Growing up as a slave never is a good way to start into life. Tamina had to learn that first hand. Since she never knew anything else Tam mostly didn´t know what she was missing, but sometimes even the most naive, little slave girl does realize how bad things really are.
One of the worst memories she got was the time, when her master’s son celebrated his 8 birthday. The entire house was decorated nicely, sweets and presents could be found everywhere and all his friends and family was there too. Of course Tam wasn´t allowed to have any of it.
While the master’s son was having the time of his life with his friends, eating candy and playing with his new toys, Tam had to make sure the flow of sweets for the kids never stopped and all the adults wishes were pleased at the same time. Despite having to run around most of the time during this day and fullfilling orders, she still managed to catch glimpses at all the happy children and the fun the young master had.
Tamina didn´t knew what it was, but this birthday thing really seamed the be an important and great thing to happen for a kid. Since the young slave girl didn´t even knew her own date of birth, she never celebrated it herself. Not that her master would allow such a thing to happen anyway.
Oven the next couple of weeks Tam couldn´t shake of the idea of having her own birthday party and having the same fun as the young master. So after some intense thinking and planning during the brief breaks from work Tam had she decided to have her very own secrets party.
There was an old storeroom that was hardly ever used. A perfect hiding spot for a her party. There was not much space in it, but Tam couldn´t invite anyone anyway. She had now friends or other family members she could ask to come by. All she knew was the master’s family and the other maids and butlers of the mansion. And she couldn´t tell them. Master would punish her, if her knew about her plans and her co-workers were told not the interact with her unless it was for work.
But Tam was sure that her birthday would be great even with the young frog girl as the only guest at all. The party was about her anyway, right? All she new needed was a present and sweets. Tam tried to be smart and cross off two things in one go and made the sweets her presents. As slave she was of course not allowed to own anything even close the candy. So her only chance was to steal something from the kitchen.
Sadly the day she was planning to have her party not a single sweet could be found. Turned out master’s son was visiting a friend and took everything over for a slumber party. Since Tam didn´t wanted to cancel her birthday she simply took, what she could get, which turned out to be a potato and a single candle.
She sneaked into the old storeroom, locked the door behind herself and sat down. Tam lit the candle and carefully placed it on the potato. She proudly looked down on her improvised birthday cake and waited. She sat there and waited for the fun to start. For this great feeling of joy everyone seamed to have on this birthday parties. She wanted to laugh and smile like the others. But nothing happend.
Why? Why wasn´t this working? Did she do something wrong? Was she missing something important? What was it?
Tears started to form in Tamina’s eyes. Why wasn´t it working? Why couldn´t she have a nice day too? Why could all the other people have have such nice days full of fun and laughter and all she had was sadness. That wasn´t fair!
Soon Tamina was openly crying in the old storeroom, still holding the potato with the candle on top. After what felt like forever she finally blew out the flame of the candle, whispering
“I wanna be happy too!”
