Chapter Text
♡ Pearl’s POV ♡
I glanced upon the gates of my new school - Catview. An independent boarding school for young girls located in Birchwall, miles away from my hometown, Azureton. The chilly September wind blew from behind me in this cloudy weather, as if pushing me towards the school.
Taking the luggage off my parent’s car, I took a deep breath and walked towards the gates. My little sister, Amber, was waving goodbye to me from the car as my parents smiled at me and said a final ‘Good luck!’ before heading off.
The gates automatically opened when I walked towards them. I looked around once more, wondering if there were any instructions nearby as to where I should go.
Eventually, after long minutes of wandering, a woman walked up to me, “Hello there! Are you one of the new students?” She asked, and I nodded in response.
She asked me many more questions, for example: ‘How were the holidays?’ ‘Did you do anything fun?’ ‘Are you looking forward to school?”
I answered everything honestly, smiling my way through, hiding the nervousness that was inside me. It wasn't until we arrived at the boarding house that the woman introduced herself as the house mistress.
The boarding house looked warm and cozy, like I was at home. The walls were painted yellow, as an attempt to make the rooms colorful. The sofas were slightly old, but they weren’t too bad. I tried to take a look at every room before catching up to the housemistress. There was a common room, a computer room, a kitchen, an office for the house mistress and most importantly, enough rooms for students to sleep in.
I told her my name was Pearl. Pearl Sweetmint. And so she led me outside one of the rooms. I looked up at the board hanging on the door with pink paper on it. The words read ‘Bubble, Pearl, Goldy, Brownie’ in a fancy font. It wasn’t hard to guess that those were my roommates for this year.
I turned the knob and pushed the door into the room. One of the beds was covered with clothing: skirts, crop tops, oversized hoodies… Almost every type of clothing you could name was dumped onto the bed. Their luggage was on the floor, spread out, with accessories, skincare, makeup and even more clothes. It wasn’t an exaggeration to compare that part of the room to a tornado. Really wasn’t.
Another one of the beds, opposite to the one just mentioned, was also covered with clothing, but they were folded properly. Their
skincare and makeup were placed neatly on the bedside table, and the wardrobe next to the bed was also opened. It seemed like somebody was hanging up their clothes, until they left to do something else.
Two beds were at the furthest part of the room. And there was only a pillow and a duvet over the bare mattress, waiting for somebody to walk over and take it as their own.
I chose the one on the right side. Just as I sat down on my new bed, the door creaked open and a girl wearing a white hoodie and leggings with ginger hair and star shaped earrings walked in.
She spotted me immediately and made a small wave. “Hey!”
“Hi.” I replied, trying to be cheerful but failing miserably.
“Lemme guess…” She stood by the door, putting her thumb and index finger under her chin. “Are you Pearl?”
“Yeah,” I replied.
“I’m Bubble! Nice to meet you!” The girl said.
I started, “So, where are you from-”
“Oh my God! Is that the kandy kat bath set?! I tried to get it, but well.. It was out of stock!”
This girl is even louder than my sister…
I tried to remain calm after the outburst of Bubble. “Well, I grabbed the last one off the shelf before anyone could get it. I mean, it’s really popular…”
“Anyways, what was I talking about…? Oh it was-…” She rambled on.
~
“Pearl? Did you hear me?” She asked, turning her head.
“Uhm…” I said, and tried to get her to change the subject. It didn’t work very well, though.
Bubble put her luggage next to the empty bed beside me, “Pearl, do you want to walk around the boarding house for a bit while we chat?”
I raised an eyebrow, “Can’t we just do it here?”
“Well, yes. But don’t you want to get used to your surroundings? Plus, we can have a look around too! Maybe there are secret passages of some sort!” She exclaimed, looking genuinely excited.
I sighed and stood up, “Fine.”
She opened the door. “Come on, then!”
We walked around the boarding house, waving and saying hi to every person we saw, as the girls from the year group above us gossiped. Some were already eating popcorn on the sofa and dropping millions on the floor. So far, boarding seemed fine.
“-So, you have a sister? That’s nice!” Bubble said happily as we walked up the stairs to the top floor.
The top floor was for the students a year above us, but Bubble insisted we go there anyway. She seems to not care about the side eyes at all.
We walked towards the end of the corridor when Bubble suddenly crouched down and looked at the gap between the door and the carpet.
I tilted my head, “What is it?”
She only motioned for me to look into the gap
I crouched down, puzzled. There was a strong ray of golden and bronze light mixed together seen through the gap. It was almost like a light beam.