Chapter 5
"Mrs. Stone, could you make sure everyone in here stays quiet?" Jim asked Maggie, still in a daze.
"Sure, no problem." Maggie said.
"Thank you." Jim said, taking April outside and shutting the door.
Maggie waited a second before going over to the door and pressing her ear to it, motioning with her hand for everyone to be quiet.
"April, what are you doing here?" Jim asked, using a ruff English.
"I'm an exchange student." April said. "I should ask you what you're doing here."
"I work here." Jim explained. "I'm the gym teacher."
"Isn't that funny? Jim the gym teacher." April said, smirking.
"This is important. If your mother finds out that you spent a week with me, she'll kill me, or at least get the courts on me." Jim said.
"Then we just won't tell her." April said. "It's as simple as that. Anyway, you're out of American derestriction."
"You've been watching too many detective shows again, haven't you? But what about Mrs. Stone?" Jim asked, pointing to the doors to the library.
"If I asked her, she wouldn't tell mom either." April said.
"If you say so." Jim said, straightening up. He headed straight for the door and pushed it open, only to find he had bumped it into Maggie's head. "Are you ok?"
Maggie smiled as she rubbed her head. "I'm fine, thanks."
Jim smiled, knowing she had been listening in on their conversation, before looking over at Yumi and Jérémie, who were mouthing something. "Hey, no talking! You're in detention!"
Yumi shut her mouth, annoyed that she couldn't finish her question to Jérémie. She looked at him and noticed he guessed the rest of her question and nodded his head just slightly.
Yumi blinked her eyes, letting him know she understood and went back to reading her text book.
"How long is their detention?" Maggie asked.
"Two hours." Jim answered.
"Well, let's go unpack." Maggie said, looking down at April.
-.-.-.-
"Are you ok?" Maggie asked as the two walked over to the dormitory where they were staying for the week.
"Yes, why do you ask?" April asked.
"Well, if I ran into my father out of nowhere, I would be kind of flustered."
"Flustered?"
"Confused."
"I do not know what I am." April admitted.
-.-.-.-
Odd stretched as the five walked out of the library. "I'm going to be good at sleeping with my eyes open soon."
"I figured you would've already known how." Yumi said, smiling.
"Where's Mom and April?" Aélita said, trying to remember to say Mom instead of Maggie.
"Odd!" April called as she walked over, ear buds in her ears.
"Hey April." Odd said. "This is Yumi."
"The Japanese?" April guessed.
"Yes!" Yumi said, surprised someone got it right.
"I have tried to learn the language, but have only learned some in a song." April said, showing Yumi her MP-3.
"Fukai Mori, I haven't heard that song in ages." Yumi said, smiling.
"Here." April handed Yumi one of the buds and they listened to the song.
"What other languages do you have on there?" Odd asked.
"The German, the French, the English of course, the Japanese, the Chinese, the Swedish, the Hebrew, the Dutch, and I think that is all. Oh, and the Romanian." April said, trying to remember.
"Have you heard of the Subdigitals?" Ulrich asked.
"With Nico, Chris, and Ben?"
Ulrich nodded his head, smiling.
"I love them! I have their English and French CDs."
"They have an English CD?" Aélita asked.
"And, I think, a Spanish one, but I do not really care for the language, so I did not get it."
"Hey, I've got to go and run a program." Jérémie said, trying to think of a way to get away.
"Uh, sure Jérémie." Aélita said, waving to him as they walked over to a bench in the court yard.
"Is he alright?" April asked, watching Jérémie walk off to the dorms. "He always wants to be on his computer."
"That's just Einstein." Odd said.
"Einstein?" April asked, wondering why they called him that. "A nickname?"
"Ya. Because he's smart." Ulrich said.
April turned off her MP-3 and got the ear bud back from Yumi so she could put it in her pocket. "Aélita, I think you should check on your friend. I think he feels alone." April looked up at Aélita as April sat down.
"I think you're right." Aélita said. "Thanks." Aélita turned around and walked over to the dorms.
"Jérémie is not a person of people is he?" April asked.
"I don't think he is." Yumi said. "We all became his friend on accident and didn't really know him before the incident. Well, all but Ulrich."
"Should I ask about the incident?" April offered.
"Probably not." Odd said, shaking his head. "Hey, you wanna play Roi?"
"Sure, how do you play?" April asked.
"It's easy, just got to find a deck of cards." Ulrich said.
"I have some in my room." April offered. She looked up and saw storm clouds. "I think it was supposed to rain today too. We can play Roi in my room."
"Lead the way!" Yumi said as the rain clouds dropped, soaking them before they made it inside.
"At least you do not have to worry about the rains flooding right now, no?" April asked as she led them down the first floor hallway.
"Not normally." Ulrich said.
"I've never seen any of the rooms down here." Yumi said.
"They are like apartments." April said. She looked up at the number on the door and pulled out her key. She opened the door and said "And here is the one I share with Maggie."
April hit the light-switch just inside and a small hallway appeared. She led them inside to turn into another part of a hallway. To her right was a bed room and to her left was a bathroom. "We can play on the island." April said, motioning over to where there was a kitchen. Separating it from the living room was an island with four stools. April went into the bed room they had past as Odd, Ulrich, and Yumi went over to the island and pulled the stools around so that the four would be facing each other.
As Odd was pulling two chairs into the kitchen area, he noticed a fridge, as tall as he was. "Hey April, is there any food in your fridge?"
"What is a fridge?" April asked as she walked out of her room and over to the island. In her hand was a deck of cards.
"A refrigerator." Yumi said.
"Ya there is food inside." April said as she went over to Odd's side of the island. "You can get us some Ho Hos, please?"
Odd opened the fridge, trying to remember what a Ho Hos was. Not getting anywhere, even with looking inside, he turned and asked as she sat the cards down, "What's a Ho Hos?"
"I was about to ask the same thing." Ulrich asked.
"It is a little chocolate cake with a crème filling." April said as she went over to behind Odd. "There they are!"
Odd moved out of the way so that she could get to the little cakes. "These." She pulled out four individually wrapped cup cakes with a white swirly line on the top.
April handed them to her new friends as she and Odd sat back down at the island. She unwrapped hers and started to eat as she asked, "Ok, how do you play this Roi game?"
"Well, since this is your first time, we won't worry about the past king or queen or loser." Yumi started as she began to shuffle the cards.
"Who are they?"
"The King was the last winner, moi!" Odd explained. "Queen is whoever was in second place, and the loser is the person who lost last game."
"So it's like Monopoly were it never ends, no?" April asked.
"Kind of." Ulrich said. "Now, three is the lowest and two is the highest." April gave him a weird face before he continued. "I know, weird."
Yumi finished dealing out the deck, leaving no card to be alone. "It's easier if you put your cards in order, but suit doesn't matter." She picked up her own deck and started to do that herself. "When you put down cards, you have to put down a card with a higher value. Like, if I put down a jack, than you have to put down either another jack or something higher like a king or two. Whoever puts down the last card that nobody can play on, like somebody put down a two and nobody can put another two on top, than the person who put down the two puts aside the deck and starts another round. Whoever losses all of their cards first, is Roi."
"Oh, it is like the japanese game "Rich man, Poor man", no?" April asked.
"Just a different name." Yumi said, nodding her head. "I didn't figure you would know that name for it."
"Fruba. But it has been a while since I last played it." April said, shrugging her shoulders as she looked down at her cards to put them in order. "Cool, let's play." April said, finishing with putting her cards in order.
"Since you dealt, I get to go first!" Odd said, pulling out a set of three tens.
"Now you have to put down a set of three of a card with a higher value of ten." Ulrich explained.
"Ok, how about this?" April asked as she put down three kings.
"Nice." Ulrich said as he put down three aces.
"Skip." Yumi said. She looked at April and explained. "I don't have anything that high with three of."
"Right."
"Skip." Odd said, laying his cards face down on the table.
"How about this?" April asked as she put down three twos.
"You won that round, but you won't win the game!" Odd said as Yumi pulled the pile out of the way, over by the wall to her left.
"You get to put down the first card of the next round." Ulrich said.
April looked at her deck and pulled out two threes. The game went on like this in till April had only one card and Odd had three. Yumi and Ulrich both had four.
Ulrich put down a seven and looked at Yumi to see her put down an eight. Odd played a queen, hoping April's last card wasn't a king.
"Sorry Odd." April said as she laid down the missing king. "I just took your title!"
"Come on, who get's queen?" Odd asked as Ulrich skipped.
"Skip." Yumi said.
"Ha!" Odd said, laying down the last ace.
"So you are a girl." April said, laughter in her voice.
"Some would say." Ulrich said.
"What's that supposed to mean?!" Odd asked as Ulrich and Yumi battled it out to see who was the Loser.
"Well, you do have a high pitched voice." Yumi said as she laid down her last card, making Ulrich Loser.
"And you wear purple." April said, looking at him. "In America, that means you are gay."
"Can't a guy wear purple if he wants to?" Odd asked, sounding mad.
"Hey, I know that Americans are stupid." April said. "Just because I wear black, people ask if I am emo." April stood up and collected all the trash, throwing it into the trash can under the counter. "They are all about the color of your clothes. If you wear red, you are part of the Bloods; blue, than you are a Crips; white, than you are rich; green, you are an Army person; and the worst part is that they do not care if you really are whatever, they will just think it is so."
"You're not the normal 'Red, white, and blue American' are you?" Ulrich asked.
April sat back down next to Odd and shook her head. "I have a Japanese stuffed cat, a French Christmas pillow, and a Chinese lucky poster in my room back in America. You think whatever you want."
Yumi put the cards back in the box, seeing they weren't going to play anything else, as a crack of thunder went through out the apartment. "Are you going to be going to classes this week?" Yumi asked, sliding the cards over to her.
"Yes, my teachers next year are going to count this to my grades." April said. "I already get an A for my first semester in my French class for spending a week here."
"Isn't that an easy grade?" Odd asked, smiling.
"I hope Jérémie is alright." April said, remembering before the storm hit.
"We'll find out soon." Odd said, looking up at the clock. "It's lunch time!"
"Already, my day has been so confused." April said, getting up and walking to her room to put away the cards.
"What do you mean?" Yumi asked as she, Odd, and Ulrich followed her to the door.
"Time zone changes." April said, walking out of the room.
"I know how that is." Odd said. "Every time I go to see my grandma."
"Where does she live, your grandma?" April asked as the four started out to the hallway.
"New Zealand." Odd explained.
April locked the door and turned towards her new friends. "Should not we tell Aélita and Jérémie?"
"I'll go up and get them." Yumi said as she turned to go up the stairs.
"See you Yumi." Ulrich said as they spit.