Student Writing Spotlight: Kenya Brown

2007

Hi, my name is Kaelith Roon. I’m 17, and today my whole life changed.

Let’s go back a week earlier: So it all started with my mom in the kitchen, preparing desserts for the town’s bake off. She asked me to go in the attic and get my great grandmother Celia’s recipe book. As I got in the attic, I seen this box I never seen before. It was black with sparkly holographic cat stickers. I didn’t pay it no mind until Wednesday night. On Wednesday nights, I have book club meetings in the attic.

The box was open, and this time I reached over the box and grabbed this dark purple notebook with a lock on it. I looked in the box for the key, but I didn’t find it, so I called an locksmith, and when he got to my house, he said there was no type of key or handmade key he could make. I called my friend Calxys over to help me because she’s good at making online things and 3D printing stuff. After she examined the lock she went home and put the custom made key in my mailbox. The next day, as soon as I got the key, I ran upstairs to try it. As I turned the key in the lock, the notebook started opening by itself and flipping pages until it got to this specific page.

As I started to read it, I realized that this was my great grandmother Celia’s book, so the next morning I instantly remembered to ask my mom what did the notebook mean or could she read it because the writing was in tongues. I showed it to my mom, but all she did was rush me off to school. While I was at school, I decided to use study hall time to go to the computer lab to use the microscope to see if I could make out the tongues, but I still didn’t understand. So the next day during study hall again instead of me going to the computer lab, I went to the library to ask Mr. Elric could he read it. He said, no, but he said he could maybe find a book that could help but still nothing.

During family dinner that night, Pa and Mema come over. At family discussion, I brought the notebook up. Everybody looked at each other. Next, my mom said, “Dinner over. Kaelith, go give your brother a bath.” I put my dish in the sink and told Aurax to come on. Later on that night, I stared at the notebook from my bed and decided to see if I could decode it. As I started decoding it, you will never guess what I seen. It was two birth certificates with my name and a boy’s name: Kairoth Roon.

I looked at the date, and we had the same birthday and same year “2007,” so I did some more digging in the notebook and found a pretty old picture with me and a boy with blonde messy hair. Instead of going to ask mom or dad, I got the family Bible, which had every family member’s name in it. I searched for the name Kairoth Roon, and there it was scratched out. That’s the moment I realized I had a twin.

After laying in my bed, trying to go to sleep, I started asking myself, where is he? and why did my parents hide him from me?

As the next morning came, my mom called from downstairs that we’re having guest, but before, we need to have a family meeting. So I ran downstairs, and when I got down there, I seen the same boy I had seen in the picture. He was my twin brother and had lived in Boston for school and that’s the day my life changed.

Kenya Brown is in the eighth grade at Curtis Baptist School. Her favorite things to write are journal entries, and her favorite hobby is being herself and talking. She is from Georgia, and she loves seafood.