Jess and Lizzy
Jess sat dejectedly on the playground swing. She kicked the sand around her feet as if personally punishing it for her lack of friends. It wasn’t fair that she should have to sit here...
Stories
Original fiction by young writers ages 8-13
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Jess sat dejectedly on the playground swing. She kicked the sand around her feet as if personally punishing it for her lack of friends. It wasn’t fair that she should have to sit here on this swing, lonely and bored, while the other kids had a great time.
Sherry had not returned to her home country in years. In a way, it was no longer her home country. What had been home is now the past. Father was the one who had insisted on the trip. She had been indifferent at first, but her father had persisted. China had changed; no longer a third-world country, it was now a Mecca of wealth.
It was a chilly autumn morning. I pushed my hands into my pockets as I walked out of our house to the car. “Don’t worry, Renee,” said my mom, “you’ll do great.” Still, though, I worried. Today I had an audition for a competition to play at Benaroya Hall.
I found the crossword puzzle section of the newspaper and picked up a pencil. One across: Roman goddess of wisdom. That was easy enough; I had studied Greece and Rome in fourth grade. I breezed through the crossword puzzle until I came to thirty-three down. “What will fly away if you don’t grab it soon enough?” Ten letters. I racked my mind for bird species that were ten letters long.
Arachne was my sister, but we were as different as night and day. I was tall and lanky, tanned from hours spent on the seashore hunting for the shellfish that Father used in his dye. She was small and pale from hours in front of the loom, doing the weaving that had brought her fame.
Every day, you wake up, eat breakfast, and walk down the five flights of steep, stone-cold stairs. As a cheery neighbor greets you, you put on a fake smile and fast walk out the door. You’ve never been a big “people person,” or a dog person, or even a cat person for that matter. Should you be someone?
A gloomy hole sheltered the shivering cardinal during a raging thunderstorm. The hole was an incomplete snake house, burrowed with consummate skill. The cardinal knew he had to get out before the hole filled with rainwater. Ever so carefully, he worked his way up the shallow passage, his gorgeous red feathers now streaked with dirt.
“He was mostly your dog.” The words flew in flurries around my head. I shall never forget them. “He was mostly your dog. Mostly your dog. Your dog. Dog.” Never-ending words, a round of angels whispered in my head. A comfort I drank like I would drink elixir. I found a blanket in those words. A mission. A dream that could never be reached. To find him.
Reject. That’s what I was. My parents claimed that eight children in the house was too much for them to handle, and that they couldn’t support them all, so they sent me away to live with my grandparents. That wouldn’t have been as much of a problem, except that Granny and Gramps lived in Maine, thousands of miles away from my original home in Salem, Oregon.
Adriane slowly opened her bedroom door, glancing down the hallway to make sure no one was awake. Once she was positive, she slipped through the small opening and closed the door. She hurried down the stairs and past the kitchen, wincing at her heavy footsteps, hoping no one would hear. As she reached the back door she slowed, looking for the key her mom kept on the counter.