The Hopefiled Siblings' Adventure - A Short Eco Fiction Story

3.1 𝑵𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒃𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒔𝒊𝒍𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆𝒅 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒊𝒓 𝒂𝒈𝒆

"I knew we met before, but somehow, I had forgotten him...

And once inside, its smell!

Jumping in for the first time was like running towards a friend I hadn't seen for too long, my old friend, the Sea."

Trever said, and kept on remembering.

"I carefully bent down on the surface of the water to smell it: the scent of salt!

I took a deep breath... and the smell filled up my nostrils and my entire body.

I felt alive: I just wanted to run, breathe, explore, taste and keep swimming like never before!"

Clover smiled, excited.

"At one point I put my tongue in the water and damn, I regretted it immediately!

She was so SALTY, Clover, you can't even imagine!

Then they started calling us back, but David and I looked at each other and stayed there a little longer, splashing the water with our mouths and pushing the waves over us.

Laughing and joking, we noticed that the sea was also playing with us: it moved in great waves that took us from one side to the other. We laughed, some water moved, and it felt like going down a slide, then we got distracted and we got a slap! Ahah!

At that point the teachers called us back again, and this time with more severity, so we ran fast towards the seashore.

There, with all the other kids, they told us to dry ourselves and take a shower, because the salt in the sea is there for real, and lots of it, even if you don't see it. You feel it when it dries and sticks to your skin.

I thought it was his sort of way of hugging us... and so I didn't listen to them.

But I regretted it all day, Cover! I was sticky til the evening, when I returned to the valley."

Zephyra nodded as Trevor told his First Day story again, recalling the similar sensations she felt with her first swim in the Sea.

"Besides that, well, it's very different from Here.

There, in the bamboo building, there are several floors and so many bright rooms! Some have no windows but are surrounded by a large terrace with the ocean breeze blowing strong from the outside, and each classroom is decorated and has a different purpose.

The teachers guided us towards the entrance of the School and so we passed through the courtyard where there were climbing areas, a sandpit, a mud pit and then a large vegetable garden running around the entire school.

From the lobby we walked down a hallway to our classroom, where a line of happy, clapping teachers welcomed us with red ribbons and ixora flowers hanging outside the door."

"Really? Really?!" - Clover said with her big eyes, tired but shining with excitement.

"Yes, baby girl! In our classroom there were several chairs and tables, one for each of us and with the flower of our Preschool plant embroidered on the front. I opened my eyes wide when I saw mine and ran to it, in the front row on the right!

The strange thing though, was that those tables were all of different shapes and colors, very small and separated from each other. Teachers call them "desks".

They're really useful as you grow up, like for keeping your books and such things, but actually in the early years we brought them together every day for group activities, and you just had to bring them closer to figure out how to fit them together like a giant puzzle.