Snakes Don't Bite Their Owners

It's not a Rabbit

"So you just got up and left...?"

"Well, yeah. There wasn't really anything left for me to stay for. My parents hate me. My best friend hates me. The whole rest of my stupid little world hates me... and besides, I needed a change of scenery anyway. Life gets boring when you're stuck in the same place all the time."

"How so? I've lived in this village my whole life. I always find something to do."

"But Pia, your village is a COOL village where people ride skateboards to school and have bright coloured hair. Things are different where I'm from."

"It's not about where you are Harriet, it's about who you choose to be. If I lived where you're from, it wouldn't change how I act or how I dress."

"I suppose..."

By the time I got around to the Q&A part of my life story, everybody except for Pia had left to get on with their lives. EJ to school, Saorise to work, and Axel to... who knows where.

"So what are you gonna do today? Do you have school or something?"

"I don't go to school."

"You don't? How come?"

"Well, I can learn everything I need to know from books."

"If that's true... then what are teachers for?"

"I'm not sure really. I've never had one."

"Never?"

"Nope."

"Then who taught you to read?"

"Come with me."

She grabbed my hand and led me out the front door - which, by the way, was just a sheet of corrugated iron with paint splattered all over it. It looked as though it was once used as a shield in a very serious game of paintball.

She dragged me along a dusty path, around a small flower garden and through a big pile of animal poop. I left behind some shoe-shaped dents as evidence I once existed in this small corner of the world.

"Um, where are we going?"

"You'll see."

So I continued to follow her along a strip of gravel she had earlier referred to as a 'road', and wondered too many things to put into words.

We eventually came across a row of odd looking cottages. None of them were the right shape, but I suppose they must have been built that way. They seemed to be falling over and were infested with cracks - both big, and... even bigger.

Almost all of them called out to passer-bys with bold letters on big wooden signs.

It wouldn't matter too much if you couldn't read because their contents spilled out into the streets in an attempt to lure people in. Smelly googly-eyed fish next to beautiful flowers, across the road from musty dusty wardrobes, and statues, and desks. The pavement was littered with conflicting aromas and energetic hues - crimson, magenta and plain old orange to name a few.

Despite the falling roof tiles and soot covered street lights, everybody seems to be smiling.

It's impossible to feel like I don't belong.

I wish I could live here forever. And if when you die you must live 5 minutes of your life 50 times over... this would be the moment I'd choose.

Well, this or that one time in the cafeteria in second grade when Roger did an impression of Mrs. Shondilafigon that was so funny it made me squirt milk out of my nostrils and then proceed to roll around on the floor laughing for the next half hour until one of my teachers had to ring my mother to take me home because I was "disturbing the other students".

It's beautiful.

Perfect.

"Welcome home."

And I followed Pia into the book store on Bargonza Alley where she read out my fortune.