Snow Fall

Part Five

"Well what time is it now?" I asked. If it was dinner time, then we were getting food.

"According to my watch, it's seven, but I'm still ahead by two hours," Noelle said. Okay, so that would mean it was five right now.

"Hey, who has the info packet now?"

Karina raised her hand and she answered my question before I was able to answer it. "Dinner starts at five."

"How'd you know what I was going to ask?" Was she a telepath or something?

Karina laughed. "Before you ask, I'm not a telepath, and I actually didn't know you were going to ask. I was following my stomach—it's already ten where I live. I'm starving right now." That's harsh.

"Where do you live?"

"Nova Scotia." Oh yeah. They were on the Eastern edge of the Sector.

"It's past dinner for just about all of us. Let's go." Karina motioned with her hands to lead us out. We all walked out and down the stairs to the lobby. As we passed through there, the woman at the front desk didn't even bother to glance up from her desk to see what we were doing. No one was in line anymore.

"I guess everyone has already arrived," I said, my voice full of nerves. Lunch in local school was Hel, so what would that mean for here. And here, it wasn't just one meal with everyone, it was all three.

"I guess so."

"Come on, you guys. I don't want to miss all the good food," Ivy urged us and started to drag JR, who was closest to her, towards the door. It was a pretty funny sight, JR was at least a good two inches taller than her, but Ivy was pulling her along determinedly.

The rest of us followed the two of them out of the building and followed signs that directed us to the dining hall. Ivy didn't let go of JR until we reached the dining hall. According to the sign on the front, it was just for witches. It was probably easier to do it that way—people who were weres and dragons and the like tended to need to eat more, especially meat.

JR rubbed her arm. "You know for someone as small as you, you can really hurt a person."

Ivy laughed. "I've had lots of practice. I always had to drag my brother along whenever I went somewhere."

We stepped inside of the dining hall. It was a massive room with enough tables to sit more than two thousand people. The food was in the far back of the room and there already was a decent sized line waiting to get food. We got on line and a woman appeared. The woman was holding a tablet and stylus in her hands.

"Last name?" She asked me—I was the first of the six of us in line.

"Eld."

"Mae?"

"Yes."

She took a card out of her pocket and swiped it along a slot in the tablet before handing it to me. "Here's your ID. Use this to buy your food. Don't lose it. It costs five bucks to get a new one." She moved on and did it for the rest of us, issuing the same warning every time.

Once she was gone, Noelle, who was right behind me, leaned forward and whispered in my ear, "I wonder how many people have to get new ones ever year, for them to be issuing the warning to everyone."

I snickered. "Probably a lot." It was a foreign feeling, this joking with people while waiting to get food. At local school, I waited in silence and ate with a group of people who weren't big fans of talking. And here in Eagle Point, things were different. I knew that eventually we wouldn't all be like this, but here's to hoping.