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“Alix, I’ve got some big news for our family.”
Those were the words that started all this change in the young Alix’s life.
After that Alix heard nothing of what her father told her, her 5 year old mind couldn’t process what her father was telling her, as she watched her whole world get packed into boxes, as she had to say goodbye to the nameless friends she made in nursery school.
The whole moving process to Shanghai was numb to Alix, in a matter of days the only home she has ever known was gone, all she had by her side was a medium sized suitcase with some clothes, a few colouring books and her brother’s old handheld gaming console.
She barely heard her Father say “Well all our stuff will be at the house, for when we arrive. Are you ready? Alix.”
Alix only nods as she takes one last look at Paris, she still feels numb to all the change happening around her.
The journey to their new house in Shanghai was shorter than Alix thought, after she got on the plane and the thrill of being in the sky had worn off, Alix closed her eyes and when she opened them again, found she was being carried by her brother into the taxi, she was now in Shanghai.
The streets of Shanghai were far different from Paris, the streets of Paris were quiet and refined to Alix, the streets of Shanghai were wild and colourful, If Alix wasn’t too tired from the flight she would beg her Father to explore them.
But all she wanted right now was to sleep on some form of a bed to get rid of this groggy feeling inside her head, she didn’t process any of her surrounding as she was pushed out the taxi by her brother and dragged herself into what will be her new forever home, she then found the nearest large soft object and when back to sleep on it. It was a whole new world for Alix, she just had to regain the energy for it.
After a week to recharge the batteries, unpack all their things and getting used to living in a house, Alix was officially bored of this house.
For the 5-year old this house was more like a prison, she had run out of fun things to do solo, her brother was too busy studying to play and her Father was away for good chunks of the day, setting things up at his new place of work in Shanghai.
Alix was so bored she counted all the flowers on the wallpaper of the house, 345… was the total she got before getting distracted by the sound of kids' laughter from outside.
Alix wanted to find the source, but knew she wasn’t allowed to leave the house under her Father’s orders.
But Alix had a cunning plan, she was going to annoy her brother so much that he would have to take her outside, “hehe” Alix laughed to herself as she planned the best way to annoy her brother.
Ten minutes was all it took for Jalil to chuck the tiny gremlin out the house, he much rather make his father angry then hear that accursed noises again,
“There is a playground over the road, go be a terror over there and let me study!”
Jalil said, trying to hold back his anger towards his sister.
As the door closes Alix celebrates her plan's success, as she can now go find the source of the noise that got her attention.
Remembering what Jalil said, Alix started scanning for any signs of a playground, after a few seconds she found a sign that she roughly translated to what look like a playground, Alix had gotten all the basic down for her new language, but she still had trouble reading words, so she only hoped she got it right as she crossed the quiet road.
In her mind this felt like a grand adventure to an undiscovered kingdom, but the reality was just a simple crossing of the road. But Alix was now staring at the entrance to the coolest place she had ever seen.
Alix remembers the few times she went to a playground in Paris, they were small and offered no real option for play without causing the girl a scrap knee or utter boredom.
So Alix was in her mind’s version of heaven as this playground was massive, it had everything a 5-year old girl could ask for brightly coloured swing, a see-saw/ catapult, one of those climbing dome things that Alix had seen in a few Magical girl anime, that her brother had put on to distract her and finally the diamond of the whole park… The giant sandbox that takes up a quarter of the playground space.
Alix knew she was going straight to the sandbox, her mind was bursting with hundreds of different ideas of what to do in the sandbox, she could do the classic of building a sandcastle, or test out her writing skills… nah, the last idea that came into Alix’s head was to make a sand trap, she figure that would be the best way to make a friend… her only problem was Alix lack any tools to work the sand and because she was thrown out of the house, was not going to be able to get some anytime soon.
Alix was stumped, she wanted to play in the sand, but without the tools her options were limited and Alix hated the thought of having limited options when she wanted to make her first time in the sandbox a good one.
But the odds of something happening to fix Alix’s predicament were slim, but as if the universe was giving Alix a sign, two voices called out “Are you new?”
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Turning to face the voice, Alix sees two other children approach her from the other side of the sandbox.
One was clearly a girl, wearing a light blue sundress that matched her light blue eyes and blueish black hair that were in cute little pigtails.
She looked nervous as she looked at Alix, like at any moment the girl would run off and hide.
Alix found this girl to be cute, especially the way her freckled covered nose twitched at any movement from Alix, she felt the need to protect this girl.
The other kid, Alix, had a much harder time guessing.
As the short black messy hair paired with the kid’s shorts and oversized sandy tank-top, told Alix they were a boy. But the larger brown eyes that looked at Alix just as curious as their friends’ does and the calm aura that seemed to relax her more skittish companion, made them feel more girly in Alix’s eyes. Alix realises she has been staring for too long and quickly replies with,
“Yeah and what’s it to you?”
Alix asks a bit too aggressively for the mysterious kids' liking, as their eyes show to Alix the anger building up inside of them.
“Fei, she is clearly new. Remember what your Dad said about meeting new kids at the park.”
The anger fades from the other kids' eyes as they reply back to her friend with,
“Always give your name…”
Alix was impressed how the cutesy girl had control of her more intimidating friend,
“And” the girl said with a cute but stern look on her face,
“Don’t have fights over pointless things”
The girl smiles as she says “Good, Now then let us introduce ourselves then, like we practised.”
The pigtailed girl then strikes a magical girl pose as she cries out “I’m Marinette.” her friend then strikes a kung-fu pose as she cries out “I’m Fei!”
Alix thinks for a few seconds before striking a pose of her own and crying out “I’m Alix!”
The trio all start to laugh as any tension between them fades away as Marinette and Fei walk closer to Alix.
“Now that we are on a first name basis, I’ll ask my question again, Are you new?”
Alix now hears the curiosity in Fei’s monotone tone voice.
“I just moved here with my Dad and big brother.”
Alix said with a big smile, as she noticed that Fei smiled.
“Wow, you got Fei to smile that quickly!”
Marinette shouts as Fei goes bright red in the cheeks and pushes Marinette into the sand.
“Hey, now my dress is covered in sand… again.”
Fei smiles as she says,
“That's what you get for teasing me.”
Marinette responds by sticking out her tongue towards Fei.
Alix is silent as she enjoys the show the two are putting on.
“Do you want to play with us, Alix?” Marinette says as Fei helps her up off the ground.
“Me and Fei were going to build a sandcastle so big it could fit both of us, but you can join us and we can make it even bigger!” Alix found Marinette's enthusiasm to be infectious as she started smiling.
“I’m in.” Alix said as she took the shovel that Fei offered her.
The trio then spend the next hour painstaking building the best sandcastle ever, they argue, they took snack breaks and they got very messy.
But once all the dust had settled, what remained was the perfect sandcastle.
All three girls admired their perfect creation, they knew it would be able to stand the test of time, they knew it would be remembered by all those who saw it… if only Marinette at that exact moment, hadn’t tripped right into the sandcastle.
A whole hour's work was now covering Marinette as she lay on the floor crying and muttering “Sorry” over and over again.
Neither Alix or Fei were angry at Marinette, both knew the girl didn’t trip on purpose and the look of pure sadness at the loss of their creation, only made the pair want to comfort the girl more.
Fei is the first to say “Marinette don’t cry, we are not angry at you, Right Alix.”
Alix nods,
“But all of your hard work is gone because of me.” Marinette whales as Fei hugs her.
“Let’s have some ice cream at my house!”
Alix said as Marinette stopped crying as she heard the idea. “Ow Ice cream!” Alix smiled as she knew the plan worked.
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The journey to Alix house was quite quick, thanks to Alix remembering that she just lived across from the park.
She hears Marinette comment to Fei,
“She is part of the new people that live next door to us.”
Alix heard the surprise in Marinette's voice and the gasp from Fei as the pair started to mutter something to one another.
Alix wants to ask what the pair were discussing as the trio arrived at Alix’s front door, but the door suddenly opens to reveal Alix’s father looking in incredible panic.
He then sees Alix and the panic fades as he hugs her while saying,
“I’m sorry Alix, I’m sorry for leaving you on your own for so long.”
Alix hugs her father back as she replies with “It’s ok, I caused Jalil to throw me out the house… I was bored of being stuck inside all day.”
Alix's father looked on the verge of tears as Alix continued with “ The plus side to this is I made some friends.”
Marinette and Fei both greet Alix’s father with a simple wave.
“We came back for some ice cream… to cheer Marinette up.”
Alix’s father starts to laugh as he wipes his eyes and says,
“It would be rude not to cheer up your friend, so come on in then.”
His smile relaxed the trio as they walked past him to enter the house.
Marinette and Fei are amazed by all the artefacts laid out across the house, at each new one, they stop to admire the weirdness of it to them.
Marinette goes up to Alix’s father and asks “Are you a master thief?”
This question catches him off guard but he quickly replies with “Yes, I’m the master thief Lupin.”
Marinette’s eyes go wide as she rushes off to tell Fei.
Alix and her father laugh at the small girl's reaction.
They all enter the kitchen as Alix heads straight for the fridge and takes out the Neapolitan ice cream, Alix’s father then dish out three equal bowls and leaves the girls to enjoy their ice cream, as he goes off to finish berating Jalil for throwing his sister out of the house.
The girls enjoy the nice cool feeling of the bowls as they eat the ice cream, Marinette is first to finish as she goes up to Alix with an ice cream covered face and says “Let’s have a sleepover!”
It was surprising how quickly the gears started moving, as Alix got her father’s approval almost immediately and it only took Marinette and Fei a couple of minutes to be back at Alix’s front door with two small packed bags.
Marinette acted as the leader of this sleepover as she guided Alix through all the common parts of a sleepover like watching a movie (Lilo and Stitch) in a pillow fort, playing as many board games that Alix brought with her from Paris and having the trio sharing a bath together, which made Alix finally realise out loud that,
“Fei, You're a girl?” to which Fei responded with “Yeah?”
Marinette joked that Alix was already red in the check before they even entered the bath.
As the three girls lay across the prepared sleeping mats, Marinette was finishing her retelling of her dream to be the knitting magical girl.
Fei then talked about her dream of being a kung-fu master and fighting a giant lion statue.
Alix talked about her dream of being an adventurer, hunting lose artefacts and getting to be the hero while getting to save the pretty girl, Marinette and Fei hug Alix as these tease her about the pretty girl part of her dream saying,
“You’ve got to have her growth spurt before she can do that.” Marinette teased,
Alix counters back with a pillow right into Marinette’s face and so begins another mainstay of any sleepover, the pillow fight.
The battle rages on for an hour before Alix’s father tells the girls it’s lights out and to stop before they wake up the whole neighbourhood.
The girls decide it time for sleep as they each head to the place they marked as their spot and all try to go to sleep.
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Alix has been trying for the last few hours to close her eyes and sleep, with little success.
She looks into the dark of her room and sees nothing, but as she listens to the void, she hears the faint sound of Marinette’s cute snorting.
Alix knew she was going to tease the girl about it later.
Alix then noticed that Fei was on the end of her bed, looking out of her window, staring at all the bright stars in the sky.
Alix was breathless as she couldn’t take her eyes away from Fei, she was mesmerised as the stars could be seen in Fei’s brown eyes.
Fei turns to see Alix staring at her and smiles as she says “Can’t sleep either, can you?”
Alix nods as Fei motions for her to join her.
“The stars are so beautiful at this time of night.”
Fei says as she returns back to looking out the window,
“It’s so peaceful”
Alix replies as the two stare in a lovely silence.
Fei then looks at Marinette as she comments “She is never able to stay awake to see this sight.”
Alix was surprised, as Fei continued,
“One day I’ll get her to see this sight… I owe her that much for what she lost already.”
Alix was curious at Fei’s comment but as she saw the sad look in her eyes, Alix knew it was best not to ask at this moment.
“We will both get her to see these stars.”
Alix said as the sadness in Fei’s eyes faded and was replaced with the same glow that radiates from her smile.
“I hold you to that promise. ”
Fei moves away from the window and places herself next to Alix in her bed, after a few seconds to get comfortable, both girls drift off to sleep in each other's warm embrace.