Faded ~ Book 1 By: Jess Rogers

1. Paris, here we come...

It was a cold rainy day in Jersey, just like any other. Luna forced her eyes to open to the harsh white light coming in from her bedroom window, and the sound of her mother, Grace, calling her from the kitchen. "Luna, honey. You need to wake up now, today's your'e big day!" Luna knew it was normal for moms to cry on their child's first day of third grade, but she accepted that this was different, she was moving to Paris on a full academic scholarship to Institut d'excellence De Paris High. Luna would only get to see her mom every two months and she was gut wrenched because Luna loved her mom to the moon and back and so did her mom, this why her mom named her 'Luna'.

Luna stretched her arms and flung her legs over the side of her fluffy duvet, aka her 'cloud of dreams' and walked to the bathroom. She played her favorite music and danced across the bathroom floor as she brushed her teeth and hair. Nervous for her new life ahead she slipped into a comfy pair of leggings an over sized blue hoodie, tied her hair up into a high pony tail with a red hair elastic and laced up her favorite white sneakers.

She tucked into her last meal at home with her mom for the next four years. It sounds worse when you think of it like that. Her mom made her famous blue berry pancakes with golden syrup and butter. Her mom went through all her lists with her and made sure she wouldn't leave anything behind.     "Phone charger?"     "Already packed."    "Uh.. undies?"       "Aah mom yes, yes." Luna replied. "Oh sorry Lu, I'm just so proud of you, you have no idea how much I'm going to miss you." Says her mom.    "Aww mom I will mis you too, just remember, 'To the moon and back' " ,they both said as a tear found it's way down Grace's check and onto the back of her delicate hand.   "Mom, please don't cry, I will be alright and I will look after myself and keep in touch with you every day," Luna promised, her mom nodded and smiled as another tear rolled down her cheeck leaving a faint line of smudged mascara.   "Oh, Mom you have smudged your mascara now--" said Luna as she chuckled and gave her mom a tissue.    "Dang it! I knew I should have worn my waterproof mascara today--" she laughed and wiped the smudge off of her face. Luna and her mom smiled at each other and took a deep breath just cherishing every moment of belonging and security in the warm and familiar embrace of her mother's arms.

They piled the last bag into the car and jumped in, the engine roared to life and off they went into the heart of the city... on the way to Paris...

They arrived at the airport and loaded Luna's bags onto a conveyor belt. A strange man with a buck tooth walked up to Luna and her mom and said "Hey'a  im'a gonna show ye te ya car." He gestured into the distance to an old beaten up car with a massive dent in the passenger side door. Luna turned away from him to face her mom for a bit of privacy, "Uuh.. Mom is this the 'Uber' we hired?" Luna inquired suspiciously.   "Um, I guess so, the licence plate is correct" said her mom. Luna looked at her mom with a raised eyebrow, "Okay then-. I love you mom so much and wish me luck!"  Luna embraced her mom.  "Honey I love you so much you are my star and always will be!"   They both cried as they hugged for what felt like a lifetime until the strange man said,   "Yo im'ma leave soon so... ye comin'?"     "Oh right, yes I am. Love you Mom!" Luna waved goodbye to her mom and walked cautiously up to the cranky, bent old vehicle. Here we go... 

Luna used her finger to trace a line down the car door window, as each drop of crystal clear rain glided down the outside of the window. 

The car ride went on forever, Luna found the most random things amusing to keep herself busy and to help her nerves to subside-.

Suddenly the car slammed on breaks and screeched to a sudden halt. Luna would have gone flying out of the windscreen if it wasn't for the half baked looking seat belt she made sure to fasten.    "Ye, ai, dat was kinda bad eh?"   Luna would have fallen off her chair if she wasn't in a car, "Excuse me! You think that was 'kinda bad eh' what were you thinking going through a red traffic light!"      "I'm sorre yeh-" "Is that all you have to say for yourself!" With that Luna made him pull over and let her out of the car. The guy pulled off onto the side of the road before the runway.                  Luna slammed the door closed, snatched her bags out of the boot and stormed off toward her plane where the passengers were nearly finished boarding the massive air - liner. The strange unruly man jumped out of the car and hurried after her, "Hey ! Miss ye fogort te give me da cash!"   With that Luna stopped dead in her tracks and slowly turned around to face this blatantly rude imbecile and said slowly, trying her best to contain her rage, "Do you really think this is funny.. if so you have serious issues, actually you do have some ridiculous issues, oh my god!" She continued on her path and noticed the door was being shut on her flight. "AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!" she swore to herself. 

Luna was over whelmed by the lack of incompetence shown by that man.

She managed to hail another taxi with a better driver who took her to the counter where she could reschedule the flight. She went over to the desk and explained her predicament.     

 "Alrighty ma'am, the next flight to Paris is scheduled for 6 pm," the receptionist said.       "Are you serious, that is 10 hours from now-," exclaimed Luna. She shrugged at her own annoyance and rolled her eyes, "Okay, it's fine, thank you for your assistance." She nodded as she headed to the waiting lounge crammed with families with smelly, whaling babies and pick-pocketing kids, yes, the type of kids that kick your seat the whole 20 hour flight. Luna found a seat in the corner of the room and decided that it would be her turf for the next 10 hours. 

And then Luna being Luna she drifted off into her own world where anything was possible, she fell asleep...

Eventually the flight co-ordinaters woke her up to tell her that her flight was leaving in an hour and that she needed to board the plane. Luna was exhausted and just wanted to be with her mom more than anything right now-.

Luna found her seat and got her snacks out for the long journey. Luna took out her notebook and started to write. Luna loved literature and writing poems, songs, story's, dialogues, essays and more. Her ability to write was the reason she got this scholarship in the first place.

She took a deep breath in and felt all the stress, noise and nerves disappear as she exhaled and began to write.

Hi everyone! This is the first chapter to my first book called Faded, my first book in my trilogy I will write called Fade. I sincerely hope you enjoyed my first chapter and one of many to come. Please leave comments and suggestions on pages telling me how you found the chapter so that I may grow and flourish into the best writer I could possibly be so that I can keep on putting out new content that you will be able to enjoy! Thank You for reading!