The alarm system goes off, and tells me it is morning. The alarm system is loud through the air, so loud that you can almost see it. It blares in and out with the wind. My G-Paw says it is the same alarm system used back in the olden days to warn us of weather conditions such as tornadoes or hurricanes. We now use the alarm systems in the morning hours to wake us; we have to, for there is no sunlight. The skies are dark and gray all the time. I pull myself up out of my bed, and in an instant, my censored room light comes on due to my body movement and my room becomes light from dark. I stretch my arms, and I crawl out of bed to head for the showers.

After my shower, I put on my school uniform, and I go downstairs to see if my brother, Jaybird, is up. He is, dressed and getting his breakfast administered to him already. He beat me, and he will get the better syringe today. My Momma is not home again. She travels a lot these days. She has to. She has to bring in money to buy all of our daily doses of food syringes. My Pappa stays home with Jaybird and me. He helps us get dressed, and he helps us learn at the learning center. He volunteers there while we are there. It is nice to see him every day. My G-maw sometimes tells me of a long time ago, when the parental segments were switched and all Mommas stayed home, and took care of the children, all Pappas went to work. Seems strange to me to think that that is how life used to be. It seems strange to me to see old, old videos of life so long ago. It is hard to picture how it was. I receive my daily dose of food injected into my side, and I am energized, and ready to go to the learning center with my brother. As we walk, we talk and hold hands, and we giggle. We have a great time walking to our learning center. It is not raining now, although the skies always look like they can open up and drench us at any time. Fortunately, pushing the special button on our backpacks provides us with a rain slicker immediately. The ground is always mushy, and wet, and there is a lot of sidewalk and concrete to walk on. My G-maw sometimes tells me of a long time ago when green, green grass covered the ground and the smell of the air was crisp; you could smell the scent of flowers, and hear birds in the sky. I would like to experience that someday in my lifetime. Experiment labs now generate the flowers. Few people get to see them. Studies are taking place in hopes that the flowers can live in our environment now. It has yet to happen. It has been so many years.

We get to the learning center, and the alarms finally die down, and we go up inside alongside the other children. Of course, that is a chore within itself. The other children make fun of my younger brother and me. I do not know why, they just always have. My hair is the color "blonde" and there are no other children in the learning center with blonde hair. Hair is usually dark in color, which is either brown or black. They call me a freak. I tell them that my G-paw tells me of a long time ago, when there were children that had my color of hair, many children. It was a common thing. There was abundant sunlight. There is no longer any sunlight, and to see blonde hair on someone is very strange and different to people. I guess that is why they call me a freak. My younger brother, Jaybird, was born with a sickness, it was cancer, and it was in his head. The Doctors tried to remove it, and they were successful, but left a large scar on his head, in addition, the other children make fun of him. It hurts his feelings, and he is my brother, so it hurts my feelings too. He is normal to me. To me, he just my Jaybird. I see him off to his class, and then I go to my classroom. I sit alone, and I see the other children stare at me. Sometimes I just want to shout at them, but I do not. It would just draw more attention to me. My Momma once told me to "turn the other cheek", whatever that means. I guess it was saying they used a long time ago. I do not think it would work now. I do turn my head from side to side, but the kids still stare. My learning center instructor comes in, and has everybody settle down, place his or her earphones on, and start watching the daily learning video. Our instructor's name is Ms. Goldenrod. She stays up front, and prepares for her long day of classes. As I try to watch my video on history, I can still hear the whispers of the other kids making fun and pointing at me. Ms. Goldenrod hears something and snaps her fingers loudly. We are all startled, and start trying to concentrate on our videos. I am safe for now.

After class, I make my way down the hall to my cube locker. In there is my snack syringe, which I decide not to administer for now, and a picture of Jaybird and me smiling, and posing for our G-Paw. It makes me smile to see it daily. All of a sudden, one of my classmates, Morning Glory, comes up behind me, and shoves me into my cube locker. Morning Glory is a tall, thin girl. Her arms look like long skinny vines I have seen in videos of plants, and her arms appear to reach out forever. The force of the impact makes me hit my head hard on the wall. I immediately swing around to see who did this to me. I can feel the warmth of the blood running down towards my nose, and I start to cry. It hurts and all I can see through the trickling blood are all the other kids laughing at me. My fists go up, and I start to swing at Morning Glory, but someone stops my hand. It is my best friend, Cardinal. He is one of my only true friends in, and out of school. His parents and my parents were friends in their school, so his family was always around. He turns me around, and starts leading me down the hall to find the nearest first aid kit. We do not have to walk far until we find one. By now, the blood is all over my learning center uniform, and on my face, arms, and legs. He reaches for some towels, and starts wiping me down. It is not the first time he has come to my rescue. He grabs the syringe that has the medicine in it, tells me that this will sting, and administers the medicine at the site of the cut on my head. I wince a little from the stinging medicine, and close my eyes waiting for the pain to subside. The bleeding stops and he walks me back to my cube locker. The crowd of laughing children are gone, and off to their next class.

"Blooming" he says", you have to watch your back! I might not always be here to rescue you! Morning Glory is out to get you! When I was younger, she was in one of my classes, and she always bugged me, and said she wanted to be my girlfriend. She would follow me home, and stare at me. It got so bad that my Momma had to go to the learning center, and make a complaint about her. I am afraid that she is capable to really hurt you or anyone"

"You are here this time," I say with a smile.

"Come on", he says. "I will walk you home."

I do not argue, but I do tell him that I have to get Jaybird first. I explain that I cannot go home without Jaybird. Pappa would be so upset if I leave Jaybird at the learning center on his own. He agrees and we walk to the office to summon Jaybird out of his class. We arrive at the office, and explain the situation, but Ms. Peacock, the secretary who works in the office can clearly see by my face that I need to go home. Cardinal speaks up, explains briefly, the confrontation between Morning Glory and me, and asks if he can walk me home safely, and then return to the learning center to finish out his day. Ms. Peacock calls Mr. Seagull, who is Cardinal and Morning Glory's instructor. Mr. Seagull...