A world to discover/ Un monde à découvrir

Chapter 1

"What are you doing? We are supposed to leave in 5 minutes for my game and you are still in your pj's!"

"Don't yell at me, I will be ready in time! "

"You sure about that? Last time you told me that we were late. No, cross that, we were extremely late!"

"Mom, Andy is bothering me!"

"What?! You obviously started it!"

"I was just sitting on the couch when you almost attacked me! It's unbelievable how you try to blame me everytime you do something..."

Not far from there, Kelsey Hodgkin was witnessing one of the numerous fight her siblings were having. She was minding her own business, as always, since she did not want to be a part of it.

"Give it back to me! You have no rights to take the remote from me!"

"No rights? Last time I checked, we were in a free country, so I have every rights to do whatever I want!"

So caught up in their fight, neither of them noticed their mom walking down the stairs. Hurt at her right hip, she took her time doing so, therefor the couch war had time to evoluate by the time she arrived. They had transfered on the floor and were currently trying to strangulate each other.

"Max, Andy, get up, now!" she said, not looking pleased.

As always, Andy was the first one to obey. He got up so fast, he almost stepped on Max's hand, which, of course, restarted the fight.

"I'm sure you did that on purpose!" yelled Max, only starting to get up.

"No I didn't, I swear I did not! Mom, I did not do it on purpose!"

Their mom took her time, she looked at both of them in an impassive way.. She took a deep breath in, and said:

"Stop. I do not want to know who started it. I do not want to know waht it was about and I do not want to know if you intented to step on his hand, Andy. I have one question, though. Why are both of you still not ready? I asked you to get dressed and to be in the car by 2:30. It is now 2:35. Which one of you can find the best explanation?"

To that, surprisingly, Max was the first to react:

"Mom! We are only five minutes late! I don't understand why I have to come, I don't even like baseball!"

"Wrong answer. Reply to Andy."

"It was not my fault, I was trying to convince him to get ready, but he..."

"Wrong answer. I want everybody in the car. And I want it for ten minutes ago."

After that statement, there was a complete silence before everyone started running in every directions. At that moment, Kesley could perfectly understand why her mom was an exceptional head of department: she could be very frightening when she wanted to be. 

 Kelsey did as the boys, she grabbed her things and ran towards the car.

When they got there, Andy went with his team for the warm up. Donna and Alfred, Kelsey's parents, walked slowly to the bleachers, hand in hand while Max followed them, whispering angrily to himself. Kelsey decided to go to the convenience store first. She wanted to buy a lemonade and maybe some chips.

She pushed the door open, and went straight ahead for the chips alley. She took her time to choose, though in the end she picked the same as always. She went to look for her drink, but found none that she liked. Disappointed, she paid for her snack and turned around to get out. As she was pushing the door, something caught her attention. A green poster proclaiming it was the experience of a life-time. A Summer Work Student Exchange. It allowed students of 16 and 17 years old to spend 6 weeks during the summer in another region of Canada. She quickly looked over her shoulders, to make sure no one was watching her, and took it off. 

 She could use that kind of change, she thought excitedly.

After her brother's game, game that he lost, by the way, they all went back home. Andy was disappointed. Max was still angry. Kelsey was joyful.  It sure was a weird ride.

Sitting at her desk, in her room, in their house in Toronto east, Kelsey was planning her approach. How could she ask the permission to subscribe to such a project? She knew she could not do it in front of Max nor Andy, because the first one would not want her to go, since he is overprotective and the second one would be jealous and would want to go with her, and he could not, due to his young age.

"Okay, so not only do I have to convince them to let me go, I also have to convince them to welcome someone else in their home while I am gone. How will I do that?" she mumbles to herself.

"Do what?"

Without her noticing, her dad had open her room door just in time to hear the end of ger speech. She was caught off-guard, and did not know what to answer.

"Euh..."

She would do it right now, she decided. And she would do it in one shot, as if pulling up a band-aid.

"Dad, I really would like to do something special this summer."

"Special? Like what? A trip to somewhere we've never been before, perhaps?"

"Yes, something like that."

"Okay, where would you want to go? I am not promising anything, but if you want, we could look for something..."

"I would also like to work this summer."

"How could you do both?"

Okay, this is the time, she thinks to herslef. One shot.

"I would like to do the YMCA Summer Work student Exchange."

Even if he was a little bit taken aback, her father reacted well. His first reaction was to ask how it works, as she expected him to ask. In the meanwhile, she had done researches on that.

"It is an exchange, for teenagers of 16 or 17 years old. If we are chosen, we go somewhere else in the canada, and the teenager of the family where I end up is coming here. It is mostly a french and english switch, so I would probably end up in Quebec, somewhere, since it is where there is the most french in the country. It is for those who want to perfectionate their french."

"How long is this exchange?"

"Six weeks."

He took a few seconds, thinking. He looked at me very seriously, which is something Kelsey appreciated, because it meant he was taking her seriously.

"How did you hear of that exchange?"

She took the poster from her desk and gave it to him. He took a long look at it, and promised her they would talk about it later, with her mom. She agreed.

After supper, Donna, Alfred and Kelsey stayed at the diner table to talk it over. Donna asked more questions than her husband, Alfred, but Kelsey already knew it would be like that, because that is the way it always has been.

In the end, they both agreed she could submit her application right now, so she could have all the informations they needed to make a decision, since submitting did not commit to anything.

Unfortunately, that plan did not go to well, since they did not hear back from the agency before April, even if she submitted right before Halloween.