The Orphanage Rose

Chapter 1

  The crowd sighs as the landlady shouts once more. Her whip dangles dangerously in her hand, making me swallow once more. I quickly focus on the floor again, which all the girls need to clean. After what feels like an hour the landlady tells us to get up. We all get up fast and stand in lines. She walks past us and stops in front of each of us. We’re all supposed to say the same line when she’s doing that. ‘’Thank you for taking care of me my queen.’’ It sounds through the room like an echo, over and over. The footsteps come closer and I look to the ground. The girl next to me stutters nervously.

 Then the landlady stands in front of me. I see her polished shoes and knitted socks. Her long skirt falls straight around her fat short legs. Her corset is tied up tight, probably a failed attempt to make herself look skinnier. Her eyes look angry, like she can explode every moment. ‘’T-thank y-you for taking c-care of m-‘’ My sentence is cut off by the pain of the whip. The pain tingles through my body. I hear the other girls gasp as everything becomes one black emptiness.

  I wake up in my tiny attic room which I share with four other girls. The thing is, I never really met any of them because I’m kinda new here. My parents died two years ago but most of the girls have lived here for their whole life. They grew up with the rules of the landlady. I never talked to them because I kind of shut myself out after my family was gone.

 ‘’You okay?’’ A girl with dark brown hair and sparkling blue eyes asks me.

 ‘’I’m fine,’’ I reply.

 ‘Fine’. The word you use when you’re everything but fine. ‘’I don’t think so, she hit you really hard.’’ The girl says with a worried look.

 I look at my feet.

‘’What’s your name? You’ve lived here for almost two years but you never told us anything about you.’’

‘’Edeline.’’

‘’Nice name. My name is Cecile, that’s Becky and this is Raya.’’

She points at the girl on the other side of the room and the girl next to her. They look nice. I carefully touch my left arm. It burns and I see red marks on it.

‘’Why did she hit me?’’

‘’I don’t know, maybe she was just in a bad mood?’’ Raya seems like a very optimistic person to me.

‘’She hates people, that’s why she hit you. But you have no right to cry, you’ve been here for only two years. Imagine how it is for us.’’ Becky doesn’t seem to like me. I don´t really care.

 ‘’Don’t mention her, she’s been living here her whole life. Rumor has it the landlady has done something to her parents so she would become an orphan.’’ Cecile says when standing up.

 She walks up to the door and listens to it. After a while she opens the door and three little girls fall in the room. One with brown hair, one with red hair and one with blonde hair.

‘’Sara, Anna and Dena! How many times do I have to tell you it is not nice to eavesdrop?!

 The girls help each other on the feet and look up to Cecile with guilt in their eyes.

 ‘’We just heard the pretty girl got hit so we wanted to know if she was okay,’’ the little girl with blonde hair says.

My eyes widen a bit. Do they see me as the pretty girl?

‘’You could also just ask whether she is okay or not.’’ Cecile looks rather angry.

‘’It’s okay,’’ I say, smiling weakly.

‘’I’m… ‘fine’.’’

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This first chapter was a short chapter i'm sorry for that aa

I still hope you guys like this story this far and i will definetly continue this!