"Yes! Finally!" Norah yelled in delight as she threw her school bag on her bed and plopped down in front of her laptop, still wearing her school uniforms and socks.
After enduring weeks of revision, and a week entirely without the Internet throughout her school's examination week, she was more than ready to make up for lost time. She had blog posts to read, episodes of Lemurian Legends and other television shows to catch up on, and most importantly, friends to catch up on. Sure, she saw Penny every day in school, but there was a difference between talking to her in school, and just cutting loose to argue about all sort of nerdy things without fear of being judged by their peers. Stacy was still doing her graduate studies in another country, and on-line was the only place where they could meet.
Just when Norah opened a web browser on her laptop, her mother knocked on her bedroom door to gain her attention.
"Norah, can you please get changed soon? We're going to the park," her mother said.
Norah was dismayed. "Now? We're going to the park now?"
"Yes. We're all already ready to go."
"You didn't tell me we're going."
"Actually, we did. We told you last night."
Norah leaned back on her seat and sighed in angst. All those weeks waiting looking forward to going back on-line, and this happened.
"Norah, I know you're eager to go on-line again, but this is a family thing," her mother explained patiently. "It's been so long since we go out to the park together. Can't your internet and cartoons wait for just a few more hours?"
Norah overheard her stepsister Aurora asking her father, "Dad, can I wear my yellow dress? Please? Please?"
"Of course you can! So, what are you this time?" her father asked Aurora.
"The same! I'm Queen Aurora, Queen of Light!"
Aurora sounded so happy to be going to the park. As much as Norah didn't want to leave, she was less willing to disappoint Aurora by not joining her.
"Okay, I'll go. Give me a minute to change," Norah agreed reluctantly.
"Alright, we'll be waiting." Her mother closed the door behind her.
Norah changed out of her school uniform and into a white dress, the one she wore whenever she needed something comfortable and casual to wear when going outside. Rejoining her family at the doorway, she picked a well-worn, yet comfortable pair of white sandals to match her dress.
A few hours out of the house. Norah could endure that. Afterwards, nothing was going to stand between her and her well-earned break catching up on Lemurian Legends.
The park was already filled with park-goers by the time Norah and her family arrived there. Making the best of her situation, Norah pushed thoughts about going on-line out of her head and just let herself be immersed in the calming ambience of the park. She focused her mind on the ambient noise of laughter and bicycle bells, the feel of cooling breeze on her skin and the warmth of diffused sunlight through the tree canopy above her.
Norah could get used to it. In fact, as much as she hated to admit it to herself, she was even starting to enjoy it. She didn't know how badly she wanted to breathe fresh air after spending almost the entire day in her school hall taking examinations. It was like breathing in life again.
Aurora was having the time of her life. She was hopping alongside her father in her favourite yellow dress, singing songs that sounded like a mish-mash of songs from her favourite animated films embellished with her own additional lyrics.
"So, Norah, how did your school exams go?" Norah's mother asked.
"Okay, I guess. The science papers were killers though, and my friends are still complaining about them," Norah replied. "In fact, I'll be surprised if I get a 'B' for science."
Norah's mother placed a hand on Norah's bare shoulder. "I know you've worked really hard, Norah. You've done well."
Norah felt warm inside. She appreciated her mother's compliments. "Thanks, mum," she said softly.
Her mother wasn't always so encouraging in the past. Not so long ago, her mother would drive Norah up the wall every time she came home from work, telling off Norah for not studying hard enough and blaming her laziness for her poor grades. Their mother-daughter relationship was badly strained back then, and looking back, Norah couldn't blame her mother.
Norah's mother, as a restaurant manager, had to regularly work long hours, and the only time mother and daughter could see each other regularly was early in the morning and late at night. To top it off, Norah's mother was also engaged in an exhausting court battle to win unpaid alimony from Norah's dead-beat father. Coming home past midnight on week-nights, and seeing Norah still awake and idling around without completing her homework, was more than enough to make Norah's mother lose her cool.
For her part, Norah had lost all interest in studying after her parents' divorce, and her already fragile school grades took a nosedive. On nights when Norah's mother attended hearings in the family court, Norah spent them alone in their apartment, eating microwaved food and watching television until it was past midnight. It was her way of trying to escape from her feeling of helplessness in both studies and her personal life, and that self-destructive behaviour was what almost ruined her academically.
Back then, the only good nights to Norah were nights when her mother wasn't around. Around to remind her that she was a failure in everything, and that everything had turned for the worse after her father abandoned her. Norah didn't want to face reality, and her mother represented everything that was unjust and cruel about real life.
A timely intervention from one of Norah's teachers in primary school, Mrs Jones, was what saved Norah's grades and her relationship with her mother. Mrs Jones, refusing to believe that Norah was a lost cause, relentlessly tried to get Norah to open up to her and see the errors in her self-defeating mind-set.
After months of trying, Mrs Jones finally succeeded in convincing Norah that her mother was still doing her best, however imperfectly, to take care of her. She also encouraged Norah to do her part to mend her relationship with her mother.
Norah remembered the night when she carried out Mrs Jones' advice. It was the night when Norah's mother finally won the case against her ex-husband. In the cramped kitchen of their apartment, Norah made a heartfelt apology to her mother for all the troubles she had caused, and thanked her for all the sacrifices she had made.
It was the first time Norah ever saw her mother cried. She would never forget the way her mother hugged her and held her until the sleeves of her pyjamas was wet with tears; her mother's, and her own.
Norah was forever grateful to Mrs Jones for going beyond her duty as a teacher to help Norah mend her relationship with her mother. If only she had done more to stay in contact with Mrs Jones, but alas, she left the school soon after Norah graduated from primary school, and Norah had never saw her again since.
"Mum, Dad, look! It's Lucy and my friends from school!" Aurora shouted excitedly, pointing at a playground where a large group of children were playing.
"Well what are you waiting for? Join them!" her father encouraged her. Aurora bolted straight for the playground with one hand on her crown to keep it from falling off.
Lucy was on board the playground set, steering a wheel that looked vaguely like a ship's wheel. When Lucy spotted Aurora running towards her, she snapped sharply to attention.
"Ahoy there! Who are you?" Lucy called out to Aurora.
"I am Aurora, Queen of Light!" Aurora shouted back.
"Wonderful! I've been waiting for you, Queen Aurora! Climb aboard!"
Aurora climbed up the rope stairs to the raised platform of the playground play-set. "Lucy, is this a ship?"
"Not just a ship, a spaceship! Welcome aboard the SS Adventure! I'm the ship's captain, Captain Lucy Diamond, greatest space captain of the galaxy, and this is the fastest ship in the whole universe!"
"Where are you going on the spaceship?" Aurora asked.
"We are searching for the Space Dragon! Would you want to join us on our great voyage?"
"Space Dragon? That sounds cool, I'm joining!"
Lucy saluted Aurora. "Then welcome to my crew, Queen Aurora!" Lucy swept her hands over her compatriots standing behind her. "Say hi to Queen Aurora!"
Aurora's friends and schoolmates introduced themselves to Aurora as their alter egos. Mindy was a fairy travelling with a unicorn friend that could gallop through space; Aminah was a queen with magical ice power; Raj was an all-powerful space robot law enforcer; and Marcus was a champion race car driver, flying alongside Lucy's spaceship in a race car equipped with rocket engines.
"Now, onward to adventure!" Lucy shouted, spinning the wheels on the play-set. "Next stop! Planet X!"