• Still Waiting For It • Reader X Aaron Burr

Chapter 12: The Paris of my Childhood (2)

                          (Y/N)'s Perspective
Age 11: 2 years after her escape

    No. Life isn't as perfect as my young mind had imagined. I was shortly caught by officers working for the monarchy after 2 months of my  "adventures" stealing bread from path-side shops and sleeping under bridges. I'm not very proud of my past, but it's still my past. Instead of sending me to a small prison, they sent me to a Catholic Orphanage in run by strict but caring nuns.

Life at the orphanage was sweet. We had bible study on Sundays and Tuesdays and on Thursdays I would walk through the gardens. There was only one thing I would have changed... CORDELIA

Cordelia was, without a doubt, a monster. She would act kind and courteous around Sister Jan, the owner of the orphanage, and all of the other nuns but when she got me alone, she was a little devil. She had stolen my clothes while I was bathing (which was a fun story to explain to the nuns), thrown a dress from my Aunt Catherine, who had passed away 5 years prior, into the fireplace, and she had blamed many things on me that had gotten me into trouble. Overall, she was an ass.

    On Sunday, we walked to St. Peter's Cathedral to listen to a preacher named Daniel Burr. He had been traveling around France for the past two years with his grandson, spreading the word of the lord. Religion wasn't really a subject I enjoyed talking about, it seemed to cause fights between everybody in France. Why can't people just respect everyone's opinion and mind their own business?

    I sat by myself because I didn't have any friends in the orphanage. I saw an older man and his grandson walk down an aisle in the gigantic cathedral. The older man, whom I assumed was Daniel Burr, gestured to his grandson, and he sat by me.

    "Hi," he said. His tone was slightly shy but I couldn't blame him.

    "Hello..." I examined his clothes. It was clear that he had a decent amount of money. Cordelia could tell as well.

    Cordelia began to leave her little group of junior thots, walked over to us, and shove me out of the way.

    "Hiiiiii! I'm Cordelia," she said in a tone I've only heard flirting women use.

    "I'm Aaron and can you return to your friends? Randomly shoving people isn't a ladylike thing to do."

    Cordelia sputters and then storms off. I already like this kid.

    "That was awesome," I say, smiling

    Aaron smiles, "Glad I could be of assistance."

                           A few hours later

    I felt the wind rush against my face. I made my grand escape from the orphanage. Cordelia had broken into Sister Jan's room and stolen several objects of importance from her and blamed it on me. I continued running as fast as my little legs could take me. Faster, Faster, Faster...

    I ran into two young girls with a young man I had never seen before. They looked kind. It must've confused them when a young, mentally unstable-looking child started yelling at them in rapid French.

    One of the children, who had short, curly hair and a pink dress talked to me, using fluent French.

    "Are you okay?"

    "Yes," I replied.

    "What is your name?"

    "(Y/N) (L/N). You are?"

    "Angelica Schuyler. What are you running from?"

    "The orphanage. A girl is angry at me there. I need help."

    The girl explains everything to her father in English and then he softly says something to her with his gentle voice and then she turns back to face me.

    "You can come with us if you would like to the colonies."

    And from that day, everything changed.

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    Hey there, kids! Sorry, this chapter took a long time. Pretty sure I fell, like, 20 spots down as I wrote this but I don't care. I'm writing for fun, not for rankings. I hope you are enjoying my book! I promise that it'll get more action-packed soon. Ciao!

- Em