Chapter Ten Sneak-Peek - (WOOOO!)

It was a day worth mentioning - a day worth carrying the epithet - if days ought carry epithets - "sweet". For, why - everything about it was just that -; the perfume in the air, the serenade of the birds, the syrup-like taste of Momma's fresh pancakes... and even Wen herself wore a sweet look, with her lips scarlet and cheeks flushed from the warmth of the morning, hair pulled back into a messy tail. Her light-brown eyes - a shade far too common for little girls - laughed a droll joke as she looked about herself, feeling the hem of her long, silken nightgown.

"Good morning... how... are you?" Asked Father, as Wen walked up to him and he clasped a warm hand to her forehead.

"Daddy, I ain't sick!" Laughed Wen. "And I do not feel mentally dreary any more, I promise - rather uplifted by the smile of the breeze that tickled my toes as I awoke."

"Pleasant, quite so!"

Wen sat down at the table a few minutes later, with the whole family grouped in at the table, eating and discussing what they were to do today.

"Terry is coming over, and we are going to the lake!" Ksenia announced.

"Me and Val will come along..." Wen grinned. Sure, perhaps it was not a good idea to go to the lake in Autumn - for some reason - and another con may have been that not long ago Wen herself had been pushed into the water by Terry, but she truly loved borrowing Mr. Oswald Stuarhte's boat to swim across the lake and feel as if she were floating on water.

...Some time afterwards, Wen had walked outside in her Spanish dress of a navy, dark colour, and ran to Val, who, when she met, saw as a very sweet, stylish red-head with greasy hair, a big brown bow and in a thick cowl skirt and tank top very inappropriate for a day in lovely, golden, crimson, somewhat cold Autumn.

Together the two skipped to the lake, holding hands and laughing and talking, feeling each other's fingers intertwined in the most splendid of manners, warming each other up.
Soon, however, the two were at the lake, and seated in the boat, with knees pulled in and hands resting on their legs, somewhat twin-like expressions of joy on their faces.

Meanwhile, Ksenia and Terry were walking through the Woods. It felt still and cool, and the shell dress Ksenia had borrowed fitted her well-built body, pointing the figure and adding accent to the pink quartz piercings upon her ears. The girl felt blissful because she was holding the hand of her true love - the thin, long fingers wrapped about her waist, with the other hand supporting her palm tenderly.

"Babe," he said with a flicker of his smart green eyes and a ruffle of his curly black head - "Today is so still and lovely, and so are you." He then traced the face of his girlfriend, sighing contentedly with every stroke as if she were some sort of magical treasure chest that needed human contact to be opened.

However, Ksenia felt queer and pulled away, flushing red. "What... shall we hurry up, just a smidge bit?" She asked with colour to her voice, clearing her throat to make it seem clear that she wanted to move on.
But the smell of the Fall scent, so putrid with scarlet and blossom colours, made the woman lightheaded and she wanted to laugh - nevertheless - when her boyfriend asked if he could possibly try carry her, in the very "bride" manner.

...Ksenia tied her flaxen hair up in a bright ribbon and then fell out of Terry's arms, and when he cried out in panic she, again, simply giggled and stood up hastily with a look of vague expectation, one that told to the tearful eyes of the man, red of cheeks - "Oh, you triple-headed bag of a fool!"

And, rubbing her knees, she grimaced - whistled beseechingly - gave Terry a haughty kiss, very cold and proper and good on the brow, whistled again, and was off through the hemlock trees, kicking up her feet as she went and cursing the man behind her to catch up, and not be a —

I won't say it. I promised Ksenia's mother I wouldn't, and Terry and I made a secret worth keeping, even at a distance away from his family.

But Terry had chased after the girl, once hiding behind a birch and then sprinting up unto the pray from the lowest branch of an oak. Well, she was caught in the thin grasp, one that genteelly supported Ksenia, but nevertheless, her hair was all mattered and full o' leaves, cheeks flushed, lips puckered...
But nothing came. Except a droll shriek -

"You wish, bae!" And then the young man wheeled over on his long legs, raised a hand as a salute, and ran away after a squirrel, leaving Ksenia to splutter and kick at the dirt, disgusted.

***

Finally, Wen got rather tired of waiting and stood up, stretching her legs as she did so. It would be wrong to say that she was skinny like Valentine, but nor were she plump as - frankly - Ksenia. Though Ksenia's round face added up to the beautiful, full lips and big eyes. Wen was more of the "average weight, average height, average eyes, average hair"... the only thing unnatural was the little scar, cut through her right brow - thin, jutting right out.

One may wonder why I have not told of this earlier, and the simple answer is that I have been waiting for this moment, at the lake, where the girls stood on the lowering part of the hill, out and under the cool bridge.

It surely was a delight to imagine a goblin with leathery skin, popping eyes bulging out of their sockets, body revealed in the chilly autumn breeze save for the cloth draped around the lower part of his body, back, arms, neck in acid... though it made shivers run down the back of Wen, and she told Val - but the other girl only grimaced and scoffed.

Just then, however, Terry came running from out of the woods on the west (and I know that to the west was the harboured shore, but a cluster of dark, dreary trees were propped up together to the slight north-west from there).
His face held mirth, and when he ran up to see two little girls, eight years younger than him - just (remember, Wen just turned eleven) - Terry let out a crow-like cackle.

"Where's sis?" Wen asked, standing up on her tiptoes, raising chest and squaring shoulders, nose up high to look at the pointed, handsome face - "Tell me now, I don't want trouble with you!"

"Yeah, she's right..." Vally nodded sheepishly.

"Shut up you weasel!" Terry hooted with laughter at the sight of the startled, bulging eyes of the offended and the raised fists of her friend. "Your sister is fine, we were just running..." and then, he fell to his knees, sighing and moaning as if he were a tortured one.

Suddenly, a little, sharp (gem)stone fell out of the left pocket of his trousers. Surprisingly, he noticed not and continued to pant till he stood up, stretched, and ran back into the woods to catch up with and then taunt and, in the end, perform a very meaningless kiss on Ksenia's cheek.

Well, Wen bent down and, with little, short fingers she clasped the stone in her hand. Breathing heavily, she made her way from underneath the bridge, call of excitement and mirth captured in her throat, accepting free fall... for now she were sitting upon the bridge, legs dangling down, and in her palms she fingers her find.

"Of course!" She suddenly whispered, voice trembling. "Good - god - oooh!" For she had just remembered so something; in year five, term two, her grade was studying about different types of minerals. Vaguely, Wen remembered being fascinated by aquamarines and sapphires, peridots, ametrines, rubies.... but. There was the mysterious turquoise, a stone which looked all mossy and this inexplicable blue, with a hue of green mingling in the forbidden depths...

"Why, I never! This could cost a fortune!" Dramatically ejaculated Valentine as she walked up the bridge and sat down, inspecting the gemstone with much care.