Chapter Three
The Community Center
Spring day 11
The town was always peaceful in the early morning, the serenity of the town was only broken once people started going to work. I made my way up the slight incline that began the mountains, when I spotted Lewis moping about in the front of the run down building.
"Good morning Mayor Lewis," I replied walking up to him, he turned to me and smiled.
"Good morning Jill, what can I do for you?"
"Nothing, I just saw you moping here and thought I could see if you needed something."
"Oh, not really, I guess I'm still trying to live in the past," Lewis replied unlocking the door and walking into the building.
"Wow," I replied following him into the building.
"Young kids these days don't really care about preserving traditions, they care about new innovations like JoJa Mart. *sigh I suppose that if anyone else buys a membership I'll sell this to Morris. Ah well, just an old man with an old heart. Hope I haven't dampened your day Jill. If you will excuse me," Lewis replied walking out the community center. I stood alone in the main corridor of the building looking around the crumbling floors and broken windows, and then I heard it, that animal-like squeak that I heard from the previous day.
"What are you?" I asked walking around the community center when I stopped dry looking down at an apple shaped creature with what looked like twigs for arms and legs.
"WHAT...Are...You..." I replied looking at the creature confused, and it jumped in fear running down the hall.
"Wait!" I exclaimed following it but it had disappeared.
"This valley is so weird," I replied to myself quietly crouching down to look at a note that was left on the ground. I studied the note for a bit but the language was undecipherable. I let out a sigh and left the community center making my way down the stairs almost running into Shane.
"Oh!" I replied in shock. "Sorry Shane, I didn't mean to almost run into you," I finished taking a step back, the strong smell of beer still lingering on him from the night before. He rolled his eyes and massaged his head.
"Whatever, I don't have time to chat with you, I'm already late enough as is," he said angrily walking towards JoJa Mart. Right, no matter what the occasion was every day was Shane be rude day. I shook my head with a sigh and walked into Pierre's little store.
"Hey good morning Farmer!" Pierre called from the counter. I smiled.
"Good morning Pierre," I replied back looking through the seeds and trying to remember what I needed when the door flung open. I turned my head to the door, a large man with rectangular glasses and pitch black hair walked in, his suit was pristine and his red bow-tie was annoying to look at. This must have been Morris from JoJa Mart that Lewis mentioned earlier.
"Come on everyone, down to JoJa mart for your needs! Here! Don't forget your fifty percent off your next purchase coupons!" Morris exclaimed waving coupons around in the air. Everyone in the store moved towards Morris for a coupon, I stood in the back leaning against the seed aisle Pierre quite unhappy in the background. Finally Morris turned to me.
"You must be the new farmer, I have plenty of seeds and fertilizer in stock at JoJa mart, you should come on down and buy some," he replied.
"No thank you. I'm quite satisfied with the service I receive at my local grocery store, besides," I replied walking up to Morris and looking up at him, "I like my produce fresh, not flash frozen and transferred from Timbuktu," I added, and Morris' face looked as though it could explode.
"Now," I said skirting past him, "If you will excuse me I have some seeds to buy and actual work to do," I finished dropping my items on the counter and I spotted Abigail in the back corner trying to stifle a laugh.
"All people see it JoJa Mart way," Morris replied trying to get the last word.
"I doubt that," I said grabbing my bags and walking out leaving Morris standing there grinding his teeth. I walked out the door smiling to myself. I always felt proud of myself after telling off a JoJa Mart bigwig.
"You seem like you're enjoying yourself," a deep voice replied causing me to turn and see who was speaking to me.
"Oh! Sebastian, I wasn't expecting to see you out of your basement," I said addressing the pale young man with black clothes and pitch black hair.
"On the weekends I usually do a bit of a jam session with Sam," he replied starting to walk in step with me.
"Oh? You two in a band?"
"Something like that. So my question?"
"To which you asked if I were enjoying myself. The answer is yes. I told off Morris."
"Nice."
"I pride myself in somethings that I shouldn't," I replied as we stopped outside Sam's house.
"Hey, someone has to right? Catch you later," he replied walking into Sam's house and disappearing behind the door. I shrugged and made my way through the forest and back home, my mind turned back very quickly to the creature I saw in the community center. I had never seen a creature like that before, was it one that was native to this valley? Could it be dangerous? Is it possible that these are one of the creatures that Marlon was talking about? That day, after Marlon handed me the sword I hesitated. I didn't go down further into the mines, mostly because I think I was afraid. Afraid that I might enjoy myself for once and do something that didn't seem like it belonged within the norms or society. None of this seemed right, none of this made any sense. My grandfather never wrote about any of this in his letter. What if he didn't know about any of this? What if he just lived a happy life as a farmer? Was that something I could do for myself? Could I really make a fresh start here? Could I really leave behind everything that happened and rewrite the slate?
My thoughts were halted when I could hear a very loud audible groan from the valley. I glanced around, there were some things that scared me, no matter how many times I heard it, and THAT moan, scared the crap out of me every time I heard it.
"Nope," I replied shaking my head and walking into the house. Everything that I heard in the outside was going to stay in the outside. I thought to myself locking the door tightly behind me.
