You're a What!?, Siagrrl [best books to read for beginners txt] 📗

“Helllooo?” She cooed. “Earth to space cadet, Serah?”
I shuddered back to reality. “Huh? Oh, sorry.” I rambled. “Guess I must’ve zoned out.”
“Yeah,” Claudia giggled, “You zoned out while staring at Eve. Someone’s got a girl crush!”
I shrugged. She may be better looking than me, but she sure isn’t as mature as me.
“No, I don’t. But she does have her looks going for her.” I said simply. Repressing the urge to say that she was better looking than Claudia, herself – a fact I knew would make her completely jealous.
“All faeries do.” Alyssa smirked.
Fantasy and Education.

During the train ride home, I couldn’t help but think about faeries. I don’t know much about the fantasy genre: definitely less than the other girlie-girls at my school, who adored faerie romance novels and fantasy movies, as a lot of them have been made recently. That and the fact that my parent thought that those kinds of things were childish. I’ve read one faerie novel before, once about four years ago when I was eleven at my cousins’ house, and surprise, surprise, it was Alyssa who had lent me the book in the first place.

For about the next month following that, I had dreamt about beautiful people with sparkling wings and colourful attire who would turn me into a faerie to escape the pitiful pit of boredom I call my life. My new life would begin in a forest – somewhere exotic – sleeping on toadstools and sipping nectar from nearby roses. It wasn’t long after that, that I had been in a magic store talking to a ‘renowned’ medium of sorts, and pestering mum to allow me to buy books that would allow me to ‘speak’ to the faeries.

I should have known better.

Faeries, magic and the entire fantasy genre didn’t fit in with the ideals my parents had set out for me. My mum had dragged me from that store after giving the ‘medium’ and earful of things no eleven year old should hear, about her tricking me into purchasing from that store and lying etcetera, etcetera.

Faeries, I was informed, were too childish for someone my age and I was too naive to believe in them in the first place; the idea was created by drug addicts and people with too much time on their hands. What my mum really meant, as I realized later, was that faeries, in this day and age, were classified as the time-wasters’ dream, and I wasn’t supposed to even think about anything other than education. Sex, boys and things of a fantasy nature were all bad. Aside from that, unlike Claudia, I was never allowed to socialize – even with a chaperone, or a venue that was public. Claudia is family and Alyssa is my next door neighbor so my parents classify them as ‘exceptions.’ I was forbidden from bringing people home, much less be alone with them away from home. Sometimes I can’t help but wonder why I am allowed to go to school at all, considering that there are people there.

Oh, the shock and horror.

Upon reaching the prison I call home, I entered through the front door and fond my mum in the kitchen, starting dinner early – which wasn’t unusual when she had to work night shifts at the hospital. I slid my bad off my shoulder, onto the floor and propped my elbows up on the counter to watch my mum. Thin and fit for a woman of her age, sporting thick graying brown hair tied back in a high ponytail and an apron cinched around her waist; over her body hugging knee length casual dress. None of the mothers of my friends, even when they did cook, wore an apron – not Alyssa’s, whose mum didn’t know how to make anything other than a toasted cheese sandwich, or my other next door neighbours – little Suzie who walked a similar path to school as me – parents who only give her organic, all natural meals. But my mum is rarely home – because of work – and she feels that it’s the duty of the mother to provide. So she does. In the form of food.

“Hey, Mum,” I greeted. “Can I ask you something…?” Mum half-turned, brushing a loose lock of hair away from her face and smiling. “Sure. What is it?”
“How come you don’t like me getting to close to people?” I asked.
“Oh.” She paused for a moment, stirring the vat of stew on the stove. “Look, Serah, you’re – different.” Mum had said this before, and it was starting to get annoying. “Different how?”
“Well – you can’t deal with people to well.” She said slowly, pursing her lips. I know how much mum hates having this conversation, but I couldn’t stand it. I needed to know. Of course, it was true that I didn’t know how to deal with people to well – I stuttered and babbled around strangers and classmates – but aren’t you supposed to learn through experience? How could I get confident, self-reliant or even mildly sociable, if my parents kept me in a large glass cage and never let me go anywhere or do anything?

“I can handle people perfectly fine,” I pouted. “I would just like to be able to have the choice.” I held my breath.
I shouldn’t have bothered.
“You know how I feel about you being around people,” she sighed. “It’s too risky.” She gave a little shriek as the flame on the stove suddenly went to high and started burning the pot. “Ah! My stew!”

I sighed.

Disappearing Act

In the school library the next day, trying against all odds – that being boredom, the constant ‘tic’ of the library clock and the numerous noisy peers that littered the room – to research books on English Literature between the 1940’s to the late 1960’s, the Modern History of Germany after the Nazi regime and the Science behind Physics, I kept feeling that my mind, as well as my gaze, was drawn towards other books – that had no relation to English Literature, Modern History or any form of Science.

Books that generally had the word fairy or faerie in the title. There were more of them than I originally thought: The Fantasy Realm – Faeries, The Big Book of Fairy Legends, The Enchanted Garden, and Fantastic Faeries. I didn’t think our school library allowed such types of non-fiction on the grounds. I was reaching for the first one when a soft voice spoke from behind me: “”Y’know, most of those aren’t very accurate.” I spun around, surprised. Eve was leaning against a nearby bookshelf, sporting a small smile. Up close, her looks were even more striking; her face was heart-shaped and flawless, like a fashion model seen in one of those masterfully created magazines. Her hair was longer than it looked yesterday and her eyes – upon closer inspection – were just as blue as Claudia’s, if not more, giving the clear blue sky a run for its money. I though of what Alyssa and Claudia had said – that she wore weird clothes, but surprisingly, they actually suited her.

“What aren’t very accurate?”

“Those books.” She stepped forward and took The Enchanted Garden off the shelf. “They’re all just going to tell you the same old thing. That fairies have sparkly wings, have magical powers, live in mushroom houses and are 2 inches tall –” She said matter-of-factly, followed by a roll