Published: September 15th 2021, 6:35:57 pm
Daily Free-Write September 13, 2021 "Alternative Education Pt. 5"
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5
"Theee wheels on the bus go round and round. Round and round. Round and round. Everybody!" Tisha, Mikey's female counterpart, was pumping us up the whole bus ride down with sing-along songs. Some of the people on the bus were into it. Others, myself included, were not. "Come on everyone! I wanna hear your happy voices!"
I rolled my eyes as I saw Trevor and Amanda begin to sing along. After a few rounds, Amanda elbowed me in the ribs.
"Oof! Hey..." I quieted down right away as she gave me a look and then nodded over toward Mikey, the other chaperone, who was holding the clipboard. He was looking around and marking something down on it. I looked back to Amanda, confused. She raised her eyebrows again and nodded over to him. That's when I noticed something. He wasn't just looking at anyone. He was specifically studying each person that wasn't singing along, staring at them with laser focus, and marking... something down on his clipboard. You'd have never seen me join in on a sing-along faster or with more gusto. He looked over at me, smiled, crossed something out and marked something down on his clipboard. I was glad when we got off the highway and approached the large structure that could only be the Fresh Start facility which was off by itself in some industrial park.
"So this was another test, wasn't it?" I whispered to Amanda as we got off the bus and organized ourselves into a single file line for the next head count.
"Yeah," she whispered back. I don't think nonparticipation will get us very far here.
"What are we talking about?" whispered Trevor, leaning in.
"The test back there on the bus. Looks like you figured it out too, huh?" I asked.
"No. I just really really like sing-along songs," he said, looking away and blushing slightly.
"Wow. This place was made for you two." I said. "I either have to follow Ms. smarty pants or Mr. dumb luck and I'll be good to go." The conversation was cut short by our Chaperones.
"Attention Fresh Starters, or Freshies for short. We will now go inside for orientation and a change of clothes. I know a lot of you are uncomfortable right now with how many accidents we had on the flight, but not to worry. You'll be in proper clothes and fresh and clean in no time."
Interesting word choice. Amanda and looked at each other and raised our eyebrows. "What do you think he meant by proper?" I asked. She shrugged.
"Newspeak," she said, simply.
"What the heck is that?" I asked.
"I'll tell you when you're older," she said, with a smirk. I was so annoyed. Now she was treating me like a kid too! Everything about what was happened seemed to be designed to make us feel younger than we were, which I guess was the point.
We walked into these big imposing colorful doors, into a huge lobby filled with sights and sounds that were very distracting - and even exciting. I felt like I was in line for some sort of fun ride as we were led past the lobby, through the metal detector, and I was sure that Amanda's magnets would set them off, but they did not.
Amanda must have seen my face because she winked and whispered, "Metal detectors don't detect magnets." Handy advice, no doubt, but what did she plan to do with it? I wondered what they did to mischievous little girls like her.
We were led off toward a large dressing room where there were some fun cartoony looking dressers and closet doors looking straight out of a 1950's cartoon show. There were also several changing tables, which was the first place everyone was lined up. Well, everyone but for the three of us 'bigger kids'.
"Do you need to use the potty sweetie?" someone asked. I looked over to a potty chair over in the corner and shook my head vigorously no.
There were a couple employees who were dressed up like tailors with pencils and measuring tapes who came around and took measurements while a tall imperious looking woman who looked like she must be in charge of wardrobe directed people to and fro to get the appropriate clothes for the little ones until each person had a bundle of clothes in their arms. I looked at mine and tilted my head a bit.
"Hmm. Overalls. That's not so bad I guess."
"I don't want to hear a word of complaint," Amanda said, as she looked at the very girly purple dress she had been given.
"If you think that's bad, look over there," said Trevor, nodding over to the table, where a beet red man was being snapped up into a onesie which bulged out from the thickness of his very obvious diaper.
I quickly dressed myself in the new clothes before someone else tried to do it for me.
"How does it fit?" asked Amanda, trying not to laugh at my apparent enthusiasm to get dressed.
"Not bad at all," I said. "Though I could have done without the kiddish underwear."
"Hey, at least it's not a diaper," she said. And that's all that she said, but the subtext was there. At least it's not a diaper... for now.
-Written by ChampTehOtter