Soul Colors

Chapter 3

​ The fresh afternoon air feels like heaven on my skin as I check out of school. I have youth group today. I really don't like youth group. It truly is the most boring thing in the world. All you hear about is how to be a "good example". I have been trained to be a "good example" since I was five years old. As though I will have any effect on the bad behavior of those around me. Bad behavior that seems to be non-existent.

​ I've still got two hours before I have to go, though. Two hours to do homework and hide in my room hoping my mum doesn't snap. It was a walk. It was an idiotic walk. I do have some freedom, don't I?

​ Ian and Will are already home when I walk in. They're in the sitting room on a green couch, their white and black uniforms getting rumpled as they play dexterity games on their tablets. From the sound of things, Will is winning.

​ I don't say anything to them, just hurry upstairs to my room. I go to plop down on my bed, but stop and think better of it. I should start my homework. Or study. Or do anything but try and sleep. Youth group starts in less than two hours. My lovely, twice-weekly ritual is truly a pain in the you-know-what. Not just because it totally takes away any free time to just think and enjoy my life. So I sit down at my desk and start typing up my English essay on my tablet.

​ It's already five by the time I finish, meaning I have just an hour to get ready and walk there. I get up from my desk and walk over to my mirror. My hair is in disarray. The wind, no doubt, has rendered my sort-of-wavy hair a knotty, tangled web of dark green. Grabbing my hairbrush, I slowly begin to work out the knots and tangles. I don't want to leave it down, so I grab a hair tie and quickly braid my hair so that it's sitting all to one side. It looks somewhat better, at least. Not that anyone will even care. Molly's really my only good friend.

​But what about the boys? A niggling voice in the back of my head wonders. What about that guy who will be stuck with me in a month?

​ I can't think about that. The guy who ends up my husband can think whatever he wants. Who on earth actually cares how I look?

​ Oh right. We're the only people left on earth.

​With that happy thought, I leave my room and head for the foggy street.

​The youth center is a plain grey stone building located on the water. From its windows, you can see the glassy surface of the bay and the peak of Signal Hill. Which is why, I suppose, we're forced to sit with our backs to the view. At least the fog is rolling in right now, obscuring the city around me. I'm not missing anything, just whorls and eddies of mist.

Molly is waiting by the doors for me. She's always punctual, at least. Although I tend to be on time when I'm without my brothers.

"So did you hear about Corrina Daly?" Molly asks quietly as we walk inside.

"No, I didn't." I say, peering around the other people in the dark hallway trying to spot her. "What happened to her?"

"I heard that she got caught snogging some yellow guy. I think they both got kicked out of the settlement." Molly adds in a hushed whisper.

"What?" I hiss. Corrina is one of those people who never seemed to break a single rule. Her homework was always in on time, her hair always perfectly styled, her friends always perfectly chaste. Now I'm wondering if all of that was a cover for her illegal behavior. Really, you can't do that sort of thing. Not even with a fellow green. You can't kiss a boy until you know that he's the one. That takes an awful lot of guts to just openly defy the government like that. Guts that I don't have and pray I'll never have.