Fair Faerie Academy: Alumina the Light Faerie - Part One

      I sat in my dormitory looking outside my window at the pouring rain and the way the enchanted streetlights made eerie shadows on the stone pavement. I didn't have any roommates; I was all alone. I used to have roommates but they all left. First was Neiva, a Snow Faerie; she was accepted into this program all the way in Terror Mountain. So now she's off learning from Taelia, one of the most famous Snow Faeries of all time, while I'm here looking out of my window, having the highlights of my weekends being reading the Neopian Times and not having any homework. Then there is Amber, a Fire Faerie, who couldn't come back from her summer vacation because she got a really contagious disease from her trip to Virtupets Space Station and now she probably wont be able to come back till after the Day of Giving break; I'm not as jealous of her.

      But I'm not going to be lonely soon. The headmistress called me into her office this morning and told me that there is this new faerie coming to the academy and she wanted me to show her around because she was going to be my new roommate. She told me that her name was Rose and that she is starting school tomorrow, so she will be here tonight. I already made space for her stuff and I can already imagine how she will look like. Rose is such an Earth Faerie name. She will have brilliant green eyes, long straight brown hair, she will have great fashion taste like me and she will be my best friend. So I get a little carried away sometimes; it's just that it would be great to have someone to talk to on rainy days like this.

      I always fall asleep when it rains. There's just something about the rain drumming against the window pane that acts like a lullaby to me. So to try and stay awake I decided to get ahead and start reading my Potions textbook. Potions is one of the hardest subjects in the academy. I was in the middle of chapter 11, about what was the difference between healing potion XI and healing potion X, and I didn't even notice when somebody came in. I looked up from my textbook absentmindedly when I saw a girl coming in carrying a ton of boxes. I got up so fast that my textbook fell on the floor with a big thud.

     "Oh, sorry, let me help you," I said, taking the boxes from her.

     "Thank you very much," said box girl with a quiet, musical voice.

      I put her boxes next to my desk and turned around to introduce myself, but my introduction stuck in my throat when I saw her. She wasn't like I imagined her. She was an Earth Faerie and she did have brown hair, but that's about all I got right. She had light brown eyes, her dark curly brown hair was up in a bun, she was about a head shorter than me and she was wearing a large green shirt with a long jean skirt.

     "Hello, I'm Rose," she said, not seeming to notice the shock that I knew showed on my face.

     "H-hi, Rose." I shook my head, trying to recover myself and trying not to feel disappointed. I felt like a neopet who had just opened their last birthday present to find out that they didn't get what they asked for, but she wasn't a present. She was a faerie and I knew that I had made myself feel this way with all the high expectations I had. It wasn't her fault. "Welcome, Rose. My name is Alumina and I hope you like it here."

     "Nice to meet you, Alumina. Can you help me with my stuff? Sorry I didn't come earlier; I just got caught up doing something and then it started raining."

     "Sure, it's fine. I get carried away sometimes too."

     She had brought two big boxes and a little one with her. I decided to open the one that was labeled 'Stuff' while Rose unpacked a box labeled 'Clothes'. We started working, with the only sounds in the room being the rain hitting the window pane and her soft humming, that I don't think she even noticed she was doing.

      There were just a few more things that I needed to unpack from her box now. Some sort of bendable sticks that were attached to each other and some canvases, I think. All the canvases were blank except for one, but I didn't know if she was one of those faeries that didn't like anybody to look at their work so I just put it to the side with the rest of the canvases.

     "Um... Rose, what is this?" I asked, pointing at the sticks.

     "Oh, that's my easel. I like to paint; it's one of my hobbies. Actually that's what I got caught up doing."

     She took out the easel and put it next to the window and then she took the canvas that wasn't blank and propped it on the easel. It was a painting of the Faerieland Library. I had passed it millions of times, gone in there millions of times, but it never looked exactly like this. It had a sort of magic to it. You could see the librarian telling people to be quiet, happy neopets leaving with their new book and books flying around putting themselves back to where they belong. It looked so real, like you were actually there. You could feel the librarian's irritation about the loud neopets and the neopet's happiness about getting a book.

     "Wow, Rose. You did this? It's amazing. How long did it take you to do this?"

     "Thank you, Alumina, that is very nice of you to say. It just took me about an hour and then I also bought a book."

     I was about to ask her what book she got, but she asked me a question first.

     "So do you have any hobbies?"

     "Well, I like to read and I am in Fair Faeries Academy's cloud racer team."

     "Oh, that's really cool. You must be really good at it."

     "Well, I think I'm alright."

     It didn't take us that long to finish after that. She was actually really nice. It almost made me look over how she was dressed. I made a mental note to help her out with her wardrobe. The headmistress called her in to give her her new schedule and give her a speech about the rules and about the Academy. I hear it every start of the new school year. I probably have it memorized by now. I was lying in bed now thinking about how the new girl's first day in the Academy was going to be and hearing the rhythmic pitter patter of the rain hitting the window pane when I dozed off.

      I woke up the next day with my alarm clock playing a Faerie Sundaes melody. I had barely pushed the snooze button when I saw something moving and I sat up so fast I got a head rush. It was only Rose getting ready. I had forgotten I had a roommate. I decided to get up. We got ready for school in silence except for her soft humming. I think she always does this when she is doing something. I decided to wear this really cute white sundress with yellow flowers that I thought brought out my yellow light faerie wings and blond hair. I got my Potions textbook from the floor and put it in my book bag. I hadn't been really paying attention to Rose getting ready, so when I looked at her to tell her that we should get going it surprised me that she was wearing purple overalls over a blue T-shirt. She didn't look that bad; it's just that I didn't think anybody used overalls anymore. I didn't want to sound mean or like a fashion snob; I was just really surprised.

     "Interesting outfit, Rose," I said.

     "Thanks. I think it's very comfortable. Do you really think it looks good, because I didn't know if it did?" she asked, sounding a little worried.

     I smiled at her. It didn't really look that bad. She actually looked kind of good. Besides, comfort is something everybody looks for when buying clothes.

     "You look fine, Rose, don't fret, but you have a loose hair on your bun."

     "Oh, thanks."

     Then she did this swift thing with her hands and her hair was in a perfect ballerina type bun. I think if I had blinked I would have missed the whole thing. She must've had a lot of practice doing buns to do it that fast.

     "So are you ready to go?" she asked.

     "Yes. Come on, let's go."

      Turns out we had my first class together. The bad news was that it was Potions. I took my seat on the far right corner of the classroom. Rose sat next to me, where Amber used to sit. I had barely gotten my textbook, notebook and pencil out when I heard some taps on the black board. Everybody in the academy knew what that meant if they've ever had Ms. Defrain. Whatever chatter was going on in the classroom stopped. Of course Rose didn't know this. I was about to nudge her to tell her to look up, but Ms. Defrain had already spotted her. She was as short or shorter than Rose, but the way she looked at you made you feel so much smaller than her. That's what made her one of the most respected and intimidating teacher on the campus. I watched, wide eyed as she came toward Rose. I wanted to warn her, but it was too late. Ms. Defrain stopped in front of Rose's desk. Rose must have finally noticed something was up and looked up from her desk. Ms. Defrain just stared at her wordlessly. She wasn't even staring at me and I felt small. Rose just stared back at Ms. Defrain evenly and then just smiled. Did she actually smile? I asked myself. Was she looking at the same faerie teacher I was? Ms. Defrain did not smile back but simply said in a loud voice so that everybody in the class could hear her, "It seems we have a new faerie in our academy. What's your name?"

     "Rose, ma'am," she said politely.

     "Tell me, Rose, are you any good at Potions?"

     "I think I'm alright at Potions."

     "Well then, Rose, what is in a Desert Blumaroo Morphing Potion?"

     Ms. Defrain had not taught us any of that. She knew that nobody would know the answer. Especially the new faerie. I waited for Rose to say 'I don't know' and for Ms. Defrain to tell her something like 'I guess you're not alright at potions, so I advice you to look up and pay attention to my class when you hear me tap on the blackboard' or something like that.

     Rose simply just answered, "A secret Sakhmet sauce."

     Everyone waited for Ms. Defrain to say something. To my shock and I think to everybody else in the class, she said, "Hmm, very good, miss Rose. You know more than everybody in this class, especially after last week's test." She looked at everybody in the classroom. "Open your textbooks to page 334. Read sections one through ten and summarize what you've read in seven pages. It is due Wednesday."

     After class I took Rose aside and asked her how she knew Ms. Defrain's question.

     She studied my face for a while but she finally answered, "Five years ago I was recruited into this special program. It is for very gifted faeries. We didn't learn like you do in a classroom, in a school. When we learned potions, we went to Meridell and learned from Kayla herself. When we learned about the history of a place, we would go there and hear it from historians and even sometimes by the leaders of the place."

     "If you were in such a great program, why are you here now and why have I never heard of this program?" I asked.

     "Well, I finished it a year early. I know what you're thinking; a smart faerie amongst other smart ones is still smarter? I never asked to be smart; I have just always been like this. Faerie law says I have to have one more year of schooling, so I decided to come here and just finish my last year and have normal friends. All the other faeries just wanted to talk about school stuff. The program is very exclusive so barely anybody knows about it and now I probably blew it in there. I should have said something wrong, no I should just have said nothing!"

     "Whoa, wait a minute, Rose. You're smart, you said it yourself. Don't try to be something you're not. If you know it, say it and if you feel strongly about something, speak up. So don't let me ever hear you say anything like that again, okay?"

     She smiled at me and said, "You know, if you were someone from the program, you would probably be like referencing a book or something about these kind of situations."

     I smiled back and said, "Good thing I'm not smart like you, brainiac."

To be continued...