t h r e e ;

The following afternoon, Roseanne didn't see the other members of her group, not even Scarlet who had left the dorm early in the morning. Roseanne thought nothing of it and still went about her day, getting ready to go to the carnival with her friends at around five in the afternoon. It was six by the time she heard a knock on her door and she was just finishing up getting ready. Since they didn't have any civilian clothes to wear--they only received school uniforms for their classes, as well as two sets of training uniforms, one set for the cold and one for the hot weather. Every six months they got a new one. Just before taking off for the mission they would be fitted into their space suits. 

As she opened it, she saw her crew mate Raven standing outside awkwardly. With a nervous tone to his voice, he told her. "You said we were meeting at six, but you never said where. So I thought I would pick you up so we could go together."

Roseanne felt a blush tinge her cheeks. She glanced down at her feet for a moment before looking up at him and smiling. She then gave a nod of her head. Scarlet still wasn't back since that morning, and she hadn't even seen Mauve, Ciel, or Seville at either breakfast or lunch. As she stepped out into the hallway next to him and closed her dorm room door behind herself, she got her holo phone out of her blazer pocket. She sent a message to Scarlet, asking if she was ready or if they were going to meet up anywhere specific. 

She then walked with Raven to the dining room so that they could wait for Scarlet's response. They were sat there for an entire hour, talking about random little things here and there. That was when Roseanne turned in her seat at the table next to Raven to face him. She said to him, "You should give me your holo phone ID number so we can text if we need anything from each other." She got her pink holo phone out and unlocked it. She saw him nod in agreement and slowly pull his black holo phone from his pocket. She looked up at him, her pink eyes studying him as she waited for him to speak.

"Its BLK06272998G." She jotted the number down, typing it into the search bar for the data base so that she could pull up his profile. The identification sequence was essentially his color, his date of birth, and a G for garden. People in The Garden had a G attached to their number, whereas people in the provinces had a P at the end, the ones who could afford holo phones anyway. Similarly, Roseanne's number was PNK04302994G. It was like a special bar code they wore on metal bracelets too which allowed them access to certain rooms in the garden, or denied  them access to certain things, like leaving the facility. 

When it came up in the search results, it showed his name, which showed up as Raven Black. Her name on there was Roseanne Pink. Then it had the option to add, send message, or block. She went with the add option and upon his acceptance it would open up to show her his full profile or whatever information he had available for the public . But she immediately broke out into a giggle when she saw his avatar. One could either put up a picture of themselves or customize an avatar. Most people just went with the avatar.

When he saw her giggling, his eyebrows furrowed into a look of confusion. 

"What is it?" He asked her.

She smiled bright at him as she turned her screen his direction for him to see. "Your holo phone avatar looks nothing like you." The hair and the eyes were accurate in color. But most of the other features and the skin tone were off by just a bit. It was similar to what he looked like, but not quite what she would have gone with. 

He thought that she had been laughing at his expense, and he let out a sigh of relief when he realized otherwise. "It looks normal to me." He told her with a tiny hint of amusement and a shrug of his shoulders. Offering his holo phone to her, he added in a bit of a teasing tone. "If you think you can do better, please show me."

Roseanne grinned at the challenge and took the phone from his hand. He had accepted her request and she saw he didn't have very many contacts on the list. He had the phone numbers of the trainers, teachers, and supervisors. But it seemed that other than Mauve, his room mate, he didn't have any of the other crew members as contacts. And even then he didn't even text him that much at all. She noticed that the last time he had texted Mauve was around the time he moved into the 12191 dorms over six months prior. Roseanne had all of them as her contacts--Scarlet Red, Ciel Cyan, Mauve Purple, and Seville Orange. Now she had Raven Black on her list as well.

She began tinkering with his phone, changing a few things on his avatar here and there. Slowly, it started looking more and more like him. Until she was finished almost fifteen minutes later. He had been sitting close to her, watching over her shoulder, but she then put the screen to his face so that he could see her handiwork. "See? I think it looks much better now. What do you think? Can we save it?"

He raised his eyebrows in surprise. He thought the first avatar was okay, passable at best. But this one looked exactly like him. Just like hers looked exactly like her. 

Raven gave a nod of his head. "I like it. It looks good." 

-

It was over an hour and a half of waiting before Raven told Roseanne that maybe the others weren't coming. Scarlet hadn't even opened her message either, and the others weren't around. She then suggested that they could still go out to the carnival together. It was their only weekend off in the entire year and she didn't want to let it go to waste. She sent another message to her friend that she and Raven would be at the carnival if they wanted to join them and they left the facility together. 

The administration at the facility tried to only let one group at a time out of the grounds, to be able to keep better track of everyone. As Roseanne and Raven scanned their bracelets by the front gates, she caught a glimpse on the screen above. 108 crew members training for special space missions, 20 instructors, four admins, 1 general admin. Underneath that was a section that said Group 12191 granted clearance for weekend, allow members off premises. Two remain in facility, requesting access for leave 7:45pm. Four out, time of exit 6:55am. When she saw that, she felt her heart drop into her stomach because she knew Raven saw it too. The four of them had gone somewhere without them. And all because they didn't want to invite Raven and they didn't like that Roseanne had invited him.

They were allowed access out of the training grounds and they stepped out onto the sidewalk. The hover train station was right outside and they bought their passes for a round trip to Province of Grains and back. They then went to stand at the platform as they waited for the train to approach. The train had just left the station, but they had trains leaving every five minutes, and since they were only going to the neighboring province, they would be at the carnival in less than fifteen minutes. 

When they arrived, there was a sea of people, all with white hair, and white irises. It was strange to both Raven and Roseanne. They had no one from Province of Grains in their group and the last time either of them had seen someone from there was when they were training with everyone as children. The trainers and instructors slowly started weeding people out of the group. Usually, the people from the less useful provinces were sent home first. Since the carnival was going from province to province and most people didn't leave their own provinces anyway.

They got their tickets to enter the carnival and everyone was staring at them as they walked around together. They walked side by side until Roseanne stopped at one of the food booths. Their metal bracelets also connected to their bank accounts which contained their stipends over the years. It was four thousand coins a year, which wasn't much. But their room and board was free at The Garden as well as their food, then they only got to go out once per year, so they didn't spend any money. Roseanne had been training at the Garden for nineteen years. By this time she had about eighty thousand coins accumulated over the course of her time there.

Roseanne got Raven to try all the carnival foods with her, from fried chocolate cookies, to funnel cakes. They shared everything and had a little bit of each. Back at the garden they had a diet of healthy foods and no sweets. The only time they ever got to have any of it was whenever they were allowed out of the facility. 

They went on a couple of rides together until it started getting late. As it was announced over a speaker that the carnival was closing for the night, Roseanne asked Raven if they could stop by the toilets. There was a line to go in and he was waiting for her. As he stood waiting outside, an employee of the carnival informed that he had to exit. "But I'm waiting for my friend. She just went in there. I don't want to lose her in the crowd." The employee said that he could wait right outside the gates for her and grabbed him by the arm, leaving him out of the carnival. He looked back over his shoulder, to see if Roseanne would be emerging from the toilets. But there were crowds of whites leaving the facilities building.

When Roseanne finally came out and looked around, Raven was nowhere to be found. She got her holo phone out and saw that she had a text message from him. 

I was waiting for you and then I was told I had to leave. I'm right by the front gates.

Roseanne nodded and stuffed her phone in her pocket. She walked by herself towards the exit and looked around. It was night time already and though he was different than the others in appearance, it would have been difficult for her to see him. She texted him, asking where he was. But since there was a sudden surge of people, her message didn't go through. 

She sighed in frustration and kept looking around for him. That had been until three white boys who looked about her age walked up to her. "Oh look, its a pretty pink." One of them said in amusement. "Want to come with us? We can have some fun together."

"No thank you." Roseanne said in a serious tone. She didn't even look at them, never locking eyes.

"Come on." Another one of them insisted. 

"I wonder if what they say about pink girls is true." The third one in the group spoke and Roseanne immediately knew what they meant. It was a typical sterotype about the girls in her province. How they were barefoot hippies who spent all their time high and slept around with everyone. It wasn't entirely true. There were people like that and there were also normal people. But everyone only focused on the negative rumors. They believed what they wanted. 

She tried to walk away, and the first guy grabbed her arm to stop her. She immediately tried to wrench her arm from his hold. 

"Let go." She said as she struggled.

Neither of them got to say or do anything more because someone immediately stepped between them. It was Raven who pushed her behind him protectively. 

"Leave her alone." He told them.

-

so last night i got into a HUGE argument with my crush. but we talked it out and now we're okay. we've been best friends for about two years. and this is only the third argument we've had. 

yesterday he had a family party of his house. and he invited me. i said i was down even though i went to work that morning and i was on my days so i felt tired and sluggish. so i get ready and i tell him im about to head out. and he tells me. "give me a few minutes. the table i was saving for us was taken and i dont want to tell anyone to move. the party is packed." so i said "so you dont want me to pull up." he says "i want you to come. but maybe we can hang out somewhere else and come back later." so then i said "no that's fine. lol i'll just text josh or fer and see if they wanna hang out." 

so then i stopped replying. he texted me like 20 times apologizing. and i went out with josh. so i ranted with josh. an hour later my crush texts me and says "so youre ignoring me now?"

and then we talked about it. i basically told him he hurt my feelings bc i felt like he was telling me not to pull up. he said he wanted me to come by, that's why he invited me. so we talked about it and we apologized to each other. so we're okay now.

-clary