Animal Ribbons

Chapter Three: Chameleon

"Connie!" I shriek as she walks over to me at morning tea. "Sienna!" she greets me happily. Her wavy hair is out today, pulled back by only a black flower hair clip, so I can see how long it really is. Connie hands me a plastic bag. "I told mum all about you and, after mentioning your extremely sad lunchbox, she started baking and couldn't stop until half past one this morning! So you have to take it," she adds as though she knows I was going to resist the offer. I peer into the 10c bag and gasp in delight.

Muffins, cupcakes, brownies, slices. Dozens of sweet things, oozing chocolate, or covered in sugar. "Your mum, is so awesome," I tell my new friend, who laughs her trademark laugh. "I may have nibbled slightly at the caramel slice," she adds guiltily. I take a bite off of a chocolate fudge brownie and groan. "Mmm! Your mum should own a bakery!" I exclaim. 'Tell her that when you come over this afternoon, and she will love you immediately!"

An excited tingle runs up my back as I think about coming to her house. "Do you have any pets?" I ask Connie. She shakes her head. "Mum and I disagree in the captivity of pets if they don't have a large enough space to run around in. Do you have any?" I blink my eyes at this extremely grown-up answer, before nodding excitably, eager to tell about my 2 pets. "I've got a Bearded Dragon named Lottie, and a Sausage Dog named Bertie. "Cool!" she exclaims, "I just love animals. You'll have to introduce me to them!"

I'm glad that she says, "introduce me to them", rather than, "show me them." Animals must have feelings too, right? The bell that I used to wish would come faster, now seems to come way too quick. I'm blaming Connie. I skip into my favourite class, the one lesson I get to pick. So, naturally, I chose Animal Studies. The last few weeks have been great; we've gone to the SPCA and looked at animals, learning lots. But this week there aren't any buses parked up front, so I know we're staying in class. I sit at my desk and wait for Mr Jones to arrive.

A familiar pair of golden eyes bore into my head as Connie sits down at our table. "Where's the teacher?" she asks. "He's not normally this late," I note, more to myself than to Connie. Mr Jones finally saunters in, carrying a dark blue box. Connie raises her eyebrows questioningly, and I shrug.

"Now, class," Mr Jones addresses us. " Today is going to be different from the last too weeks." No duh! I think to myself, and roll my eyes. Connie, noticing my display, grins.

"Today, we will be dissecting frogs!" Mr Jones says. I freeze. Some of the immature and stupid boys who were put in here for punishment, yell, "awesome!" Some of the girls are fine with it, too. In fact, I have a feeling that Connie and I are the only ones that have a problem with this; she's looking as green as I feel!

Mr Jones hands put the scalpels, and passes the blue box around. Kids drag the poor, half-dead, amphibians out of the container, and I feel like vomiting. And then I do something that I've only daydreamed of doing. I stand up, my chair scraping back in the process. Mr Jones eyes me suspiciously, and says, "Miss Cole, is there something you would like to share with the class?" I freeze again, unable to move, or speak. Luckily Connie has my back. "This, is wrong!" she shrieks, her voice shrill. "People sign up for this, because they love animals, you could have warned people about this! This- this is wrong!" she repeats. She marches up to a boy, Jarodd, and snatches the box of barely alive frogs from his hands. She stomps angrily up to Mr Jones' desk.

She violently snatches his Pump bottle from his growing mountain of exercise books and squirts the contents into the box, before sprinting out of the classroom (with the box). Instead of standing still like an idiot, I decide to do something useful. I gather the remaining population of frogs and snatch a container from the corner of the room. I pull my cheap drink bottle from my bag and squeeze like my life depends on it. Not knowing what to do next, I stammer something unintelligible about needing to go toilet, and dash out of the room full of widened eyes and gaping mouths.

*** After School***

"I got a phone call from the school today," Connie's mum, Heather, says disapprovingly, as she blends us a smoothie. "They didn't sound impressed," she adds. Connie grins cheekily. "Suspended," she mumbles happily. Heather raises her eyebrows. "Again! Seriously Connie! What did you do this time!"

"I saved innocent froggy lives," Connie says, serious for once. Heather immediately softens, as she nods knowingly.

Whilst they speak, I try and figure out (unsuccessfully) what Heather and my own mum have in common. My mum is tall, and average mum size. She has shoulder length blonde hair, always in a ponytail, and wears clothes that cover every inch of her body. The only bodily alterations she has made to herself, is one set of ear-piercings. Heather is average height, and skinny, like she works out. She has hair even longer than her daughters, only a few shades darker, that she has left flowing like a waterfall down her back. She's wearing a strappy dress that flows down to her knees. Escaping from the pair of baby-blue stilettos (so unlike my mum's flat black work shoes) are tattooed butterflies, inked in every colour you could imagine. Like her daughter, she has two sets of earrings in her ears. But, unlike Connie, when she talks you can see the stud shining from her tongue.

I'm a little scared that my own mum won't want us to be friends. I sip my smoothie in a daze, that is soonly awoken by Connie beckoning me up the stairs to her room. I enter and note that her dwelling is every bit as eccentric as herself. The walls, painted navy-blue, are sprinkled with pictures and dotted with decorations. The weirdly shaped room has seven walls, each dressed up neatly. One wall has a window, shoulder-height, which has her single patch-worked bed underneath. The black roof has those glow in the dark stars stuck to it, surrounding a skylight. I gasp in delight at it.

"You like?" Connie asks nervously. I shake my head. "I love!"

A/N: I know that the chapters are really short, they will get longer!