Fire in my Heart

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

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Rose

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I limped as fast as my legs could take me down the long rocky path, despite the constant

sting in my feet. That's what I get for running barefoot. The taste of blood gushed in my mouth and I also felt it, warm and sticky, trickle down my leg. I was already getting light headed from the loss of blood. 'Keep going', I told myself, 'If you stop, you'll die'. At the time, I wondered why I didn't stop. I secretly wished that I would pass out, it would make everything a lot easier for me. However, something told me that I couldn't stop no matter what, that I needed to stay alive, at least for now. So step by step, heartbeat by heartbeat, I kept going.

You might be wondering right now something along the lines of this. What was I running from? How did I get injured so badly? Where was I going? Well, quite honestly, I still don't know where I was going, but to answer the first two questions I should start at the beginning of that day.

I woke up at sunrise, as my everyone in my tribe always does, and put on my work clothes; a loose, rough, brown shirt and dirty jeans. My dry hair looked bland, so I put it up into a bun and slipped on my fur moccasins. Lila, my roommate and best friend, shifted in her bed.

"Wake up!" I yelled at her, shaking her shoulder.

In response, Lila let out a deep groan. Her usual perky self had disappeared, leaving a person much crankier. "Why can't I sleep in just once?" She moaned.

"Come on, your going to be late!" I said with a slight smile, "And you do NOT want punishment today. Corine told me she overheard that punishment this week had to do with 'pampering the elders'."

She just groaned even more, which I strangely found delight in. Corine was the daughter of the tribe leader, Seamon, so she basically knows everything that happens.

Reluctantly, Lila got up and put on her leather sandals. She started to out her hair up in a ponytail. "Okay, let's go." she said, finishing the elastic wrap around her hair.

"Are you going to put your work clothes on?" I asked.

She let out a snort, "They can have me on time, or they can have me well prepared, but they can't have both."

Together, we walked out the cabin door, and down the path that led to the night time gathering spot, otherwise known as the fire circle.

Over near the fire circle, a list was posted that tells us our job for the morning. Once I pushed my way toward the front of the large group surrounding the list, I scanned the list for my name. Today I was on cooking duty (my favorite job).

Just as I was about to rejoice, Lila moaned.

"Ugh! I got laundry duty. Why not just make me pamper the elderlies!"

"I'm telling you, you are going to regret that." I looked at the sun clock, and realized I was almost late. "Hey, I have to go to cooking duty, I'll see you after, kay?"

"Kay." She glumly replied, as she headed towards the laundry house.

I ran over to the food cabin, where our meals are cooked. Ms. Brendale, the head cook, waved at me and gestured for me to come over to her.

"Good morning Ms. Brendale. How can I help today?"

She smiled at me. "Well, surprise suprise. Today we are making oatmeal. You know the gist right?" I nod. "Excellent! Ok, get to work!"

We have oatmeal all most everyday for breakfast so it can be easy to get sick of the extremely blah taste. (I honestly don't know if blah is a word, but it describes the oatmeal perfectly). Some times I sneak out extra brown sugar and give it to the younger kids to spice up their oatmeal. I walk up to the barrel a of dried oats and measure out 10 cups and put them in a large metal pot. Then, I fill the pot with water, up to where the water reaches the top of the oats. After that all I had to do was put the pot over the fire and relax. I loved this job.