I woke up that morning feeling the same way I did every morning- annoyed.
Why people insist on trying to knock the door down to wake me up, I don’t know. I mean, a simple shaking of the shoulder, and a “wake up Bailey” would be much more effective. Even if they poked me or tickled my feet would be better. But no, fist through the door it is.
Still grumbling about this fact, I swung open the door to look straight into Raileighs cool eyes.
“What?” I snarled.
She didn’t even flinch. 5 of 16 years of our lives being roommates made her used to my hatred of waking up early in the morning.
“Jesus Bailey, quit whining about the way I wake you up. Would you rather I let you sleep in and be late? Or even better, stick your hand in a bucket of warm water so you piss yourself?”
Unable to think up an impressive argument, I gave her the best death-stare I could muster at 7 in the morning. Which is to say, I looked about as intimidating as a 5 year old throwing a hissy fit.
She snorted and walked off, already dressed and organised and looking, as usual, completely flawless. Raileigh was wearing a pair of black shorts and a pale blue singlet top with a brand logo I didn’t recognise covering the bottom left corner and a pair of strappy silver sandals.
Some of her ancestors way back were native American Indians, so she was luck enough to have skin a light bronze colour, the kind that most girls try (and fail) to achieve through tanning and solariums, but only end up getting cancer. That was as far as the Cherokee in her went, because her eyes were a bright green and her straight; shoulder length hair was a really pretty gold kind of colour.
Beside her I look as out of place as freaking tits on a bull. Average height, i.e. I came up to her shoulder. Curly mahogany hair that has to stay long, because when its cut short just ends up turning into an annoying Afro, and dark blue eyes. My eyes and hair stood out pretty well against my fair skin that I’d given up trying to darken long ago. No matter how long I spent in the sun, I would just burn, badly, and remain my usual, stubborn colour. Raileigh swears I glow in the dark.
Quickly throwing on a pair of cut of jeans, t-shirt, favourite ballet flats and working my hair into its usual braid, I followed Raileigh out of our apartment.
“Is it pancake day?” I asked through a mouthful of bobby pins.
She thought for a moment before shaking her head, “That’s tomorrow. I think its waffles today.”
We walked in silence the rest of the way to the dining hall, me still blinking sleep out of my eyes, while attempting to pin back any unruly curls.
Technically it was a dining hall, or at least that’s what ’they’ tried to get us to call it. But that was a fancy name for what was clearly just a cafeteria.
The dining hall’s walls were a simple pale blue colour. But that was as plain as it got. The chairs and tables were an assortment of colours, styles and sizes. Everyone here had their own furniture that they chose for themselves, so there were no, ’that’s my spot’ issues.
But the usually cheerful and loud dining hall was silent, with everyone looking downcast and not making eye contact with anyone else. It was the kind of silence that was unnatural, and signified there was something very, very wrong going on.
It wasn’t until we got into the hall and noticed the giant projector screen pulled down at the front of the room, that we knew what was going on. This was the day that everyone dreaded, but thankfully only occurred every 6 months.
“It’s Selection day”, Raileigh breathed.
