Day one: Right, now where am I?
Emily POV:
I took two deep breaths. I have to calm down. I can't let him see he upset me… I hate him. I hate waking up to see him stood there. He hates me and I hate him… but mum loves him… so…
I opened my eyes to see an unfamiliar room around me. I sat up dazed and confused… where am I? I looked around and saw the uniform Nook had given me on a chair by the window. The chair was pink and it had a purple cover thrown over it. I picked up the clashing uniform (as it was now starting to hurt my eyes) and looked around at the dark room. I noticed some things I hadn't before… The walls were made up of long pieces of wood in a pattern (four pieces stacked on top of each other horizontally and one next to the stack placed vertically) with a clock hung by the door and a candle hung on the opposite wall. By my bed was a small table in the shape if a mushroom. There wasn't much else in the room apart from a grey radio, the lava lamp and an amazing carpet! It had different hues of blues, purples and pinks in a strange watery shape. Naturally I found myself staring at that for a while before the clock chimed eight o'clock and the radio started playing. The little display on the radio simply said "8 am". I decided to keep it on. It was upbeat and I needed something to keep me awake. I'm so sleepy!
Taking the dress I went to a room to the left of the door to see if it was a bathroom. Well I tried to, it was locked for some reason. It was strange, I hadn't been given any keys… not for the front door or this room or this house! I eventually turned away from the door and saw another, open, room the other side of the door. The floor was covered in mosaic tiles and the walls white. There was also a toilet, a mirror, a bathtub, a shower and a little table in the middle of the room with a comb and various shampoos, lotions and whatnots on it. Having pulled on the dress I combed my bed head flat and pulled the messy hair into a plait. Despite my previous attempts to grow my hair it was still only shoulder length. Looking in the mirror I struggled to recognise the tired face of a pale grey-eyed girl that was looking back at me. She was so different from the bright eyed happy girl in all of mums photos… but they were all at least a year or two old by now.
Suddenly I heard a few small taps on the door. Flattening down my dress and tucking my bangs behind my ears I walked towards the door. The door was a bit creaky and stiff but it opened easily enough. Looking around I couldn't see anyone until a small cough brought my attention towards the ground. In front of me, coming up to my knee height, were two tanukis in blue aprons.
"Ahem, my name is Timmy"
"And I am Tommy"
"We work for Tom Nook and as of today"
"So do you" Looking down at them in slight shock I tried to regain my senses as quickly as possible so I didn't seem rude. "You must be confused" Tommy continued.
"We would be too"
"Our uncle"
"Tom Nook"
"Wants you to work for him so you can"
"Start paying off your debt"
"For the house"
"Follow us!"
"Us yes!"
I blinked a couple of times but followed obediently closing the door behind me.
"You'll want to know who our customers are" Tommy (I think) continued
"So here's a map with the names of the rest of the towns folk!" Timmy ended. They handed me a folded piece of paper with a bird's eye view of the town. Scanning the map I quickly found my house, it was in the bottom right by the river we were walking next to. My closest neighbours were Muffy (Nook mentioned her last night), Alfonso and Fauna. The other side of the river were two more houses belonging to Pudge and Cheri. Right at the very top were the two last houses belonging to Marshal and Aurora. The shops and town hall were grouped in an area just beyond the train station and Nooks shop was right on the end of the central line of shops.
"Any questions?" Timmy asked. I looked up to answer him but found myself walking strait into a tree.
Silence.
I started peeling myself off the tree and held a hand to my pounding head… I wanted to say something but the only word I could get myself to say was
"oops"
"O-oh my! Are you ok?!" A voice came from behind me. I collapsed on the floor from dizziness.
"Y- yeah I'm fine…" I opened my eyes to see five penguins gathered round me… all of them were black and white penguins wearing a red shirt with pink flower patterns on it… "Are you quintuplets?" As my vision re-focused and the five penguins became one I realised my mistake. "s- Sorry!" I said quickly as I tried to stand.
"Hahahahahahaha!"
"hahahahahahahahaha!" Timmy and Tommy had started laughing…
"It's not funny you two!" The penguin said in a concerned voice as she helped me up. The penguin picked up my map and handed it to me. I now realised she only came up to my shoulder and that I had knocked the fruit (peaches) off the tree. Two seemingly un-related facts that will be crucial as you keep reading
"Hey stop breaking the fourth wall!" Timmy and Tommy shouted.
Sorry…
"So what's your name?" The penguin said looking up at me
"I-I'm Emily…"
"Glad to see you're not concussed! I'm Aurora" She smiled and held out a hand… or should I say flipper… "Nice to meet you!"
"You too" I said rather quietly taking her flipper and shaking it.
"Ahem" a rather harsh cough broke the moment "I'm sorry to interrupt you two, but Emily is late for work!" Nook had appeared while me and Aurora were chatting.
"Sorry Mr. Nook" Aurora bowed as she addressed him "She was injured and I was making sure she was ok"
"Is that so?" I thought I saw Nook glare at the twins (I assume Timmy and Tommy are twins anyway…) but as quickly as it had happened he had regained his all but constant stare back at me. "Well I'm sorry to say Emily has no more time for conversations!" Nook said in a huff walking towards us. "It's time she-" you remember those peaches? "WOAH!"
Nook slipped on a peach and skated forwards diving head first into the nearby river…
Rover POV:
"Ah there you are Rover!" Isabelle said in her normal cheerful voice. "Nook gave me the forms for the new child in town. Emily right?" The clock ticked on endlessly as Tortimire snoozed away in his chair at the back of the office.
"Yeah that's her name." I sat on the leather sofa in front of the front desk. I folded my arms and closed my eyes bowing my head. I'd been up all night last night trying to sort some stuff out for Emily.
"She seems nice" Isabelle continued as she scribbled some notes on the forms "Well, I haven't met her yet but Tom seemed to like her."
"Yeah, he always likes the kids who pass through. Reminds him he can make things better after his city days." I heard Isabelle sigh a little and rest her pen down. "Paw cramp?"
"I've been writing for about two hours straight." She was shaking her paw trying to release some of the pain from her tiny yellow appendage… She's kinda cute when she doesn't notice she's being cute. "It's cause the mayors not doing so well… I don't think he's going to last all that much longer" I opened one eye and looked at the tiny yellow dog sat behind the desk. She was looking over at the wrinkled up turtle behind his desk snoring his cares away. "I mean… as Mayor. Turtles live for ever. He'll probably outlive us!" She said turning back to me trying to smile.
"Yeah. He should go live on an island. He'd love that." I said smiling at Isabel.
"That would be nice. Lucky man!" She giggled
"That's it!" Tortemire sat up with a start and fell off his chair leaving the shell where he had been snoozing. "An island! We must invest in an island!" Is he serious?
"Good morning Mr. Mayor, your coffee is on the table by your paper work."
"Isabel! To the vault! We need… we we need… an island vault..." He fell asleep on the floor…
"At least he's lively today" Isabell said cheerfully giggling a little.
"Aha are you sure the coffee is a good idea?" I joked.
"He insists I make him some but he never drinks it. Normally I re-heat it and leave it for him just in case."
"Ew week old coffee! Brewster would kill you if he knew!"
"Yeah but we wasted so much of the treasury on his morning coffee at the café it made more sense if I made it" We had a bit of a laugh and the atmosphere went back to the calm of normal everyday work mode.
"Hey Isabelle…" I reached into my left pocket and held onto some tickets I'd bought us "are you… um… free Friday night?"
"Yeah I think so." She looked up to me and gave me those adorable puppy eyes and I felt my manly persona slowly fade into a puddle of awkwardness.
"E- I… I have-"
"But uncle it wasn't us!"
"wasn't us!"
"If you two had just done your job and brought Emily to the shop as promised-"
"We were!"
"Were!"
"Shush! We're at town hall now so be quiet! I need to talk to Isabell about those forms!" A set of three short sharp taps echoed around the hall.
"Come in!" said Isabell. I sighed and put the K.K. slider tickets back into my pocket before the door opened and the twin disaster zones entered the building. As soon as Nook started talking to Isabell I had Timmy tugging on my ears, Tommy pulling my tail, Aurora trying to keep the piece and poor Emily had about five letters, one carpet, a dress, a present, various items of small furniture and stationary all in a pile as she tried to balance what she could in her arms and on her head. The mayor occasionally chimed in with all the ruckus shouting ideas about his Vault Island before falling asleep again and repeating the process of waking up, shouting and going back to sleep again.
"Emily, you go make those deliveries! I'll be a while with Isabell"
"Yes sir" a tiny voice came from behind the leaning tower of deliveries. I sighed and stood up.
"I'll help her Nook. You're working the poor thing too hard. You better pay her as much though."
"Yes, yes Rover go help the small hard working tooth. As I said I will be a while."
-Morning end-