Valkyrie (Kate O'Hearn) - By Kate O'Hearn Page 0,35
‘All set.’
They delivered the newspapers in record time and found Alma and Tamika waiting for them on their front porch.
‘My, my,’ Alma said as she looked at Freya. ‘You look lovely. Skirts suit you much better than those leather trousers. More feminine – and they hide all the right things.’
‘What things?’ Tamika asked. ‘Grandma, Greta doesn’t need to hide anything.’
‘Of course,’ Alma said. She focused on Freya. ‘Well, Angel, are you ready for your first day at school?’
Freya nodded. ‘I’m a bit nervous.’
Alma’s eyebrows shot up. ‘You, nervous?’ she cried. ‘Sweet child, there’s not a thing to be nervous about. Just follow Archie and Tamika’s lead and you’ll do fine.’
Getting Freya registered into the school was easier than everyone expected. No one questioned the falsified documents, and with Alma’s talent for telling sad tales about the loss of Greta’s family in Denmark and her long list of illnesses, by the end, the office staff were looking at Freya with great pity.
‘All right, Greta Johnson,’ the secretary said loudly and slowly as she handed Freya the school schedule. ‘I understand you speak English?’
Freya nodded, unsure why this woman thought she was deaf and slow-witted. ‘I do.’
‘Good,’ the secretary said slowly. ‘As your great-aunt suggests, I think it’s best if we keep you with Archie until you get to know your way around an American school. Will that be all right with you?’
‘Yes . . . it . . . will,’ Freya said with equal slowness.
Archie sniggered and nodded. ‘I’ll show her around.’
‘Will you be OK getting home, Grandma?’ Tamika asked as they walked Alma to the school entrance.
‘Course I will. God gave me two good legs and I’m going to use them.’
Freya felt great warmth towards this kind old woman. ‘Thank you, Alma, for everything.’
The old woman’s eyes fogged. ‘No, Angel, thank you.’
When she was gone, Tamika turned to Archie and Freya. ‘We have the same lunch hour. Want to meet up?’
Archie nodded. ‘Let’s meet at the old oak tree in the front yard.’
Tamika nodded and smiled at Freya. For an instant, Freya saw Tyrone Johnson shining in her face and eyes. ‘Good luck with your classes.’
When she was gone, Archie caught Freya by the arm. ‘Well, Gee, this is it. Math is our first class.’
Hidden from inside her coat, Freya heard Orus moan, ‘It would have to be, wouldn’t it!’
By the lunchtime bell, Freya’s head was spinning. Each class she entered seemed worse than the one before. Every time she and Archie showed the new teacher the note from the school’s office, explaining her strange dress and seating requirements at the very back of the room, the teacher would give her a curious look that suggested they would have found it easier to believe she had wings.
Once they got past the class introductions, there was her lack of comprehension of what was going on. Archie had tried to prepare her, but it hadn’t worked. There were four different classes in the morning, and although she had a perfect understanding of Geography, she was lost when it came to Maths, English and something called Humanities.
‘I don’t think I can do this,’ Freya said as the lunch bell sounded. ‘I’ve only been here half a day and already want to fly home screaming. This is nothing like my education in Asgard.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Archie said. ‘First days are always the worst.’
Freya leaned her forehead against her locker and sighed. ‘But it’s like I know nothing! I have lived over six hundred Earth years and yet I still don’t understand what Humanities mean. You are already human; why do you need a class to tell what it is to be human?’
Archie put an arm around her. ‘Humanities aren’t about being a human, it’s human philosophy, literature and language. It’s not really hard once you grasp it a bit more.’
‘But I’m not human,’ Freya exclaimed. ‘How can you expect me to grasp something I’m not?’
‘I know you’re not. I also know you don’t like us. Maybe in the Humanities classes, you will learn why you should like humans.’
‘I doubt that,’ Orus called from under her coat. ‘Now, will you please take me outside before I suffocate under here?’
Tamika was already waiting by the old oak tree at the front of the school. Freya opened her coat and released Orus as they joined her.
‘Why did you bring him?’ she asked, eyeing the raven skeptically.
‘I told you before, I go where he goes and he goes with me.’