At promptly 6pm the intercom sounded again, announcing that all students should make their way down to the dining hall for dinner, I didn't want to climb out of my cloud like bed, it was so comfortable, but the last thing I had eaten was breakfast, so my stomach was having a conflict of its own. I stepped out into the hallway and pocketed my key, directly opposite my room at door number 7 Parker stepped out wide eyed with the biggest grin on her face, "Mila! I was wondering where they took you, what is this place!?" I obviously had no idea how to respond, I just smiled and said "your guess is as good as mine.'' We hooked our arms smiling together and proceeded to make our way down the stairs towards the dining hall. Surrounded by a hundred other students we slowly pushed our way through the sky high doors, in front of us were five long tables easily seating at least 20 people at each, they were named as first, second, third, fourth and final, and then facing us in the opposite direction was another table which looked as though it could sit only ten or so people. Parker and I seated ourselves at the table named 'first' and waited. Once everyone had settled into their seats, an elderly woman proceeded to sit down at the smaller table, followed by seven other elderly men and women and two students.
"Good evening Whimsy High students and teachers, I am Principal Rose'' the semi elderly woman said, She was extremely tall, with dark brown shoulder length hair, deep set eyes behind thick black rimmed glasses, ''I would like to give a warm welcome to our newest first term students, and welcome back to all of our existing students, I trust you had a blessed Christmas break. I am certain you all have many questions that you would like answered" she said as she faced our table "let me begin by saying that you have all been very carefully selected to attend this school, these decisions are not made lightly, and we are thrilled that you have all agreed to be here. Whimsy High is unlike any school you may have heard of, we do not work according to a syllabus, nor do we hold any exams or extracurricular activities, at Whimsy High the only thing we encourage our students to do is to keep an open mind. You may not be aware of it yet, but each and every one of you, are gifted, you are all, or will all have the ability to mould your own dreams as well as the dreams of others into reality. You see, when a person dreams, they assume their minds are subconsciously trying to tell them something, or they have merely gone to sleep with a thought in their mind that somehow manifests into a dream once they fall asleep and they never think of that dream again. Although this is true, it often happens that you have a case of de-je-vu, where exactly what happens on any given day is true to what you have dreamt of at some stage in your life. In these cases, it is our abilities that have been put to work. We are the entity that allows a dream to become a reality. Basically we are the third party between a living person's dream like state, and their future reality. Of course we are not capable of allowing all dreams to come true, there are too few of us, and also not all dreams are meant to become a reality, but it is our duty here at Whimsy High, to study the dreams of others, and decide which dreams should be allowed to enter our world, which dreams could benefit the future of our world, and then use our abilities to make those dreams happen. Your abilities will start to manifest towards your thirteenth birthday and only grow stronger from there on. I know that this is a lot to take in, but let me just finish off by saying that you are all extremely special and the world we live in exists because of each and every one of us. Now, I want you all to think of what meal you would most desire to appear in front of you tonight, as you will do for each and every meal for the duration of your time here. Keep an open mind, and let your desires become your reality. Enjoy!"
I looked around the hall and was surprised to see that absolutely no one else thought that what they had just heard was complete and utter nonsense. I mean who can simply wish for a meal to miraculously appear, and gifted? What was that all about? At this stage I was finding it extremely difficult to remain open minded, when all of a sudden food started appearing on the tables beyond ours, some as simple as a fruit salad, others as vast as an entire buffet of meats and salads, one pupil even had a simple yet rather large slice of apple crumble. I looked at Parker in complete shock and she returned my gaze with equal horror. "How the hell did they do that?" she asked me, ''I don't have a clue" I said, shaking my head from side to side. "They said that all we have to do is keep an open mind, and think of what we most want to eat right? So why don't we try that?" we agreed and both closed our eyes and tried to think of something to eat, but apparently with everything that had happened today, neither of us were able to think beyond how crazy this all was. By this point my stomach was about to claw its way out of my body and onto someone else's plate, so I closed my eyes again, and tried to clear all other thoughts and picture only the food that I wanted to eat. After about a minute I opened one eye and to my complete astonishment there it was, a Big Mac and Cheese Burger and chips (I had been dying for one of those ever since I had seen a MacDonald's add on TV a couple of months back, (I had never dared ask my parents for one though) but there it was, right in front of me, still steaming with warmth, its deliciously unhealthy aroma making my mouth water. I looked over at Parker who had managed to muster up a boiled egg on toast with a side of avo; she was never one for junk food. "That's just not normal" we said at the same time, "Jinx you owe me a coke" we said once again at the same time through our giggles, and suddenly there they were, a coke in front of each of us.