Island of Jewels (first book in the Alli Jones series)
By Tara J*****/Angelclaw
Introduction and information
I’m Alli Jones; I’ve got a strange life. Ever get the feeling that no one knows where you are? You ever feel like you’ve hardly any friends? Ever feel like you’re a mystery?
That’s how I feel. Every day. It started when I was only 9; I was adopted into a family. A family of two snobby sisters and 3 jerk brothers, oh, and my baby brother and sister. My two snobby sisters are twins; I call them the Terrible Two. Jenny and Jessie are their names. They’re identical twins, both tan, brown/blonde hair and green eyes. And they are average height. They’re 14, so it’s horror, horror, horror!
They’re hair is down to mid-back and always tangled. Once they got stuck together because Jessie got bubble gum in Jenny’s hair and her hair got stuck to Jenny’s hair!
My three brothers. They’re better, but not by much. At least they are sporty and don’t act like snobs. Benny, Jake and Ryan. All of them are 12. Benny is Hispanic with brown eyes and short, messy brown hair. Jake is tan, long-ish blonde hair and has blue eyes. Now Ryan, he’s something. He has his hair dyed orange, blue and green, he’s pale with green eyes. Ryan is the average height, Jake is quite taller than Ryan and Benny is smaller than Ryan. I tease Benny by calling him Benny Boo.
My baby brother and sister. They’re troublesome! I call them the Trouble and Terror, or Troubling Terrors. I call my baby brother Trouble; he has a real name though, it\'s Oliver. Terror is what I call my baby sister, her real name is Olivia. Trouble has short, brown/blonde hair and blue eyes. Terror has long brown/blonde hair and blue eyes. Both of them are Hispanic. And they’re only 3.
I was adopted, my only real family that I live with are the two that were my real sibling and adopted with me. Trouble and Terror. Sometimes I call them Ollie and Ollie.
I’m Hispanic too, I have long brown/blonde hair and brown eyes, I was born with blue eyes, but they changed to brown when I was around 5 or 6. I’m tall for my age; I’m twelve, by the way. My real name is Alexandria. Alice for short. But even though Alice is for short, everyone calls me Alli.
This family has a mother and father of course! My mom is Amelia, she is tall, has medium blonde hair and has her eyes dyed purple, her skin is very tan. My dad is Mick Jones. He’s tall-ish and has short, black hair and green eyes that stand out from his pale skin.
My family can be real annoying at times, everyone but my brothers and I are snobby and that sort stuff. It feels like heck sometimes, you know what I mean. Everybody’s family gets annoying, but not as annoying as mine. And I’m always blamed for Trouble and Terrors mischievous doings. Annoying, right?
And the worst bit is I can’t run away! I’m on a sunny, unknown island. I don’t even know whereabouts it’s near. It’s a really big island. I don’t know what they mean by if I go back that I’m dead. What do they mean?!
Anyways, the house we live in is 5 stories. Mad, right? It’s pretty big. I get lost a lot, luckily I have a phone. In that house, you could play hide-and-seek for days on end!
So, basically I’m always in trouble. I’m responsible for the things my siblings do.
Do you ever get blamed for something you didn’t do?
Yeah, that’s why my life is heck.
That’s basically my family. Yeah. . . It’s not the best family, but it’s better than nothing!
As you know, I was adopted. So I was seriously skinny, I still am. But I’m not anorexic, luckily. Some people are obsessed with being skinny, why?
There are lots of questions that I want someone to answer, but no one will. I hate those questions that are really important to you, and no one will answer them!
That ever happened to you? It happens a lot to me. I hate it so much. Not as much as the Terrible Two, though. Not sure about how much more. Probably a lot.
I hate those words that sound like two words but they’re actually one. I don’t know what that has to do with hating The Terrible Two.
Well, it’s a strange world, right?
Chapter 1 - New begining
So here’s how my parents adopted me. My background story, I guess.
I was in the adoption house, Mrs Muffy’s Adoption Shelter, I had my two baby siblings, Troubling Terror, they were only one and I was nine. It was kind of fun, selling cookies for charity, trying to get more money than your friends.
But Mrs Muffy was never pleased with how much we raised.
We usually had to spend the rest of the day in the shame room. It’s a small, dark room in the Adoption Shelters basement, with a small bathroom and a blanket for sleeping.
I didn’t like it in there; I don’t think Troubling Terror liked it either.
That’s mainly why I didn’t like going down there. They always cried, not nice.
I walked up to Mrs Muffy, “Hi, and Mrs Muffy! I sold 21 Coconutties!” I smiled, feeling proud of my sale. I’d never sold that much Coconutties before.
Mrs Muffy frowned. We used to call her Muffin, because her body shape was like a muffin.
I giggled quietly to myself; she had an unusual frown, the kind of one a person with ‘troubles’ might have. She stared at me, the frown growing bigger.
“And you say that like you have just got a record for the most Coconutties sold. That’s not a lot, Alexandria,” Muffin said, placing a hand on her fat hip, getting up from her squeaky office chair, it didn’t fit her, too small.
I crossed my arms and stuck my tongue out. “Don’t act spoiled, it’s not like you’ll ever be adopted,” Muffin laughed harshly. Her ginger hair, that was thick around her round face, fell over her hazel eyes, making her look slightly nicer and younger.
“Well, you don’t know what it’s like having no parents!” I said loudly, stomping my foot hard on the ground, I just about missed my other foot. That would have been embarrassing.
Muffin looked at me, an angry and disappointed expression on her face. “And it’s not like you’ll ever know what it’s like to be loved by parents.” Muffin began to pick at her nails.
I took a step back, feeling offended and shocked at her remark. I looked at her, my brown eyes wide with fright. I turned away and walked up the large, creaky, vintage stairs, up to the third floor where my room was.
I changed Troubling Terrors diapers and put them to bed. I didn’t know what time it was, I didn’t care. It’s not like I had parents telling me to go to bed, or saying stuff like, “It’s eight o’ clock, go to bed now.”
Muffin was right. I didn’t know what it was like. Even though I have parents now, I feel like they don’t care about me now. It was okay when I was ten, but now I’m twelve, and I’m not gullible to their presents of ‘love’.
I sat on my bed, springs sneaked out of the mattress, making it hard to sleep.
I lay down and sighed heavily, looking at the ceiling blankly. It had water marks on it.
Troubling Terror fell asleep. I thought it was my bed time too. I rested my head on my soft pillow, curling up beneath the thick blanket. All the pillows and blankets had the same design.
Yellow with orange vertical striped.
I liked the plain design; it reminded me about the sun and it\'s rays of light and warmth.
I fell asleep within an hour, reluctantly though.
I woke up with a headache. Troubling Terror were crying when I woke up.
I clambered out of bed, stumbling as I gained balance. I walked over to their cots.
Their blankets and pillows had the same design as all the others.
Giving them both a bottle of warm milk that I get from the mini fridge. They calmed down and began to drink it calm, happy and soothed.
I sighed and began to walk to the door. Troubling Terror began to reach their arms for me, so I walked back and picked them up; still letting them drink their milk.
I walked down the stairs and into the lobby, where Muffin was, sitting in her tiny chair, filing her nails in a mean-girl way.
Well, she is a mean girl. A really mean girl, at that.
I looked at her, pursing my lips to imitate her. She stood up and glared at me.
“Don’t you dare mock me!” Muffin screeched at me, her hazel eyes looking like a hazel fire.
“Has anyone come to adopt us?” I smiled, looking innocent as my big brown eyes twinkled.
Muffin sighed and sat back down, behind her desk and took out some papers from a large, squeaking draw that was at the side of her desk.
“Yeah, I don’t know why they would want you and your, ugh, siblings.”
“Really?!” I exclaimed, not believing it. She played that trick on me before, I wasn’t going to get my hopes up just to be let down.
“Yes, really. They’re coming in an hour, get ready.”
I walked up the stairs, a skip in my step, when I reached our room door, I sighed. “This’ll be fun,” I told Troubling Terror. They smiled back and began to make bubbles from their spit.
I laughed at the bubbled and left them in the cot when we got into our room.
I began packing my clothes and other things. I also backed Troubling Terrors stuff.
It was all packed into two large, purple, wheelie bags. I strapped Troubling Terror on the bars that lead up to the handle, so I could carry the bags.
I went down the elevator that you could only use if you were going to leave and had bags.
The metal doors opened and I stepped inside the elevator. It flung the door closed. I looked at the hard metal floor, ceiling and walls. It was like a metal box, to be honest.
It brought us down to the lobby and I got out, with the bags.
But the bags didn’t have Troubling Terror.
I spun around and saw Troubling Terror sitting in the elevator that was starting to close.
Ditching the bags, I ran over to the elevator. Managing to squeeze through the doors before the closed and squeezed me to death.
“What?! How did you get loose?” I asked Troubling Terror, even though I knew they couldn’t talk.
They just giggled and spat.
I picked them up and pressed the button to go to the lobby, repeatedly. This time it crashed down to the lobby. The doors opened weakly as I stepped through them.
This time, I had Troubling Terror.
I strapped them onto the bags again, but this time tighter.
See why I call them Troubling Terror?
Anyway, I walked past Muffins desk and to the table that had food set up for my soon-to-be parents.
I took a cupcake and began to eat it. Yum, it was vanilla flavoured.
“That’s not for you!” Muffin yelled at me, from her desk.
“What are you going to do about it?” I said, stuffing the rest of the cupcake in my mouth.
“Grrrr!” Muffin growled at me. She actually growled!
“Are you a dog, or something?” I asked, my big, brown eyes twinkling.
“No! But I’m sure you are,” Muffin mumbled. This is where the argument starts.
“No, I’m not a dog!”
“Keep acting like that, and your parents will ditch you.”
“No they won’t, I’m sure they’ll ditch you!”
“Well, they’re not my parents.”
“Ugh! I hate you!”
“I hate you too, fat kid.”
At that point, I lost it. I was actually quite skinny. Too skinny, if you ask me.
I walked up to Muffin and jumped down on her fat foot.
It felt nice getting the anger out and hearing a fat person called Muffin scream in pain.
A second later, my new parents walked through the door. I immediately stopped acting angry and started acting cute and innocent.
“Hi,” I squeaked, looking at Mr and Mrs Jones.
“Hi there, cupcake!” Mrs Jones said sweetly, tapping me gently on the nose.
I giggled. It tickled me, and I have the tickles.
“Isn’t she cute,” Mr Jones said, smiling warmly at me. “We’re going to take you home.”
“Yay!” I screamed, “They are my baby siblings.” I pointed to Troubling Terror.
“Aw! You lot are cute,” Mrs Jones said in awe. “I’m glad we chose you cuties.”
“Mmmhmm,” Mr Jones mumbled as she signed the adoption certifricates. “So we have complete responsibility over them?”
“Yes, Mr Jones! Anything else?” Muffin said politely. I never saw her like this.
That’s when I knew their surname. Jones.
“No, thank you, Mrs Muffy.” Mr Jones grumbled, deep in thought when he was reading through the papers and noticing all the important stuff.
“Okay. Just sign here, here, here, here and both of you here,” she informed them, pointing to the places where they were spaces.
Mr and Mrs Jones signed the spaces and handed them to Muffin.
“Okay, now you’ll be going home with Mr and Mrs Jones, Alexandria!” Muffin informed me.
I looked at Mrs Jones, who was setting Troubling Terror in the double-pram. She looked at me warmly and stretched a soft hand out for me.
I placed my hand in hers, a warm, fuzzy feeling spread in my body.
I followed her down the street and into a long limo.
I gazed in awe at it as Mrs Jones ushered me inside it.
I sat down and strapped myself in. I smiled and looked out of the window.
I felt a sharp and painful stab in my arm.
After that I don’t know what happened. I just blacked out.
I woke up in a soft, lush bed. I believe it was stuffed with rose petals.
It was, as a matter of fact.
I looked up at the ceiling. It was yellow with rubies embedded in it.
I had a pounding headache.
I noticed a few tablets and a note on my stomach. I read the note, it said:
Dear Alexia,
I’m sorry that you blacked out. We had to let you rest for the long journey.
You are now with our family of 10.
(Including you and your siblings)
You have two fourteen year old sisters; Jenny and Jessie.
You have three 12 year old brothers; Benny, Jake and Ryan.
And then you have you, Oliver and Olivia.
You can have one of these tablets for your pains and aches.
Sorry for the pain,
Love your new Mom and Dad.
That was a nice note, I have to say.
So I ate one of the tablets and stared at the glimmering rubies.
I felt a bit dizzy and a bit sick. I began to fall asleep.
I fell asleep.
I dreamed about eating pancakes. Yum!
But, I don’t know why I dreamed that. Funny dreams.
I got up from the bed. The whole room was yellow and embedded rubies.
Some rich family, huh?
I could just take all the rubies and live my life alone.
Yeah, that’s a good idea!
I got up and walked to the door. Opening it and walking down the stairs and into the kitchen.
I smiled at the large, open spaced kitchen and sat in a high, spinning chair.
Jenny and Jessie walked in, giggling obnoxiously and talking with a very American accent.
“Hi! I’m Alli,” I beamed at them, they stopped making noise and stared.
My blonde/brown hair was slightly messy and I was wearing pink pyjamas.
“Hello,” Jenny said, looking at me up and down with a disgusted expression.
“Yeah. Hiya,” Jessie giggled, “What a weird name.”
“What are you doing here?” Jenny asked, her eyes wide.
“I’m your new sister!” I laughed, then stopped abruptly.
“You?” Jenny asked, looking surprised, but in a bad way.
“Yes, me.” I looked at her, was she un-happy about me?
“Ugh! Not another one,” moaned Jessie.
“Another one? Another what?” I asked, puzzled by what she ment.
“Another adopted sibling,” Jenny laughed, pointing at me.
“What? How many are there?” I asked another question. Was there really more?
“Hmmm… Let me think. Maybe three others,” Jenny replied in a thoughtful tone.
“Yeah, I think so too,” Jessie agreed.
“What?! Three others!” I screamed in disbelief.
“Yeah. All boys!” Jenny laughed with her mean tone.
“Nooooo,” I mumbled quietly to myself. Were they the boys in the note?
A tall, blonde woman walked into the room and smiled at me. She had pretty purple eyes.
“Go and get some more rest, Alexandria,” she told me. Right then I knew she was my mom.
“Where is it?” I asked, “My bedroom, I mean.”
“Top floor, last room in the corridor,” ‘Mum’ informed me. “Call me Mum.”
“Oh. Okay.” I walked into the hall and saw an elevator. The gold doors opened, revealing a large room with a red carpet and gold walls. It had gold buttons on the right-hand wall. The numbers were in diamonds!
I clicked the highest floor, floor five. The gold doors shut with a bang, then I there was a cluttering noise. The elevator began to go up and up and up. Classical music played, I moaned and leaned against the wall, accidently pushing a button.
I leaped back to see what I pressed. It was a music button; I presumed it was that because the classical elevator music was now a new pop song. I smiled and listened to it.
Suddenly the gold doors jerked open, I jumped back in surprise. “Whoa!” I shrieked.
Then I saw a boy with long-ish blonde hair climbing into a window by a rope! He was tanned and had blue eyes. He looked up, surprised. I saw him jump back from the window.
Why did he jump?!
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