Confessions under a Tree

April 20th, 2018

6:47pm

Damaris entered out into the small backyard of her house from the backdoor, carrying a metal pail and a rag full of soap in one hand while in her right forearm she balanced the dishes from this evening's dinner. She sat down on the back steps and started to scrub away at the grease on the plates. As she focused on her task, a girl with dark hair around the age of sixteen immediately stepped outside slamming the door behind her. Damaris saw her walking over to the tree that had a rope swing attached to one of the thick branches in the backyard, leaning against the base of the tree slowly sliding down to its roots. She had seen her a week earlier, when the gates of Haven Community Nine opened to welcome immigrants that have been rescued by the government's forces. Each of the families that arrived was assigned to the residents in their already established homes for a couple of months, until the builders have set up homes for them. This rule however didn't apply to any resided families in their Haven Community if they had more than five people under their roofs, and Damaris' family was one of the few exceptions. She could agree that Freya and Daniel have enough on their shoulders as it is, raising seven energy filled children and running their local bakery at the same time, although, she tried to help make their lives easier by helping them the best that she could to her abilities.

Her thoughts were interrupted when she heard a voice call out, "Hey!"

Damaris immediately cocked her head looking around at who the dark haired girl was calling out to. There was no one else around outside than just the two of them, so she looked at the girl pointing one of her right fingers at herself with a slightly confused look and she answered, "Yes you! Wanna come over here and take a break?"

Damaris hesitated for a moment lowering her head looking into the stale water of her metal pail seeing her own reflection. She knew she had awkward social issues, since she felt most of the blonde girls around town didn't like partaking in conversing with her since she was the oddball of the Haven Community, having dark hair and all. But it wasn't her fault that she looks the way she does, she was just born like that. She took a long strand of her soft black wavy hair tucking it behind her ear staring at the water one last time, placed the pail aside on the step with the washed dishes and decided to join the girl crossing from her backyard to hers with no boundary or fence keeping her separated from the girl. Damaris sat down on the rope swing slowly rocking her feet as she swayed back and forth pondering for what to try to say to her as she twitched her fingers.

Her voice cracked as she introduced herself, "I'm Damar-"She took a brief cough to clear her throat and then tried again, "I'm Damaris, by the way."

The girl sitting down on the grass giggled a little and she replied, "Alice, Alice Coakley."

Damaris avoided eye contact flushed with embarrassment that her voice cracked in front of Alice. She started to feel a bit uncomfortable, being nearby this girl

"Looks like you had a lot of dishes to wash over there. Do you live in a huge household?"

Damaris giggled a little as she answered, "I....do actually. They're my foster family and I'm the oldest of the bunch. But it is a little challenging to help take care of seven younger siblings. So what is there to know about you? Are you adopted as well?"

"I'm not. I may look different from my family but that's just because this body isn't really mine but it used to be someone's body."

Damaris took a glance at Alice's face in complete disbelief. What did she mean that the person she saw her as isn't really her true self? Damaris felt a conflicting urge of uncertainty of how to respond to what she heard Alice said to her.