Trudy grabbed her brother’s hand. They had been walking down the wooded path for some time, and she had sensed Sam’s nervousness, but hesitated to say anything. She loved being his big sister, but saw that as they were getting older, that he was wanting to prove his independence. In this moment, however, Trudy was glad as she felt her brother’s hand squeeze hers, and felt the calm come over him.
“Do you think she noticed?” Sam asked.
“Nah,” Trudy said. “And even if she does, I don’t think she minds us getting out of her hair a little earlier than normal. She’s got all her soaps to catch up on.” Trudy winked at her brother. He smiled back at her but Trudy saw the sadness in his eyes.
Just eight months prior, Trudy and Sam moved in with their aunt after their parents were killed in an accident. Neither Trudy, nor Sam knew the details. Trudy thought maybe when she got older she’d hear more facts, but for now, she needed to adjust to their new life, and especially help Sam settle in.
Their aunt was glad to help out, but Trudy suspected that much of her willingness came from the extra income she was now receiving. She was nice enough, but made it pretty clear that she was the victim in this situation, having to provide for two extra hungry mouths.
As if losing their parents and moving in with an indifferent caretaker wasn’t enough, the transition to the new private school was nearly unbearable. The students were unfriendly, the teachers stuffy, and poor Sam had to wear those ridiculous socks that went clear up to his knobby little knees. With all the strange adjustments they were forced to make, Trudy knew she needed to do something. So for the last five months, they’d left for school just a few minutes earlier each day. As the days went on, they were soon scarfing down their toasted waffles as quickly as they could shove and chew, and were now leaving with twenty extra minutes to spare. Their aunt chalked it up to extra play time before the school bell rang them into the classroom, but the real reason was much more exciting.
There was, along the way to school, a huge Sequoia tree which had a burn scar on one side, so big that even Trudy could stand up, full height, inside the tree. At first, they’d spend their extra minutes just playing, and imagining the tree was their house, but as time went on, they began to dig up the soil beneath the scar. One morning, they snuck a shovel out to the tree, and each morning with their extra minutes, they’d dig and dig, careful not to get their uniforms too dirty. They dug out rocks, and around the roots which divided their space into rooms. Today, they planned to disguise the opening with branches so that no one else would know their hideout. It was their own little secret, and it seemed to bring light and life back to Sam.
As they turned the bend that led to their underground hideout, they could see something like fog, pouring up and over the opening, and a yellow light – as warm and bright as the sun itself, made the fog glow like golden clouds. The two let go of each other’s hands and ran to look inside.
Emily M.
The tiring September sun was doing it’s best to warm up the morning as Jane bounced out the door, eager for her first day of school. She was going to be in fourth grade, finally! She had been waiting for the fourth grade for four years now, because the fourth grade teacher, Sister Harrington, was a star in their tiny catholic school. She wore fashionable clothes, played the guitar and sang every morning, and made lemonade for the whole class on the first day of school. Jane’s mouth was puckering in anticipation already.
“Jane!” a distant cry pulled Jane out of her lemonade party. She turned around to see her little brother, Timmy barreling down the lane to catch her. Jane waited, playing with the hem of her sweater. She would have much rather been twirling her hair, but her mother tied it up incredibly tight so that she could not today.
“Sorry, Timmy,” she said when he caught up to her. “I didn’t mean to leave you. I guess I just got a little too excited about—“
“Lemonade,” Timmy finished for her, panting.
“Yes,” she smiled a little sheepishly and reached for his hand.
“Jane,” Timmy squeezed her hand and kicked a rock, “Is Sister Trotter really as big and scary as they say?”
“As who says?” Jane shot back, rather ruffled at anyone scaring her little brother.
“Oh, David and Michael.”
“Timmy, since when do you believe those boys over me?” Jane laughed, relieved. “Don’t you remember half the stories they told you this summer about their fishing trips and pranks on their cousins? I don’t believe hardly anything those two say!”
“Yeah,” Timmy’s step lightened as they approached the schoolyard. “Can’t wait till I’m in fourth grade, though.” He let go of Jane and took off to catch his friend, Bill.
Just then Jane’s friend, Amanda, ran up to her, white as a sheet. “Jane, you won’t believe it. Sister Harrington has mysteriously left, and now we have Sister Trotter again!”
Cedar
Marc and Maude were plodding carefully along the wooded path, eyes searching the ground closely. “Where did she say we’d find it?” asked Marc for maybe the fiftieth time. Maude sighed. “Where we’d least expect it.” It was the same answer she’d given maybe fifty times. “Well, that’s not really helpful,” said Marc, for the fiftieth time. Maude squeezed his hand.
They kept walking. “Is that it??” Marc suddenly asked, pointing at a larger-than-usual pile of gravel near the edge of the path. Maude looked at the pile of normal, greyish-brown little pebbles. “Are you serious?” she asked. “Are you actually serious right now? Do any of those little bits look to you like a ten-carat ruby?” Marc shrugged. “I dunno. I haven’t spent much time studying the appearance of rubies.” Maude rolled her eyes and kept walking. “Well, here’s a hint. This one will be bigger than those little stones. And, you know, it will look like a ruby.”
Suddenly they heard a jeering voice behind them. “You two shopping for an engagement ring, sissies?” There was Eldon McFarfield, the school bully, who apparently had nothing better to do with his time than appear suddenly in unexpected places and attack people with cliche insults. For his own sake, he could not possibly have picked two worse people to bully that day.
Marc rolled his eyes. “I’ve already told you this, McFarfield. This is my wife. It’s stupid to ask if I’m looking for an engagement ring, because I already gave her one. Forty years ago.”
“I already gave her one,” continued the cliche bully. “I already gave her one.” Maude slapped him hard and then grabbed him by the collar and yanked him toward herself. The slap had startled him into silence, and he stared into her threatening face.
“Listen, you little punk,” she hissed at him. “My husband and I are sick of looking like little kids. Believe it or not, you’re not the only bully in the world. The one who turned us into this is way bigger and scarier than you. That’s what we’re dealing with. No sniveling little monster like you is going to get to us. Get it?” And she shook him a little.
Eldon McFarfield thought that Marc and Maude were the weirdest kids he’d ever met in his whole entire life. And he’d met a lot of weird kids. These two kept talking about being married and breaking some spell. He had thought they were nuts before. Now he knew they were.
Maude let him go but pushed him forward. “You’re coming with us,” she said. “Three pairs of eyes are better than two.” He was bewildered and annoyed, but she kept pushing him forward and telling him to keep his eyes out for a big red jewel, and for some reason he just kept going. Maybe he thought a big red jewel sounded like a nice reward for having to join a couple of lunatics on their screwball adventure.
“Ethel will be meeting us on the other side of this forest,” said Maude, still scanning the ground.
Marc groaned. “That old bitty?”
Maude gave him a sideways glance. “‘That old bitty’ is my oldest friend.”
“Oldest is right,” he muttered under his breath. Ahead of them, Eldon rolled his eyes.
They approached the edge of the woods, and ahead of them they could see a little old woman silhouetted against the sunset. She was rubbing her hands together excitedly, like she had big news to share. As they approached her, she cried out, “There! It’s right there!” Marc, Maude, and Eldon all looked where she was pointing. All they saw was a giant cow pie. In unison, all three wrinkled their noses and looked back at Ethel. “Look closer!” she cried.
Suddenly they saw it — the glint of shiny red, buried deep in cow crap.
———-(timer)———
“Well,” stated Marc flatly. “That certainly is the last place I’d expect to find it.”
Eldon hesitated only a moment, then dove toward the manure. In his greed to have the stone, he disregarded all that might otherwise have disgusted him. Marc and Maude and Ethel watched him with unconcerned curiosity. Eldon’s hand grasped the ruby. He held it up in triumph.
Marc, Maude, and Ethel watched as Eldon grew by about a foot. They watched as his freckles faded and then were replaced with wrinkles and sunspots. They watched as his red hair turned white, as his back stooped, as his ears sprouted whiskers. In a matter of seconds, Eldon McFarfield had become a seventy-five year old man.
“Well, hell-O, honey,” said Ethel.
Maude rolled her eyes and took the stone from the aged Eldon. Marc snickered and took the stone from the now-aged Maude. Eldon looked at the group of elderly people, the magic stone, and his own withered hands, and fainted.
“Sissy,” said Marc in his deep, husky voice.
Elisa
“Will it be fun?” Benji asked.
“How do I know? It’s a new school to me too,” Lana said.
“But you’ve been to kindergarten before.”
“But it’s a new school.”
Benji paused. “What if it isn’t fun?”
Lana shrugged. She was holding Benji’s hand as they walked. Her backpack was heavy with lunch and books.
“I’m scared,” Benji said quietly.
Lana said nothing for a minute. Then she squeezed his hand. “I’ll be there.”
Benji edged closer to her, and they trudged along silently.
It had been cold when they left the house, but the sun was bright, and walking made them warm.
After a while Benji sighed. “It’s far.”
Lana picked up the pace and tugged him along. “Keep up. We’ll be late.”
Benji took a hop to get back in pace with his sister. He looked through the trees next to the path. There it was again—the bottom of a wooden staircase, the rest of it winding away out of view, a smiling face leaning out—
Benji kept looking at where it had appeared, as he and his sister moved along, his eyes darting among the trees, craning his neck, until Lana tugged his hand again. No use. Gone in the blink of an eye, as usual.
Benji sighed again. “What if the teacher’s mean?”
“Then—find out how to not make her mad, I guess.” Lana’s voice trailed off, as if the question weren’t worth much bother.
“How will I do that?”
“How do I know? We haven’t met her. Maybe she’ll be nice.”
Benji kept worrying and looking up with dread as they rounded each bend, until finally the school house appeared. It was a long white building with a gray roof. There was a large door exactly in the middle of its long side, with four windows on either side of the door.
A woman dressed all in gray was leaning against the doorframe with her arms crossed.
Lana pulled her hand out of Benji’s as they reached the steps leading up to the door.
[I was writing slowly and that was as far as I got]
Emily H.
The challenge: Write a story about the image.
20 minutes
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