Postby JayDee » Tue May 23, 2017 11:00 am
Part 1 - Meeting her
Every year the school I go to participates in an exchange visit with students from a certain school in France. This year was no exception and since I was in junior year at the time, I had a chance to go as well so I decided to take it.
At the time I had no idea that this will be a decision I won’t forget for a damn long time.
About a month before we were supposed to set off to France, the teachers gave us the names and contacts of students whose houses we are going to be staying at. I read my host’s name out loud:
"Kelly Le Maitre…"
"Kelly, huh? Doesn’t sound very French if you ask me…" said my friend Nathan who was also attending the exchange.
"Yeah," I admitted. "The surname does though. If I’m right, 'le maître' means something like 'a teacher' or 'a master'."
Our teacher must have heard our conversation and stopped by.
"Oh yeah. Jason, I forgot to tell you, that Kelly is actually only half French. Her mother is American so she speaks fluent English."
"Well, I guess that explains the name."
"I’ve heard that she and her parents are really friendly people. You should write her an e-mail or something."
"Yeah, you’re right. I’ll contact her as soon as possible…"
*Fast forward to the day of the departure.*
I didn’t contact Kelly. Not because I would be shy or didn’t want to talk to her. I just somehow managed to forget about it. Now I was sitting on a plane that was heading to France, knowing that I’ll meet her face to face in about ten hours but not knowing anything about her.
"Well at least meeting her will be kind of a surprise for you," said Nathan, trying to make me feel better.
"Yeah, well I hope it will be a pleasant surprise…"
"You worry too much, Jason. What could possibly go wrong?"
/////
After what felt like ages, our plane finally landed. When we got all of our luggage, we exited the airport building to meet the French students and their families.
I recognized Kelly almost the second I saw her. Probably because she was holding a sign with my name on it. She was about 5'7" and had long blonde hair and blue eyes. I didn’t see her parents anywhere, but before I had a chance to go to her, one of our teachers ran up to me.
"Jason, I’ve got bad news." Yeah, welcome to France Jason! Time for bad things to start happening to you. "Kelly’s parents had to leave the town for a very important business trip. You think you two can take care of yourselves without them?"
"I guess so. But how are we going to get from the airport?"
"Oh don’t worry about that. One of the families offered to drive you to Kelly’s house."
With that he ran away again to talk to the French teachers about something and I decided to go and say hello to Kelly. As I approached her I noticed how beautiful she actually was. Well, it seems like things won’t be all that bad after all.
"Hey, I’m Jason, nice to meet you." I smiled at her and offered her a handshake.
"Kelly," she said and smiled back at me. "Nice to meet you too Jason. I’m sorry that my parents couldn’t make it."
"Oh that’s okay. I’m pretty sure we’ll be able to take care of ourselves."
"We sure will. Those people over there will take us to my house. Let’s go join them."
It turned out that the family that offered to take us with them was actually Nathan’s host family. They dropped us off right in front of Kelly’s house and when their car disappeared behind the corner of the street, me and her were left alone.
/////
I know that the intro is probably taking a bit too long, but stay tuned. Things will get a bit more interesting in the following part...