Diamond Fires

CHAPTER 1: The New Roommate

Walking down the carpeted corridor, Miri rolled her suitcase until she reached Dorm 2: Dust. 

It was across dorm number 1 and next to 4. She was in her last year of middle school, Year 9, so she assumed her dorm was at the end of the corridor. Still, it was strange for the number one to be last. 

Then again, nothing had been particularly ordinary about her experience at Glen so far. Her house test had been one of the strangest she'd ever taken and she had just passed a fireplace-lit 'living room'  for the dorms of this house, Narubia. The 'special' house. Typical, the school year hadn't even started and she was already an outsider!

She stopped for a moment to take in the mind-boggling view from the window; in the distance she could see a half moon spotlighting a wall of proud mountains and a silk ribbon of a river trickling down slowly. A thousand twinkling stars were like fairy lights against the velvet black sky. The sight was tranquil and eased her nerves. I suppose I could get used to this.

She pulled her gaze away from the window and knocked on the door. A bright voice hollered, "Hold on just a second!" and a few seconds later, a tall lithe girl flung the door open. At first Miri was stunned,  the girl standing in front of her looked like a model! She had jet-black wavy hair to the top of her shoulders and her presence was loudly positive.

She had a sunny smile on her almond shaped face, "Hey! Come in! You must be my new roommate!"

Miri was so glad, she seemed like a relatively nice person, "Thanks! Yeah, Prof Marlo told me to come here."

She walked into a huge room that was decorated to be cosy, but simultaneously looked modern. There were twin wooden-framed beds separated by a cushioned window seat and matching bedside tables beside each. They were raised above the ground by two storage drawers, the sheets and cushions a combination of greys and purples.

Her mouth hung open as she exclaimed, "This is amazing! It's even better than my own room!" It was very spacious, with a small bookshelf and two twin wardrobes on the light-coloured walls.

The other girl laughed, light blue eyes twinkling, "Yeah that was exactly my reaction, except mine involved more running around and touching things!"

Miri was temporarily distracted by those eyes that seemed to look right through her, as if she was air. Snapped out of it, she awkwardly laughed along and the pyjama-clad girl introduced herself excitedly in a fully-fledged American accent, "I'm Ella, Ella Arai. I'm Japanese-American, but I've been to this school for like, forever! Are you excited to be here?"

"I guess I am? I'm Miri Hale, by the way. I was brought up in Europe by an American family." She stood up straight to face her. I should at least try to make a good impression. But how can someone pull-off the pyjama look and still manage to look graceful, who is this girl?

Ella plopped down onto her bed, beckoning Miri to sit on hers. "Wow, that's so cool!"

Miri giggled and set down her suitcase, "Yeah, I suppose it's interesting."

An awkward silence ensued as she struggled to find something to say, never being the one to keep a conversation going.

Ella finally spoke up, "So, you can sit down and then I'll show you all the school rules, ok?" she smirked and whispered, "Although I honestly don't even know half of them and just don't care about the other half."

Miri scoffed and sat down on the bed on the right, opposite to her new roommate. Ella tossed a booklet at her, on the cover was printed 'GLEN Academy Rules'.

"Thanks." Miri caught it, just barely, and began to leaf through it:

Dress Code-

· You must wear your uniform during classes and at school events. This does not include school dances, balls, open night and formal evenings.

· You may wear jewellery, as long as it is not distracting.

· Outside of classes you may wear an outfit of your choice, but it may not be derogatory or include any offensive images or words.

· On school sports events and in sport classes you must wear the sports uniform.

· Secondary sports applies for the above, unless your teacher has instructed you to make any changes.

Attendance-

· You may not skip any classes without a note from the nurse or any member of the faculty or unless there is an obvious disability.

· You must be present in your homeroom at 8:30am and in the afternoon at 4pm on every school day for roll call.

She threw it to the side, "Boring! It's the same at every school!"

"Yeah pretty much!" The lanky girl shifted and began to play with a small ball that she found amongst the mess on her bed. "But this school has its perks, let me show you!" Ella suddenly stood up, grinning with barely contained excitement.

The new girl smiled, she had never met someone this enthusiastic at first interaction, "All right, show me!"

The taller girl dug into her cluttered desk drawer and fished out a tattered map, "Here, I'll show you the campus!" She walked over to Miri's bed and plopped down heavily.

"First of all," she pointed to a rectangle shaped building with a big circle behind it and paths leading into fields and eventually to the forest, "We have stables!"

Miri laughed, "Seriously? What kind of rich-kid school is this?"

Elle pushed her elbow playfully, "A very special one. Maybe on Monday after school, I can take you there, okay?"

Miri's eyes were bright at the thought of riding again, but she kept her calm, "Yeah, that would be fun."

Ella laughed, "Well that's only the beginning! The best parts of the year are the overnight fieldtrips. We have one at the beginning of the year, one in the middle and the longest one at the end! We travel to different places, stay in hostels and everything! It's one of the best experiences."

Miri's eyes widened, she had never experienced that kind of extravagance, "Woah. I'm actually starting to not hate this whole moving away thing."

She chuckled, "I'm not done yet! We have many school events, like dances, sport days, field days, inter-class competitions and much more. Plus, we have open-night concerts once a month, so people can perform their talents and basically showcase their work. There's probably a lot more, but I'm too lazy to say it all." She finished sheepishly, having interrupting Miri's comments at several intervals.

The other girl just sat there, "I'm surprisingly looking forward to see all of it."

Ella looked at her analytically, "Well new girl, I hope GLEN doesn't disappoint."

Miri was still smiling, "As long as it distracts me." She pushed a piece of her dark, silky hair behind a petite ear.

Ella's phone started to ring and she went to answer it, giving the shorter girl an apologetic look. She shook her head and made a shooing motion with her hands, "Don't worry about it, I still have to unpack."

Hello my lovely little pandas! 

Yes, that is what I'm going to call you from now on :) This is the second chapter and the progress is still a little slow but don't worry, there's a lot more to come! SO stay tuned and be prepared. Vote vote vote so that I know you want more!

Love and cookies,

Kia