Chapter Two
Journee’s feet barely touched the stairs as she ran down the staircase ready for her first day of kindergarten. Her mind was racing with so many thoughts from last night. “Slow down speedy” Journee’s mom laughed as she rubbed a wrinkle out of Journee’s new purple dress. “Sorry mommy, I’m just so excited!” “I know baby, the first day of school is always exciting, but for now we have to get you to school.”
The ride to school went by so fast that before she knew what happened Journee was sitting in her new classroom. Journee was in awe by all the posters on the walls. There were ABC posters, 123 posters, animal posters and even rainbows all over the walls of the classroom. She thought about diving on the colorful mats in the corner more than once, but that thought quickly passed as her attention was drawn to the playground through the classroom window. “Good morning class, my name is Ms. Monroe and I will be your teacher for the year.”
Hearing her teacher’s voice, Journee took her eyes away from the window just as Ms. Monroe started her roll call. Once Journee’s name was called she raised her hand and said, “I’m here” with a big smile. Journee’s mom told her all about school, so she was ready and exciting about doing all the things she was told about. “Today we will learn how to count to 10” Ms. Monroe said as she drew 1 thru 10 on the big black chalk board behind her desk. Once she wrote 10 on the board, she turned to the class and said, “So can anybody tell me what number this is?” as she pointed to the number. Seeing every hand go up, Journee also raised her hand ready to give her answer. “Do you know the answer Brady?” Ms. Monroe asked the hyper red headed boy that was sitting in the front row. “Yes Ma’am that’s a 7” Brady answered with pride in his voice and a smile. After just 4 hours in school learning, Journee was more than ready for a nap by the time Ms. Monroe showed them each their nap mats. It felt like 2 seconds after laying down for her nap that Journee was running down the dirt path on her way to Aniya’s pink tree house.
“Hey Journee” Aniya yelled after seeing Journee running up the path. “Come on up.” Aniya made her way towards her slide and slid down to meet Journee. “So how do we go up?” Journee asked not sure how the slide really worked. Giggling, Aniya pointed to the edge of the slide. “You just sit down and the slide does the rest.” “Oh okay” Journee said ready to see the tree house up close, however she wasn’t ready for the slide to pull and jerk her as she slid up the slide and somehow she managed to land on her feet. “Wow, that was so much fun” Journee screamed with joy, just as a laughing Aniya popped up right beside her. “So, what do you think?” Standing on the balcony Journee took a closer look around from this point she could see the waves smashing into the river bank and the bright yellow fish she saw made her want to jump in and swim with them. Pulling her eyes away from the river, Journee saw Aniya walk into her pink treehouse. Journee walked into the room with her eyes wandering. She had never seen a treehouse like this before. On one side a pink hammock hung from the roof with wonderful paintings hanging on the walls behind it, but it was the clay sculptures Aniya had on the shelves lining her walls that Journee loved. “Your home is great” Journee said in awe, but before Aniya could respond, Daesin walked in.
“Hey Journee” Daesin said before turning to Aniya. “Aniya we have to go check on Butch the ogre. Jacob says he hurt his leg pretty bad while cutting wood.” “Well then we better get going” Aniya said as she ran out of the treehouse jumping on the slide. By the time Journee made it outside, Aniya was already standing below them.
“We might have to go to the waterfalls to get help from the Sparklers” Daesin told Aniya, while the three made their way to the magical forest. “Hey Daesin what are Sparklers?” Journee asked trying to keep up with their walking pace. “Oh yeah, I forgot you don’t know everything yet, well they are shiny Fairies who stay behind the waterfalls and with their healing powers, Butch the Ogre should be find in no time” Daesin filled Journee in finishing just as they reached the magical forest. “Good day magical trees, we would like to get to the swamps please” Daesin said in a polite voice. “Sure thing Daesin, have a good day” The trees said as they moved out the way to make a path. “So how does Jacob know every time something is wrong in the magical forest?” Journee asked as they made their way to the swamps. “As our leader Jacob holds a powerful globe in his treehouse that allows him to see into the forest whenever someone is in trouble. Then he send us watchers to handle the issue.” Aniya explained to Journee as they made their way through the forest.
They had only walked ten minutes by the time Journee saw a moss covered home on the edge of the swamp. In the front yard stood a grown female ogre and a younger male and female ogre who all looked worried about Butch who was laying on the forest floor holding his leg. “How are you holding up Butch?” Daesin asked as he kneeled beside the ogre. “I’m hanging in there” Butch said as he rubbed the big knot on his leg. Well from the looks of it you just hit your leg with your axe, but luckily you didn’t break any bones, we’re still going to have to go to the waterfalls though” Daesin said as he helped pick Butch up and sit him in a homemade wooden chair. “That’s fine Daesin, hey I need some time off my feet” Butch chuckled as he laid back and propped his leg up. “Well in that case we will be right back” Aniya said as she started on her way around the lake heading to the waterfalls.
They had only been walking a few minutes when they came upon a large waterfall pouring into the lake below. To Journee’s amazement once they came closer to the waterfall the image of a sparkler’s face popped up into the falling water. “Hey Grace, how have you been?” Aniya asked the sparkler’s leader. “I’m fine Aniya, what can I do for you?” Grace asked with a loud voice. “Well Butch the ogre has hurt himself and we were wondering if you could send a sparkler to help us.” “We love helping you guys, but as you know first you must pass one test” Grace said. “Yes Grace we know your laws” Aniya said ready to answer Grace’s question. “Okay, well simply tell me what number comes after 12 but before 14”?
Looking back and forth between each other for the answer, it was Journee who spoke first “Well guys if we count to 14, we should find our answer. Let’s see, 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14.” With a big smile Journee turned to Grace before telling her that the answer was 13 since 13 comes before 14 and after 12. “Good Job!” Grace’s voice spoke as her face faded away and in its place popped out a very shiny sparkler. She was the prettiest thing Journee had ever seen, her body was so shiny and bright that Journee almost covered her eyes. “Hey Aniya, you guys ready?” Holly the sparkler asked as she flew over their heads. “Sure thing Holly, lead the way” Daesin said.
Once they made it back to Butch, he was more than ready for Holly to sprinkle her healing fairy dust on his leg. Journee started to feel different as she stood by watching Holly take care of Butch but before Journee could say anything, Aniya spoke first, “Oh no Journee, your earrings”. Before anything else could be said, Journee felt herself waking up. “I hope you had a good nap because now it’s recess time.” Ms. Monroe called out to her kindergarten class. Journee heard the words from her teacher, but she really wished she was still sleeping. She got up, folded her mat and made her way to the playground.