staring at the large fish in Luke's hand. He actually caught a fish with his bare hands. Is there anything this boy can't do? I'm honestly starting to doubt it.
"Wow, Luke. You should be on TV." I say to him. I can't help but smile at how happy he is. He smiles even wider but it only lasts a few seconds because he loses grips on the carp. He turns around to see it flopping down the side of the river towards the water. He tries to catch up to it but it reaches the water before he can even try to grab it. "Dammit! You guys are my witnesses. I did totally catch a fish with my hands!" He grumbles at the water. He kicks it with his feet and turns around to grab his shoes. His shoulders are slumped down and he looks upset. "Aw, cheer up, Luke. We can always come back to grab fish with our hands again sometime." I say , hoping to make him smile. Success. "You're right. It was one fish. Next time, I'll catch even more. Maybe even a shark!" He raises his fist into the air.
"Sharks only live in the ocean, idiot." Toby says, and with that he turns around and heads towards Caramel Falls.
"Well, anyways, I wanna catch a shark." Luke says once Toby's out of earshot.
"I'm sure you can, Luke." I say. I give him a gentle punch to the arm and we both walk back to our homes.