Merci Of The Gods

chapter 3

Fatima lived next door to Merci. Fatima was being raised by her grandmother because six months after Fatima was born her mother was thrown off of the roof of one of the project buildings on the Ave. All the gossip says that it was her boyfriend that killed her and that either he or one of her many friends was Fatima's father. Fatima always knew she was just a product of a financial arrangement and pretended not to care, still, she was a little fast for her age. Having been left back a year, she was the eldest of the girls.

Soraya is one of three children, and her parents only daughter they live on 122nd and Morningside Avenue. Soraya is the middle child with one older brother and one younger, her older brother and his friends are always in trouble in the neighborhood and he's always going to jail for something. Soraya's mom manages the supermarket around the corner and her dad is just a drunk who beats his wife and kids.

Skye was 10 years old when she met Merci in the fifth grade. Sky lives uptown but goes to Merci School Eastside prep. Skye's father is the pastor of Higher Calling Chapel and sanctuary, helping the homeless and the community was their calling, her mother runs an organization called Women Against Crack operating out of the church basement. Skye's parents tried to make a difference in the inner city helping those in need with free food and housing assistance. Anyone who needs help can always get it. Everybody in the community knows Skye and they call her PK it means preacher's kid. She hated the name because it labeled her and she didn't like being labeled.

Since that day at the planetarium these four girls have been inseparable, spending all their time together, they studied together and they play together. Finding solace in their friendship each needing something else to look forward to besides their boring lives, they loved going to Merci's house because Mama lowe as they fondly called Estelle. She always made them feel loved welcome and comfortable and she always had food in the refrigerator and plenty of goodies for them.

When Merci and Estelle would leave to go on Expeditions and digs the girls really miss them Merci has spent most of her youth traveling to faraway places with Estelle, she has been to Bimini in the Bahamas she visited Mexico City she'd even seen Egypt Costa Rica, as well as turkey she touched the ruins of the city of Troy and took pictures at Easter Island, which was in the South Pacific. Sometimes they would be gone for a year or two.

Wherever there was anything having to do with ancient Linguistics Estelle was who they called any time there was a question about anything having to do with Anthropology, Astronomy or anything strange in the ancient world Estelle was there Consulting. Dr.Estelle Aristarr Lowe had a Ph.D. from Harvard University in linguistics, she also had a Ph.D. in Astrophysics an a masters in Anthropology she also has a Doctorate from Yale University in Archaeology. She was that go-to person when it came to ancient civilizations and their languages. Estelle's interest was the ancient Sumerians, she did her thesis in grad school on the ancient Sumerians and the gods who from the heavens came.

Cuneiform was Estelle's specialty she had started teaching Merci about cuneiform early in her youth, it was the language of the ancient Sumerians. Estelle created a game to Aid Merci while learning about cuneiform she would put cuneiform letters and words on index cards then ask Merci for a particular card using its meaning, this way Merci would bring her the card that she thought it was. Merci was getting very good at it, as a matter of fact, she was actually learning how to translate cuneiform without realizing it.

Merci was being prepared for her future, Estelle hoped that Merci would one day understand the reasons for all she was teaching her and would want to take over her research. Estelle hoped that she had instilled in Merci a love of archeology, at Merci's age when most little girls had other things on their mind her head was in the sky, she read books on Planet X also known as Nibiru she read the books by Zecharia Sitchin, but the one she liked the most was Chariot of the Gods by Erich von Daniken. Merci loved anything and everything having to do with science fiction or science.