My Story

“Embroidery Basics”

“Let’s sew!”

“Sewing made simple”

boring, boring and boring. With a yawn, i snapped each book shut on its dusty cover and tossed them one by one onto the floor. What's the BIG deal about all those sewing and embroidery and clothes making and those stuff? I've never read anything as useless as that in all the 13 years of my life. Its like, cooking's alright, cos what's the point in living alone without knowing how to cook? and that's exactly what I’m planning to do. Living alone, that is. Dad's not exactly crazy about that idea but whatever.

  And maths is fun. So is history. Quite. Apart from all the 'mental calculation' stuff. I always seem to get that wrong. I'm quite careless really. At least that's what Dad always call me. 'my dear little careless Sofea'. i hate that nickname. Its the only thing worse than sewing or romance novels. Don't get me wrong. I love books. Its the thing i like most apart from my family. It's just that, i think romance novels are seriously mushy and gushy and yucky. A little is alright but THE WHOLE BOOK?! No thank you. I prefer adventure stories.

With a yawn, I snapped each book shut, and tossed them one by one onto the floor. I pulled myself out of the dusty old window seat which I was sitting in (i.e. forced to sit on by Dad) to ‘read up on my sewing’ and retrieved my torn and tattered old book from beneath a loose floorboard in the room. I rushed outside, not bearing to be stuck in that little room any longer. Slowly, I made my way out of the village, and into the dense, emerald green forest.

"Oof!"

What the hell?

I was unpleasantly surprised as my face met with the damp forest floor. Sitting up, I looked around and noticed a fallen tree branch beside my foot. Tripping and falling was nothing new to me. It was as common as the sun rising in the morning, but it happened much more often than once a day. As I brushed the dirt off myself, I noticed a strange print with the corner of my eye. I turned to examine it more closely, and noticed that it must have come from a horse.

A big horse at that.

The biggest horse in my village was the size of a small donkey, and large animals like the horse who made the prints, were a rarity. Deciding it must have been a passing rider, I picked myself up, and continued walking.

Stomping noisily through the thick undergrowth of the forest I found the familiar path, leading to my favourite place in the forest – a beautiful clearing. Even though I’ve been walking this path for years, something seemed different. Bemused, I couldn’t shake the feeling and scanned the surroundings of pretty birch trees and majestic old oaks, which seemed to carry the weight of the whole world on their knobbly branches, hoping to find something out of the blue. I gasped as my gaze fell on the biggest, tallest birch tree in the clearing. Tethered to it stood a magnificent, gigantic coal-black stallion in the midst of munching contently on a cupful of apples and oats placed between its perfectly formed forelegs. It was beautiful.

Mesmerised by the majesty of that great big stallion and lost in my own thoughts, I didn't notice a foot poking out of the side of my favourite spot, an old oak whose bark was surprisingly smooth and perfect for reading on, until it was too late.

"Wha-" I tripped over the foot, landing face-down on a puddle of mud. I leapt up indignantly, glaring blindly at whoever the culprit was, spluttering as mud entered my open mouth.

“Hello, over here?” An amused voice sounded in my mud-clogged ears as a pale long-fingered hand waved in front of my face.

“Oh er…”I turned to face the person, ignoring the rush of heat at the back of my neck as I realised how embarrassing that fall was. That was when the full force of my embarrassment hit.

Standing in front of me was a boy, maybe around one or two years older. His brown hair fell over his eyes, and was specked with gold.

Shiny shimmering gold. Yeah. Weird, I know. But the weirdest (i.e. most interesting) part of his face was his eyes. Large, long-lashed and forest green eyes.

No, wait, hold on. Now they looked blue.

No…brown.

Violet!

Green again.

Whose eyes change colour like that?

I stared at his straight, nose and high cheekbones. His face altogether was quite handsome.

“Hey, are you alright?” The pale hand waved in front of my face again, “Hellooo…Anyone home?” The hand began to wave more frantically.

I snapped back to reality.

"Huh? Wha-" My face blushed red as I noticed that I was openly staring.

"I said, a-r-e- y-o-u- a-l-r-i-g-h-t-?" The boy looked at me, speaking deliberately slowly, as if I was a three year old. I tried to walk away, but tripped and fell again as I was standing up.

“My, my! Is falling a hobby of yours?” He began to laugh.

I felt the colour drain from my cheeks. I was thirteen, not three, and in no mood for jokes and stupid bullies like him. A rush of anger filled me to the brim as I glared furiously at that strange guy.

Before i knew it, my bunched-up fist was heading straight towards his face and that stupid nose I once thought was nice. I relished the thought of my fist breaking his nose into tiny shattered pieces. I braced myself for the impact and shut my eyes. Liking the thought of breaking someone's nose doesn't mean one has to see it actually happen after all.

"OWW!"

The word burst out of my lips before I could stop it.

Wha-

How come his nose was so hard?! Even Billy, that big rock of a bully's nose wasn't half as hard as that. It didn't feel like a nose. More like a…a rock! Or a fist.

Aha. A fist..

I snapped my eyes open.

I knew it.

That guy just blocked my punch! Wha- How was that even possible? A stupid arrogant smirk was comfortably seated on his face. Well. If he won't wipe it off then I will. My fist started flying again.

"Hey, hey, wait!" he raised his hands high above his head.

This time he couldn’t defend himself. All the better to hit with then. I lunged.

Somehow his hands came back in time to block my punch. He twisted my arms away, and grabbed me by the shoulders. I glared at him furiously.

“Please do let go” I said sweetly, “I’m dying to bash you up”

He gaped at me, taken aback. “Look, what do you want? You trip over my foot, and when I ask you if you’re alright you start hitting me?” he shot me an incredulous look, “I'm just here for some peace and quiet to read my book and you come crashing in and threaten to beat me? Are all you people like this? No wonder Father always forbade me to come Could you maybe go away now?”

So he was angry. Well, I could afford to be angrier. And what was with that ‘you people’? He mustn’t be from around.

"Look here.” I pushed his arms off my shoulders and jabbed him in the chest. He didn’t flinch. "What do you by this? I've been coming here ever since I was six to read. No one's going to make me 'go away' from my own spot.” Realization on what he said caught up to me, “Hold on. Did you say you come here to read?”

“What's wrong with that? It’s stranger to find a girl reading you know…” He gave me a look showing such extreme annoyance that I burst into a fit of giggles.

“Nothing really, it’s just that most in my village find reading a waste of time.”

“Well. Then I'm special then, don't you think?” He flashed me a goofy grin.

Suddenly, I realized that I wasn’t angry anymore. I had a strange urge to talk with him.

“I’m sorry” I apologised, “I didn’t mean to fight you. I’m just not used to anyone else coming here. It scared me a bit.” I stuck out my hand and put on my best smile.

He shook my hand and gave me a dazzling smile. A strange euphoria seemed to replace all of the anger.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Eylan.”

Okayy… Weird name…

“So, what books do you like to read?” I asked him without trying to sound too curious. I failed miserably, as usual. I was too intrigued by this mysterious boy who reads.

"Well," His eyes start to have a faraway look.