Ch.8- Emily: The Christmas I Couldn't Have
Disclaimer: I don't own One Piece, but I DO own the characters in this chapter
A/N: Okay, this is a bonus chapter about the main character in my story The Melody of the Seas. Emily is a slave girl that is bought by Zoro and becomes the Straw Hat Pirates' new musician. This chapter takes place BEFORE she's bought and stars her and her sister. This is a tiny little bio about them:
Emily: Her family was murdered when she was a month old, a pirate brought her to an orphanage, where she learned how to read, write, and talk before she was even two. She was adopted into slavery when she was three. When she was six, she was in a traveling circus, where she learned to play the flute. The circus dropped her off at a friend's house when she was nine because the circus was making less money and she was starving. She lived with the friend for seven months before the friend died and was brought right back into slavery.
Misao: She is Emily's sister. The two are not actually related at all. Misao's family was born into slavery. Her mother and twin died when she was two. Misao met Emily when she was three and the two became such good friends that they called each other sisters. Misao's father died when she was only three. She was separated from Emily after Emily went with the traveling circus. She was freed and adopted by the circus' friend for two years. She and Emily met again when both of them were nine. Both her and Emily were brought back to slavery after the friend died.
And now…on with the story…
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It was once believed that when it was wintertime, there was always snow, especially in December. Unfortunately, that wasn't what was happening at the Peterson house in the city of Anacohtes. There was no snow, even though there was cold. Of course, for the nine-year-old slave, Emily and her sister Misao, this was not the worst feeling they have felt. Losing loved ones to death was the worst and both girls felt it.
Since it was December, the Peterson family was going to have a large Christmas Party on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, not to mention the large Peterson family coming to visit around the middle of December and staying until the day after Christmas. It happened every year even though neither of the girls had been at the Peterson house for more than a few months.
This place they recently worked at wasn't not the worst one the girls had been to, but it also wasn't the best one either. The work at this house was light for both girls and although they were punished at times, it was only by slaps, kicks, and screams, not whips. The only that was extremely annoying were the two Peterson children: Marisa and Corey.
Marisa (aged eight) and Corey (aged four) were not necessarily bad children, although they never wanted to stop bothering Emily and Misao from their work, which both girls got punished for. And now, it being December, there was so much more work to be done. Both Emily and Misao had many different floors to scrub.
They dipped their hands in the hot, soapy water, dug out the sponges, and started to scrub at the partially filthy floor. The Master's wife was watching them and for once, did not look displeased. The girls scrubbed in silence for fear that she'd scream at them and beat them. She watched them for fifteen minutes before she left for the kitchen. Now Emily and Misao were free to talk.
"Do you think that the people coming over are going to buy and separate us?" Misao asked fearfully.
Emily shook her head, "It's not a slave trade. In Anacohtes, it's illegal to sell slaves if they aren't in a slave trade."
"How do you know that?" Misao asked.
Emily shrugged, "I heard the older slaves talking about it."
Misao believed her. Emily and Misao were the youngest of the six slaves at the Peterson house. The oldest was forty-nine while the youngest (besides Emily and Misao) was sixteen and none of the other slaves would lie about something as important as that. Besides, there'd be no reason for the Peterson family to get rid of the few loyal slaves they had.
Emily and Misao were almost completely done with the floor they were scrubbing when the house began to shake. Two people, Marisa and Corey, ran up the stairs onto the second floor with dirty clothes and muddy shoes.
"I'm going to get you, you little…" Marisa screamed, chasing after her brother.
"Little Miss, Young Master…please don't come up here." Misao said. The two ignored her and started running down the halls.
Emily attempted to grab their shoulders, but stopped, remembering one of the rules from their father: Don't touch the children without their father's permission. All Emily and Misao could do was watch Marisa and Corey running through the halls, trailing dirt and mud.
"What's going on up here?" a voice screamed. Marisa and Corey stopped and looked at their mother. "You two are filthy. Go change your clothes. Aunt Martha and Uncle Harry will be here soon." The woman told her children.
"Okay, Mama." Marisa and Corey chirped, running off to their rooms.
The woman turned to Emily and Misao, "You two! Get started on this floor! Some of our guests will be arriving soon!"
"Yes, Miss Kate." The girls chorused, getting to their work. The woman nodded and walked into Marisa's room. Emily and Misao shuttered, Miss Kate, the wife of the house owner, was the scariest part of working at the Peterson house.
Emily and Misao finished their work an hour later. Right when they finished, the sound of a cart stopping came from outside the house. The girls looked down the stairs and saw a very thin and well dressed woman, a well dressed man, and a little boy Corey's age standing in the doorway, hugging Master Peterson (the house owner), Miss Kate, Marisa, and Corey.
Emily and Misao didn't say anything or go downstairs. Instead, they took a break and sat down on the stairs to take a break.
Minutes later, sixteen-year-old Ryu walked up to them, "Master Peterson wants all his slaves to meet up in the parlor." Emily and Misao nodded and followed Ryu down to the parlor.
The other slaves were already there. Ryu, Emily, and Misao stood next to the other slaves and in front of the Peterson family. Aside from the well dressed man, woman, and little boy that came a few minutes ago, there was a different family: another well dressed man and woman, a boy and girl around Corey's age, and an older girl Marisa's age.
After being introduced and looked over by the guests, the slaves were dismissed to the kitchens or wherever else they worked.
Emily and Misao were sent to Master Peterson's study to dust. That was Emily's favorite place to be. Misao's too. When the girls were there, Emily could teach Misao to get better at reading and Emily could practice also.
Unfortunately for them, the door opened and Corey and his cousins Cody, Nina, and Mike came in before the girls could read and they weren't going to leave.
"What's your name?" Cody asked Emily.
"Emily." Emily answered, not taking her eyes off the books she was dusting.
"What's your last name?" Mike asked her.
"I don't know." Emily answered truthfully.
Nina wrinkled her nose, "You don't have a last name?" Emily shrugged and kept dusting. Nina turned to Misao, "What's your name?"
"Misao." Misao answered.
"What's your last name?" Cody asked her.
Misao knew her last name, but didn't want to reveal it to anyone. "I don't know." Misao answered. Nina, Cody, Corey, and Mike laughed at them.
Corey grabbed a book off the shelves and opened it up, "Read this for me."
Both Emily and Misao could red it and before Emily could read it out loud, Misao quickly answered, "We can't read it. Slaves aren't supposed to know how to read."
The four other children laughed at them. The girls felt humiliated not just because they were being laughed at, but because of the truth: they weren't supposed to read and write.
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By dinnertime, Emily and Misao had earned the last name "Baka" by the other children because to them, slaves were stupid. All the adults allowed the children to call Emily and Misao "Baka Emily" and "Baka Misao".
The girls hated their given names, but nobody really cared. They were slaves and were not allowed to express who or what they hated.
As the guests ate their food, Emily, Misao, and Ryu stood against the wall, still as statues, only moving to refill plates and cups. All the children were laughing and talking about Christmas. All the things they talked about were gifts, celebrations, and special Christmas people they've never even heard of.
"Boy! Gimme a refill!" one of the men shouted, holding up his empty wine glass. Ryu walked up to the wine glass and started pouring wine inside.
Cody held up his empty glass and shouted, "Baka sisters! I wanna refill!" Emily and Misao walked up to him and filled up his glass of water.
The Christmas conversation went on and on for hours, making Misao homesick and Emily confused. Misao knew about Christmas from the few years she had when she was freed, but Emily didn't. Work and traveling prevented her from celebrating the holiday. Of course, it really didn't matter. Slaves weren't allowed to celebrate the holiday.
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When dinner was over and all the chores finished, the slaves were sent to their rooms for the night. The slaves were very similar to most of the rooms at the other places they worked at: a very small one room house the size of the Peterson's parlor, split into two rooms by a sliding paper door. The girls slept on one side, the men on the other.
Before they went to bed, Emily played a little tune on her flute, a suggested tune. Tonight's son was a slow and sweet song that put everybody but Misao and Emily to sleep. Emily put her flute away and laid down in the bed she shared with her sister.
"Hey, Misao?" Emily asked her older sister.
"Yeah?" Misao asked.
"What's Christmas?" Emily asked.
Misao looked at her sister, "Didn't you celebrate the holiday when you were in the circus?" Emily shook her head. "What about the orphanage?" Misao asked.
Emily shook her head, "We were too poor to really celebrate anything."
Misao was surprised. Her younger and more intelligent sister didn't even know what Christmas was.
"Well, Christmas is a holiday that comes once a year. The holiday is supposed to be for friends and family to be together, celebrate, and hand out gifts to each other. I don't think slaves are allowed to celebrate the holiday." Misao explained.
"How come?" Emily asked.
Misao gave out a little shrug, "I don't know."
Before Emily could ask another question, Calle, the thirty-three-year-old woman that shared a room with Emily and Misao, woke up. "Hey, you two! Shut up and go to sleep! We got work tomorrow!" she shouted. The younger girls obeyed her.
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In the next week and a half, more guests had come to the Peterson house. There were so many adults and children coming that all six slaves couldn't keep track of who was who. All the children made fun of Emily and Misao's last names. The talk of Christmas was constantly being talked about and sure enough, Misao was right about everything, especially the part about slaves not being able to celebrate it. But, that didn't mean that both girls couldn't try to celebrate it.
Emily and Misao knew it was risky to even try to celebrate, but they were known to be slave risk takers, especially Emily, even though they usually failed when they took risks. They had their celebration all planned out: on the day of the big Christmas Eve party, sneak into the kitchen, steal all the food they could and bring it back to their room without getting caught then hide it carefully from everyone else.
The plan was absolutely perfect, but also very risky. Both girls knew the risk. They knew that stealing would lead them to punishments. They've never done it before, but they saw others slaves from other plantations do it and get seriously punished. But there was an up side to the plan. The party was supposed to be huge and they could easily be hidden in the crowd.
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The Christmas Eve party was really huge. So many friends and family members of the Peterson family were joined together in the large house. Emily, Misao, and the other slaves were working almost constantly, moving food to the rooms and plates to the kitchen to be refilled. Calle and two male slaves were not taking their eyes off all the stoves that had food cooking on them.
With two towels from the linen closet, Emily and Misao snuck into the kitchen and started placing sweets in them.
"What are you doing?" Forty-nine-year-old Ichigo asked the much younger girls. The girls didn't answer him.
"You're going to steal food, aren't you?" Twenty-four-year-old Spike asked. The girls blushed.
"Forget it! I won't have any of us getting punished! Now take these out to the living room." Ichigo demanded, putting a large plate of Deviled Eggs in their hands.
Emily and Misao walked to the party, carefully balancing the large plate in their hands. There were so many people laughing and snatching eggs off the plate as they walked that they hardly made it to the tables. Once they placed the plate on the table, the girls went back to the kitchen. They could hardly believe what they saw.
The towels were now completely filled and tied up.
Spike handed the towels to the younger girls. "Hide these in your room." Spike told them with a smirk on his face.
The girls smiled and walked out of the kitchen, carefully hiding the bags in between each other to avoid having them being seen. They never got the chance to bring the bags to their room.
One of the guests spiked the eggnog and the other beverages on the tables. The party was soon becoming out of control with intoxicated men, drunken women and children, and passed out guests.
One of the men was so intoxicated that he mistook one of Misao's buns as food and attempted to pull them off her head. Misao cried out in pain and struggled to remove her hair from his hands.
"Let go of her!" Emily shouted. Without thinking, she hit the man with her bag.
The man let go of Misao's hair, but the bag opened up and the messy treats flew across the room and hit the guests. The guests grabbed foods off the tables and threw them at the others. Food was flying everywhere. Misao dropped her bag and ran with Emily back to the kitchen before any of the food got them.
"What's wrong?" Calle asked the freaked out girls.
"Stop cooking! Everyone is drunk and having a food fight!" Emily cried.
"Oh, I gotta see this." Spike shouted, running to the door and opening it a little. He let out a laugh. Ryu, Calle, and Ichigo took a look and also laughed. Not one person in that room was sober.
"You two better not go back out there." Ichigo told Emily and Misao, "They aren't going to be okay until at least tomorrow morning." Emily and Misao nodded. They sat down at the tables in the kitchen, eating a few of the sweets being cooked and laughing until both girls fell asleep.
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At 6am, all the guests were passed out and asleep. Emily and Misao woke up in the kitchen to the smell of coffee being brewed.
"Good morning, girls." Calle said, smiling at the little girls.
"Have we slept out here all night?" Emily asked.
"Yeah. You'd be surprised how much of heavy sleepers you two are." Spike told her.
Misao quickly jumped up and grabbed Emily's hand. Misao dragged Emily back to their room. The second they got there, both girls dug into their bags that held their belongings. Each girl pulled out a teddy bear belonging to both of them: Emily's being white with multi-colored firework sparks that she got from the circus, Misao's being teal with red music notes that she got from the woman that freed and adopted her.
Emily and Misao exchanged their bears. "Merry Christmas, Sis." Misao told Emily.
"Merry Christmas, Sis." Emily said back. Both girls gave each other a hug. Emily grabbed her flute and followed Misao to the kitchen. By the time they got there, food was all over the table and sheets of Christmas music stolen by Ryu from the parlor was on the counter.
Before everyone ate, Emily took a look at the music sheets and played the songs, all unfamiliar to her. The songs were soon over and all six of the slaves sat at the small table and began to eat their food.
"Merry Christmas, everyone." Ichigo said to the other slaves.
Spike held up his mug of coffee, "To Christmas."
The others lifted their mugs and chanted, "To Christmas!" They tapped the mugs against each other's and took a sip.
As Emily ate the breakfast she was made with Ichigo, Calle, Spike, Ryu, and Misao, she thought about how she was always told by both the Master and the other slaves that they couldn't celebrate Christmas and she believed it at first. But thanks to the party that went wrong, she learned that even slaves could celebrate Christmas.
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A/N: Well, that was the final chapter of Christmas Memories. I hope y'all liked this story. If you want to know more information about Emily and Misao then read The Melody of the Seas. R/R if you want, but don't flame me. It's Christmastime.