Rainbows

chapter one: third person, following Matthew

Young Matthew Williams clutched his stuffed polar bear to his chest, as he walked into the school behind his older brother Alfred. Alfred was escorting Matthew to his kindergarten class for his first day of school. Matthew was really nervous, he was afraid of being alone in a class room full of other kids that he didn't know how to interact with.

Sensing his younger brothers anxiety Alfred turns around and crouches down so we can look Matthew in the eyes. Alfred is only two years older then Matthew, but Matthew is rather small for his age, and Alfred isn't exactly short. Sighing Alfred pulls Matthew into a hug "if you get scared or hurt, come by my class room anytime, ok?" Matthew nods his head slowly, enjoying the feeling of being comforted by his older brother. "good. Now remember Mattie, my classroom is upstairs, third door on the left, got it?" Matthew nods again and Alfred pulls back from the hug. Alfred grabs Matthews shoulders and turns him around, giving him a gentle push into the classroom.

"now go have fun!"

Matthew clutches his polar bear even tighter to his chest as he walks into the room. Almost immediately Matthew sees rambunctious children running around and fighting over toys in the play kitchen that was set up in the corner. Matthew walks over to a corner, near the painting area, and sits down, more comfortable now that he is more alone. He sits there for a minute or two until the tall woman, who he assumed was his teacher walked over to a chair and called everyone over. Matthew rises from his spot in the corner of the room and goes the sit on the edge of the giant alphabet rug that all of the other students are seating them selves on.

"hello children, my name is Ms. K" the teacher spoke with a thick Russian accent "I hope to get to know you all very well, and i know that we are going to have tons of fun this school year!"

Matthew likes how kind she seems and how she really looks like she cares about the students.

"so" Ms. K began "who wants to read a story" all of the children around Matthew start screeching in excitement, shouting out the stories that they want to hear. After a few moments, Ms. K gets the class to settle down and begins to read the ugly duckling.

"it was a beautiful summer day" the story began "The sun shines warmly on a farm house near a river. Behind the house a mother duck is sitting on her eggs. 'tchick' one by one the eggs begin to crack open.

Except one" she says, as all the children gasp. "this one is the biggest of them all" she continues "Mother duck sits on the big egg. At last it breaks open, 'tchick,tchick'. Out jumps the last baby duck. It is big and strong, it is also ugly and grey"

Some of the kids in Matthews class begin to talk about the ugly duckling, but Matthew leans in further, intrigued by the story.

"the next day the mother duckling brings all the ducklings down to the river and tells them to go and play in the water. All the ducklings jump in. The ugly duckling jumps in too. They all swim around, the ugly duckling swims stronger then the rest.' Quack quack', says the mother duckling 'come with me to play in the farm yard'. All the ducklings follow their mother into the farm yard."

Ms. K pauses for a moment, then sets down the book. The other children all whined and complained, but settled down when she said that she would finish the story at nap time. Ms. K stands up and walks across the room before coming back with a book of construction paper.

"okay kids, today i want to learn about what you do and do not like, so you are all going to line up, and take two pieces of paper." for an example Ms. K holds up two pieces of paper, one red and one blue. "and on one you will like things you like, and on the other things that you don't like"

All of the students stand up at once, except for Matthew, and push and shove to be in line first, until every one but Matthew has their paper. Once all of the other students are at their tables, Matthew walks over to Ms. K and collects his paper, before going to sit in an empty seat next to the Cuban kid Carlos, and his friend from Denmark, Mathias.

Neither of them notice as Matthew sits down and starts to work. Matthew starts with the things he likes, on an orange piece of paper. He writes, drawing, pancakes, his brother and his pet polar bear, Kuma-something, and hugs, from his papa and dad. Then he moves onto the things he doesn't like, loud noises, his dads cooking, war and crying.

Matthew looks over at Mathias' paper, the things he does like, there is lots of cars and guns, making Matthew shy away from the other slightly. He also sneaks a peek at Carlos' and sees that he likes ice cream. hm. Matthew thinks. I like ice cream, maybe we can be friends. The thought of having friends makes him smile because hes never had any friends before (unless you count his brother)

Carlos looks up at Matthew and smirks, before flicking Matthew on the forehead, causing him to shrink back into his seat, before laughing.

"Sorry, but i don't like Americans" Carlos says with a Cuban accent, faint in his voice. Matthew wants to voice that he isn't American but in fact Canadian, and that he did not appreciate being flicked, but Matthew stays quiet in fear that he will be flicked again. So he instead turns back to his work, to finish colouring in his drawing of pancakes. He continues this for another 15 minutes until the bell rings, signalling for them to go outside for break. Matthew writes his name on the bottom of his paper and hands it in to Ms. K, before walking out the door, and going to sit on the playground.

Matthew sit on one of the bench outside and watches as the other kids run around and play tag or double dutch. He sighs quietly and closes his eyes, absorbing the September sunshine, until someone much larger then him sits on top of him. Matthew sucks in a gasp, the extra weight crushing his legs. Matthew Squirms a little, but the boy sitting on top of him doesn't seem to notice. Finally, giving up on the silent approach.

" U-um, d-do you Th-think that you c-could m-maybe g-get off me?" he says as loudly as he can, which is only a whisper. The boy sitting on top of him looks down at Matthew, the stands up.

"what were you doing under me child" he says in a thick Russian accent, close to that of his teachers "you want to become one with me, da?" Matthew shakes his head vigorously, not even knowing what that means, the Russian kids, who is probably in third or fourth grade smiles at Matthew darkly, making Matthew shake violently. "then you should be moving from my spot, da?"

Matthew is about to move when the Russian kid gives him a hard shove, sending him face first into the pavement, skinning his palms and knees a little and scratching his cheek. Matthews hand shoots up to his face, and his big doe eyes begin to water.

Matthew runs inside and into the bathroom. He pulls his hand away from his cheek and looks in the mirror, where he sees that he has a scratch around the size of a baby's hand on his left cheek. Oh no Matthew thinks Alfred is going to freak out! Matthew grabs a hand full of paper towel and wets it, pressing it against his face to get rid of the dirt and blood. Just as he is finishing up washing his hands, the bell rings again, signalling the end of the short break.

Matthew heads back to class with his head hung low, trying to hide the scratch on his face, should he walk by his brother. But lucky for Matthew, he did not, and makes it back to his class without further, except for the getting pushed around by the other students that are in a hurry to get to their classrooms.

when Matthew walks into his class, he situates himself back in the same corner near the paints where he curls in on himself to be as small as possible, hoping that if he is small enough and quiet enough, that he will turn invisible and be able to sit out for the duration of the day. Unfortunately, luck is not with Matthew, and after around five minutes of sitting there, he feels a large hand lay on his shoulder. He looks up and sees Ms. K looking at him with worried eyes.

"What is wrong Matvey?" she asks him delicately, as though she is afraid that her words could break him. " Why do you not want to play in the kitchen with the other children?" Matthew shrugs lightly, not wanting to speak, because he has noticed that he is the only student with a stuttering problem, which is only made worse by him being nervous. Ms. K frowns at the shrug, her brow furrowing lightly. "why don't you come and paint, you are good at art, da?" Matthew nods his head gently. Ms. K grabs hold of Matthews hand and helps him up, then leads him over to the art area.

Matthew gingerly picks up a paint brush, then looks up to Ms. K for approval. She smiles and nods, letting Matthew know that he is doing good. Matthew first puts the brush in the brown paint, creating the wide base of a tree, followed by the long twisting branches. He then dips it in the green, adding a few leaves here and there. Then he takes some green and mixes it with come white. Creating a lighter green, he ads a few leaves of this colour too.

Matthew turns around, noticing that the feeling of being watched is gone. He looks around the room and sees Ms. K on her computer at her desk across the room. Matthews lips twitch lightly into a little smile as he turns back to his art. He mixes just a little bit of orange and yellow into his green. He adds a few more leaves onto the tree, as well as putting some down at the base. Taking a step back Matthew admires his work. It's no Van Gogh, but it looks better then most fourth graders could paint. Ripping the painting off of the stand.

Matthew walks over to Ms. K's desk and places the painting next to her computer gently. She looks at the painting and gasps

"Matvey, this painting is amazing!" She says, pride flashing threw her eyes "how did you learn to paint like this?" Matthew, of course, just shrugs before turning around and walking back to the painting area.

Matthew spends the rest the block painting in his corner, until Ms. K calls them over to finish the Ugly Duckling before nap time. She finishes the story telling the students how the duckling was bullied, until he finally ran away. He returned to his family again though, and they were all astonished to see that he had turned into a lovely swan. Matthew felt a strong connection to the duckling. He likes that the story has a happy ending for the ugly duckling, who grew up to be the prettiest of them all. Matthew finds himself drifting off, thinking about the Duckling and how he over came everything that god threw at him, and came out on top, falling asleep with a smile on his face.

"Alright everyone" Ms. K's voice cuts into Matthews sleep "there is ten minutes until lunch, it's time to wake up" There is groaning all around them as the students all awaken from their naps. "now, children" Ms. K says as she turns on the lights " everyone go to your cubbyholes and grab your lunches and line up" she instructs "we will wait for the bell to ring, and you will eat your lunches in the lunch room"

All the children begin to rise from their spots on the carpet and rush towards their individual cubbyholes. As always, Matthew walks into the coat room slowly, not liking the hustle and bustle. He walks over to his backpack that is almost the same size as he is, and pulls out his lunch, a ham sandwich and a cut up apple, before joining all the other students in line.

The buzzer rings and all the student file out of the classroom into the hallway. The lunchroom is on the 2nd floor so in order to get there, the small students have to walk threw the crowded halls and up a flight of stairs. Along the way, Matthew has knocked over three times by larger students. When he walks into the crowded lunchroom, he sees that all of the spots are taken. He looks to the back corner of the room and sees a group of students have a picnic like thing going on because they have no spots.

Sighing, Matthew walks back out into the hallway, and in order to avoid the overpopulated lunchroom, eats his bathroom on the second floor boys bathroom. He pulls out his sandwich and takes a large bite, trying to ignore the smell of pee in the urinals next to him. After he finishes his sandwich, he moves onto his apples. The crunch fills the silent bathroom, and is the only sound other than the leaky tap that is across the room from him.

Matthew is just finishing his apples as the bell that signals that the eating portion is done and you are to go outside rings. Matthew is about to walk out of the bathroom when he hears heavy footsteps coming towards the bathroom, accompanied by a Russian accent. Matthew panics and ducks into the closest stall to him.

The Russian boy enters, along with two other boys, who are yet to be named. Matthew doesn't mean to be rude, but ends up eves dropping on their conversation.

"So Ivan, which teacher did you get stuck with this year?" This voice comes from the Cuban boy on Matthews class, how strange that he and the Russian would be friends.

"I Have Mr. Grayson, what about you Carlos, you are repeating kindergarten again, are you not?" says the Russian, Ivan.

Ah Matthew realizes so he failed a grade or two. With the witty comeback comes the laughter of Ivan and... Wait a minute. Matthew knows that loud and obnoxious laughter. But it couldn't be.

"So whose class are you in Alfred?" asks a Cuban voice, confirming to Matthew that it was in fact his brother, talking to the two other boys, though from the sound of Carlos' voice, they do not get along to well.

"Well" says Alfred's cocky voice "Unlike you i haven't been held back two years and I'm in Mrs. Clarts class" from the sounds of Alfred's voice, he doesn't like Carlos that much either. Carlos scoffs at Alfred and their conversation is muted to Matthews ears as they walk out of the bathroom.

Matthew steps off of the toilet that he was standing on and walks out of the stall, before taking a deep breath and walking out of the bathroom and outside.

Matthew spent the rest of his lunch sitting on the stairs out front of the school, with his backpack sitting next to him, since the kindergarteners get to go home after lunch. Matthew will be walking the three blocks to his house on Leaf lane. The streets around the school are all named after things in nature, there is even a Pine-Cone place.

The loud bell interrupts Matthews thinking. He stands up and begins walking home, not even looking back at the school as he walks away. Matthew would be lying if he said he liked walking home. He doesn't like it because he constantly feels as though he is being followed and watched. It might be because around two weeks ago his parents gave him the stranger danger talk. Unfortunately it had freaked him out and he was now super paranoid, looking over his shoulder every ten seconds the entire walk home.

When Matthew finally arrives home he feels safer and relieved. He walks into the living room where he sees his Dad, Arthur Kirkland, sitting on the sofa reading the paper and drinking a glass of orange pekoe tea. Matthew stands in the door frame for a moment before deciding to announce his presence.

"H-hi dad, I'm h-home from Sc-school" He says quietly, causing Arthur to look up for a moment, bewildered , before a disapproving look

"Alfred, you bloody twat" Alfred scolds in an English accent "What are you doing home at this hour? Its not even one!"

Matthew sighs, realizing that his father has mistaken him for his brother. Again.

"D-dad, I'm not A-Alfred, I'm M-Matthew." Matthew says tiredly as he watches confusion, then realization cross his fathers face.

"Crap, sorry about that lad." Arthur says apologetic "so how was your first day?"

"S'fine" Matthew mutters, barely audible. Somehow Arthur managed to understand him. And nods before returning to his paper.

Matthew slowly climbs the stairs of their two story house. He walks into his Canadian designed bedroom. He drops his bag in the corner of his bedroom before walking over to his twin sized bed. The bed is so high that in order for Matthew to get on it he actually has to climb. Once on his bed, Matthew lays his head on his pillow and falls asleep thinking about how horrible his day went.