1941 - chapter one

~~This is another story I'm writing~~ It will be posted on Sundays, and Hiding in My Head will be posted Thursdays~~

I woke up with a start, feeling the cold wooden floor on my cheek. Today was the day! We were finally moving to Hawaii! I'd been oddly excited about this day ever since my parents had announced we were moving there. Of course, there were business reasons. My father had been called to work in Hawaii just weeks earlier, and we'd been preparing to move ever since then. Of course, as any teenager would be, I was sad to be leaving my friends, but even more excited at the prospect of being able to see the ocean out my window, along with palm trees, and live in a cute yellow house that my father had described in detail to me after his visit to Hawaii earlier in June. 

"Adelaide!" I could hear my mother calling me from the lower level of our house. "Are you awake yet?" 

I sighed. I was awake, but still in my pajamas. "Yes!" I yelled back down. I quickly dressed in the outfit I'd chosen for moving day, kept out of the boxes that were probably down by the front door at the moment. I pulled on my new brown pants and a pink shirt.  I tied my sneakers, rolled up the blankets I'd slept on, and pounded downstairs. 

My mother and father were both looking at me when I emerged from upstairs. "Adelaide, do not run down the stairs. That's dangerous and not very ladylike." My mother was frowning at me. "And, your hair's a mess." 

"Mother, why does it matter? We're moving today anyways!" I retorted, knowing I'd get in trouble, but not caring. 

"Don't talk back to your mother, young lady," my father replied. 

I nodded and set my things by the front door, heading back upstairs to brush my hair. I brushed it quickly and did an exaggerated slow walk back down the stairs. Mother and Father were still at the kitchen table, and there was now a pancake sitting in my spot. I sat in my chair and began to eat. 

"Are you sure we're going to be able to fit all this in the trailer?" I asked. 

Father nodded. "Yes. And when we get on the boat, we'll keep it in the trailer when we park the car in the car area." 

"There's a car area?" I asked. Father nodded. "Oh, and how long will it take to get there?" 

Mother sighed. "Five days. We've been over this. We'll sleep and eat and everything on the boat." 

I nodded. "Okay," I said, and went back to my pancake. I thought about starting high school in Hawaii. Honolulu had a population of 180,000 people, which was huge compared to the 105,000 people I was used to in Sacramento. The high school I'd be attending come September was made up of 1,000 students and even that was a whole lot larger than my middle school, which had 200 students. 

I went back to being silent, since I didn't have any more pressing questions. For now, I figured, I could just wait until Mother and Father were ready to pack the car and the trailer. Mother and Father had told me earlier the route we'd be taking: We'd first drive to San Francisco, which would take about three hours, and at a port in San Francisco, we'd get on a really large boat, where we'd sail for five days until we reached Hawaii: Honolulu to be exact. Honolulu was about to be my new home!