12 – Offending Barry (3)

Barry had left to see Waylon around the same time the servants went home. The only employees left were those who dealt with the general public. They had no business entering the mansion’s restricted areas. That included the library.

It was a fitting place to work. Stellaluna carried her bag of books there. She just needed a writing utensil.

A small desk in the corner of the room had a pencil cup. She pulled a pencil out from it, and sat at one of the tables in the middle of the room. After looking around the room, she took out the workbook, and opened it to the first page.

It was covered in various letters. Each one of them unique. Perhaps it was a list of every letter in the alphabet? Stellaluna actually did know the alphabet song from her early childhood. She learned the song from her cousin, Hazel, who had gone to school. Although jealous at the time, Stellaluna long stopped envying her for it. Had Hazel not gone to school, she never would have met that boy who got her pregnant, which led to her untimely death.

Stellaluna tried not to think of such depressing thoughts. Instead, she focused on wondering if these letters were in order of that song. She doubted it, for there were far too many different letters on the page.

She flipped to the next page, which contained a line of text at the top she couldn’t read. Below it was the triangle with legs in between horizontal lines, with several dashed versions of the letter below it. She picked up the pencil in her fist, and slowly traced over the dashes. Her hand was shaky, but it wasn’t too difficult. She traced that letter a second and third time, feeling confident. Yes. She could do this.

Stellaluna moved to the blank horizontal lines below. She drew a triangle, with two short legs at the bottom. Just like in the tracing.

Somehow it looked nothing like the tracing. The lines were jagged, and she couldn’t get the little legs to perfectly match up with the side lines of the triangle. She tried again and again until she gave up. Maybe she’d have better luck with the next letter.

It was a circle with a small, straight line on the right side of it. After successfully tracing, she again tried to draw the letter freehand. It was also a struggle.

She moved onto the next, which was a long line with two half circles pressed against the right side. Then, a long line with a small, half circle. After that came a letter that was simply a half circle. Stellaluna sighed in relief. Finally. A letter even she couldn’t screw up. The next letter was a smaller version of that. The one that followed looked familiar to her. A circle with a flat side. Where had she seen that one?

Stellaluna looked away from her workbook, so she could reach for her bag to pull out the small book with the thick pages. Before she could, her eyes landed on Yannick, standing at the edge of the table. She gasped and slammed the workbook shut, covering it with her hands as she looked up at him. “What are you still doing here?”

“I came in late. So, I stayed late.” Yannick eyed the book under her hands. “I was to leave, but I have you write see.”

“So you decided to stand there and watch, instead of saying something.”

Yannick apologized with a slight blush. “I was curious. How you hold your pencil. It is… strange. Like a child.”

Stellaluna had to be blushing more than Yannick at that. She didn’t know how else to hold one. “How do you hold yours?”

Yannick sat in the chair next to her, and picked up the pencil, holding it with two fingers. The edge of it laid against the area between his thumb and pointer finger. “Everyone I see hold it so.”

Stellaluna reached for the pencil to try for herself, revealing part of the work book as she did so. Yannick’s eyes landed right on it.

“You know not how to write?” Yannick reached for the book, and Stellaluna reluctantly let him see for himself. What use was there in hiding it? She’d already embarrassed herself enough, holding her pencil like a child. Maybe that was why her letters came out horribly.

Yannick opened to the page of her leggy triangles. Stellaluna caught a smile behind his hand. Great. He was laughing at her.

“Here.” Yannick turned the book towards her. “Try it again.”

This time, Stellaluna held the pencil how Yannick had shown her. It was a little easier, though she still struggled to get the legs to line up with the sides of the triangle.

“Interesting.” Yannick’s mouth twitched.

“What?”

“Look.” Yannick took the pencil, leaned over, and drew the top half of a triangle, followed by a line in the center. “Like that.”

“Oh.” As if Stellaluna hadn’t felt stupid enough. She tried it his way, with much success.

“Now know you, how to write A’s.”

Stellaluna nodded. So that first letter was an A. Was the next letter a B then?

Yannick turned the page. “Your small A’s are better.”

“Small A’s?”

“You know… I forgot the word.” Yannick pulled the book towards himself to read some of the text. “Lower-case A’s. They are better than your upper-case A’s.”

Lower case? Upper case? “Huh?”

“You know. Upper case and lower case. Sentences and names start with upper-case. Others are lower case.” Yannick tilted his head at Stellaluna, who stared down at her clasped hands. “You know not this? From reading?”

“I… can’t read either.”

“How?”

“I was home schooled. But my parents only cared about teaching me how to be a proper wife. They thought me being literate would make men less interested.”

Yannick stared at her. Stellaluna wondered if it was out of shock, or if he didn’t understand her words.

“That is wrong. Many men like women that read.”

“Barry doesn’t.”

Yannick rolled his eyes and snorted. “Is that why you this now make? Because he out is? He cannot know?”

Stellaluna nodded. “I want to learn. But… it’s hard. I don’t even know what these letters are.”

“What other books have you?” Yannick gestured towards the bag.

Stellaluna pulled them out. Yannick picked up the small book, that had one word on each page. He flicked through it, landing on a picture of a bat.

“I assume that word is ‘bat,’ Stellaluna commented. Though she at least recognized the lower-case A this time, and that other letter she drew.

“It is.” Yannick pointed to the A. “That makes the ‘ah’ sound. When you it read.” He tapped at the first letter. “That is a B. ‘Buh.’”

Stellaluna sounded it out in her head, then pointed to the last letter. “Then that makes a ‘t’ sound?”

“Yes. That is a T.”

She slowly sounded the letters out. “Buh-ah-t.”

“Good.” Yannick gave her an encouraging smile as he turned the page to a picture of a lemon. “Try this here.”

She didn’t know a single letter of it, but the answer was obvious. “It’s a lemon.”

“But what sound makes the letters?”

Stellaluna slid the book from him, and put her finger on each letter as she sounded them out. Yannick continued smiling.

“Good.” He turned the page to a picture of a cake. Two letters she recognized, but only one she actually knew. Sounding it out made no sense in her head.

“Well?”

Stellaluna placed her finger under the word. “Cuh-ah-k-eh?”

“No.” Yannick had his hand over his mouth, probably hiding a laugh. Right when she was beginning to think she had a chance, she had failed. Possibly sensing her mood change, he pointed to the first and third letters. “You have those right.”

Stellaluna pointed to the a. “Shouldn’t that be ‘ah?’”

Yannick shook his head and pointed to the last letter. “That makes it ‘ah’ to ‘aye.’”

“What?!” Stellaluna gaped at him. “Why?”

“I know not, but it had me also confused.”

“This is hopeless. I’m never gonna learn.”

“You were doing great.”

“Only because this book tells me what the word is.” Stellaluna picked up the book with the cat on it. “I wouldn’t be able to read a single word of this one.”

“Not today. But someday. If you with these practice.” Yannick turned to a page with a picture of a hammer.

Stellaluna was not up for such a large word. “I give up.”

“You have just started.” Yannick closed the book. “Maybe enough for the night. We can more another day try.”

We? What did he mean by that? Besides, Barry was home most days. “I can’t risk it with Barry here.”

“Then go we where he not is.”

“What? Meet in secret?” Stellaluna gaped at him. How was she to meet anyone in secret? Especially a servant. A male servant at that! If they got caught, people would assume the worst.

“Yes. You know that…” Yannick rubbed his chin. “Small house? In the garden. Far from all.”

“The abandoned cottage?” It used to be living quarters for past groundskeepers, until Barry fired their last one. Instead of replacing him, he piled that extra work onto the gardeners. The cottage still remained, uninhabited. Stellaluna couldn’t imagine what else Yannick could be referring to, other than the shed- which was a far less pleasant place to be.

“Yes. Cottage. Nobody uses it?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“We can us there meet?”

It had its risks. While the cottage was far from the areas open to the public, it was still possible for someone to decide to poke around the cottage. And if it was dark, they would need a light. And anyone in the vicinity would be able to tell someone was in there. There was also the matter of Barry. Did he ever enter the cottage? Probably not, but the risk still stood.

Stellaluna couldn’t think of any reason why anyone would ever need to go in there. What were the chances of them getting caught?

“Yes,” Stellaluna finally said. “Let’s meet there.”