A Revolutionary Moment (chapter one)

A Revolutionary Moment

“I’m so tired of reviewing this!” Aimee complained in a hushed whisper to her companion, sitting at her right. The girls were in History class, reviewing the Revolutionary War.

“Yeah. We’ve gone over it since 4^th grade!” riposted Claire.

“It’s kind of getting to the point where I want to just stand up and yell ‘Yes! We get that it was tragic. Americans had to fight for their lives! Yadda yadda yadda. But it couldn’t have been that bad or there wouldn’t be any Americans left!’” Abby hissed from Aimee’s left in an exasperated, almost bored tone.

“The Boston Massacre occurred on March 5^th, 1770.” the teacher- Ms. Bellows- droned on. “The Boston Massacre came about because there were British soldiers-also known as red coats and lobsters-were in America. Some Patriots were in town, and began to make fun of the soldiers, calling them all kinds of names. The British soldiers took drastic measures and shot at them. The result was a total of 5 deaths and the historic name of The Boston Massacre.”

“Ooh! 5 deaths! What a waste of time! It’s not like were even going to use this in the future!” Aimee muttered angrily.

 “Now, your next assignment will be to write a three page essay saying if you were a British soldier would you have defended yourself? Why or why not? Due in three days.”

The whole class groaned, including the three girls in the back who had just held the uncomplimentary discussion.

“Enough of this nonsense! You will do the assignment whether you like it or not. And if you keep complaining it will be a 4 page essay!” the teacher snapped rigorously. “We still have a little time left of class so get started. And no procrastinating! If you are not working I will right you up immediately!” barked Ms. Bellows.

“I’m sick of this! I’m going to attempt an escape to the bathroom.” whispered Aimee sarcastically.

She walked up to Mrs. Bellows and sweet as candy asked

“May I please be excused to the restroom, Ms. Bellows?” 

“Quickly.” she snapped.

“Thank you” Aimee said hastily, trying to escape the scowl beginning to form on her strictest teacher’s face.  

Aimee fleetingly stepped into the hallway, as to make it look like she was following the fiat Ms. Bellows had just given but, took her own sweet time making it down the hallway to the bathroom.

The whole time she kept her head down until a voice came from right in front of her.

“Trying to avoid class, Ahmay?” said Trevor, pronouncing her name in the correct, French way; instead of the way she had told everyone else. Trevor and Aimee went way back into kindergarten. They had met on the first day of school. As Aimee looked into the deep, grey eyes of her best friend, she felt as if that day had just been yesterday.

“But I don’t want to go, Mamma!!!” shrieked Aimee, as she tightly clung to the leg of her mother, as if she were her life source and was too afraid to let go.

“It’s only for eight hours, baby. And then, when you get home, we can eat popsicles and swing just like we used to!”

“But I don’t want to do that when I get home! I want to do that NOW!” wailed Aimee.

Finally, the teacher- Mrs. Kindly- came over and gently peeled Aimee off of her mother-Donna.

“It usually takes a few days, but they get used to it eventually” Mrs. Kindly reassured Aimee’s mom.

“I hope so,” replied Donna, straightening her now crumpled dress, “I don’t want to have to do this everyday!”

Both the women laughed at this, and Donna gave one last goodbye wave to her only daughter, Aimee.

“Come on, sweetie. I’m sure you’ll meet some nice people” Mrs. Kindly coaxed as Aimee’s cries became no more than a quiet whimper.

She gently guided Aimee into the room and showed her to an almost completely desolate table, where a boy was quietly coloring a picture.

“Trevor, this is Aimee. Play nice.” And with that, she left the two petite children alone. Aimee timidly took up a chair across from Trevor. He looked up and smiled.

“Would you like to color something, too?” he asked confidently.

This warmed Aimee up a little bit, and she smiled and said “Sure.”

Trevor pushed the box of crayons to the middle of the table briskly and handed her a piece if blank, light yellow paper.

And they had been best friends ever since.

This flashback had happened so quickly, Trevor didn’t notice the pause when she said

“Ms. Bellows is bad today. I think her cat ran away again. I don’t really blame him, though.” Aimee replied, and Trevor laughed at her humor.

“Well, don’t take too long in the halls. She’ll probably suspect the worst and think you’re coming up with some evil plan to ruin her teaching career.”

“I wasn’t planning on it, but now that you mention it…” she trailed off evilly, a fake, sinister grin spreading across her face.

He rolled his eyes and briskly said “See you at lunch…if you haven’t still blown anything up or anything.”

“I’ll be there.” She replied, trying to smother her laughter so she wouldn’t get caught.

She stepped around him, a content smile still on her face. She was kind of thankful for seeing Trevor. In many ways he had brought her spirit back up….until she thought about the Revolutionary War and the three page essay due on Thursday.

She continued her slow saunter down the hall.

When she reached the girls room she flung the door open automatically, expecting to see a line of sinks, a row of stalls and the light beige, cream, and olive tiling, but instead getting a pitch black room. She turned around to find a janitor to tell them the power had gone out, only to find more of the perplexing, ebony darkness.

All of a sudden she felt an unwelcome feeling as if she air had been whooshed out of her. An erratic wind began to blow form every direction, seeming to come straight at her, meeting together, and then blowing straight up, causing her hair to blow out all around her in deep, mahogany tendrils.

And then, just as suddenly as it had come, it stopped she looked up to see very old looking buildings. She quickly reviewed her basic geography and deduced that this was London, England.

She rose to her feet clumsily, still dazed from the bizarre room, and looked around. She realized that everyone looked like a scene from The History Channel. One man was looking at a gold watch with an eagle on the front, but the odd thing was it was a pocket watch. Nobody used those anymore! Turning, she grabbed a woman’s arm. She was wearing clothes that looked as if they should be in her history text book. The woman tried to jerk away, but Aimee caught her apron that was tied tightly around a faded, caramel colored dress with ruffles at the hem.

“Exc-cuse me,” she stuttered to the curious looking woman, “but c-could you tell me

w-what year it is?”

“Well, you should know that our ancestors did not have the intelligence to record what year it was!” she snapped in an old British accent, clearly annoyed by the interruption of her daily life. "Now we don't know exactly waht year it is!"

“But, c-could you give me at l-least an estimate?” Aimee tried again.

“Well, I believe it is around year 1767.”

Aimee’s eyes froze wide in fear. She had gone back to the time of the Revolutionary War.