The Ringing

The Day that Changed it All

It started like a normal day-but, then again, doesn’t everything? Have you ever woken up and said, “I’m going to break my arm today,” or, “the Guards are going to come for my parents! Oh joy!” Every day is a normal day. Until the abnormal happens.

            I woke up to the strange buzzing noise of my alarm clock hovering in the air around me. I slapped it and it fell to the ground with a thud, its blue shell contrasting with my cold tile floors. I slipped out of my covers, threw on my navy school uniform, and slid downstairs to breakfast. I picked up a package of cereal and a serving of milk from my food compartment and mixed the two together in a bright orange bowl. I inhaled my cereal and then inspected my compartment, looking to see if some cookies or pudding had been inserted by our nutrition Assistant. I sighed-guess I had already reached my junk food limit for the week. Oh well. I grabbed a banana for a snack and started on the long walk to school.

            I ran along the gravely path, passing silver and teal houses, all shaped like a half circle just like ours. Apparently long ago they had square houses-but these were much more practical, the Guard said. They’re more pleasing to the eye, they would say, or that rain ran off them better.

            Rain. The sky closed up and started crying. Freezing wet spots blurred my vision momentarily and soaked my navy dress. But I smiled. They would have warm heaters ready to dry us off at school. And the rain would slow up Hector.

            I laughed and ran farther. Hector was my older brother, who left 15 minutes earlier than me to make it to Tertiary School, while I got to sleep in before walking to the adjacent Secondary School. But I always caught up to him. He was a slow walker, never seemed to care how late he was and how many times a Guard smacked him before opening the gates to let him in. I dashed through the soaking wet rain, muddy gravel splashing around me. Around the next turn, he would be, smiling and accepting defeat. I knew it. But as I turned the last corner and came up to the gate in front of all three schools, he was nowhere to be found.

            I shrugged and walked up to the middle Guard station. It was too late to look for Hector, for he would have gone through the third gate to Tertiary School, into the serious, boring world of learning to become an Official or an Assistant or worse, a Guard. I had only one year left before joining him in Tertiary School, and I was not looking forward to it. I sighed. I was just hoping that I would pass my Extracurricular tests next semester and get a grant to go to a Changeling school, where I could become an Artist or a Songwriter or a Novelist. “Now those are real jobs,” I mumbled to myself before snapping back to reality.

            I walked up to the Guard station and fished my ID out of my bag. I turned it

over in my hands before handing it to the surly, squinting guard. The ID was about ¼ inch thick plastic, with a picture of me looking bored in my school uniform in the top left corner. It then had all my information, my fingerprint, and a barcode under our school name in navy blue-Suffex County, Secondary School. Pretty original, right?

            He fingered my card and scanned it into his large, grey computer, and I could tell he was reading my information. Guards were always pretty nosy. Name: Annalise Jacobson. Eyes: Green. Hair: Red-Brown. Age: 14. Why did he care?

            The guard finally handed me my card back and I took it with a snap. I walked towards the school, following the large path to the giant, black double doors. I shuffled in with the rest of the kids, all in either navy dresses like mine or a navy pantsuit. We all filed in front of our light blue lockers, put our book bags inside, and took out our grey notebooks, a red textbook, and a pencil before standing against the white walls outside our classrooms, waiting for the teacher to take roll. We were emotionless, silent, like robots. That is, everyone except for Ophelia.