This is the assignment I got:
Write a story. A family of five in the 1950's move from the suburbs to an isolated farm in the dead of winter. The hundred twenty five year old farm is located on top of the Missouri River bottom bluffs. Railroad tracks run along the bottom of the bluffs where a couple of squatters live with their cow. The old abandoned farm house was void of heat, running water, telephone line, bathroom and a TV. There are two large hand-hewn beamed barns and other sheds, plus a cistern and an outhouse. There is evidence that Indians once occupied the land.
Why did the family move here? Who are they? What are they like? How do they adjust to this drastic change? Will they be happy, content, bored, scared, or frustrated?
And this is what I wrote:
“
Oof!” I gasped as Jay shoved a box at me. At seventeen you’d think my brother would be more mature, but no.
“Hey! Watch it!” Roy insisted, taking the box back from me and glaring at Jay. Roy was only fifteen and, as immature as he was at times, he was still more mature than Jay.
I wasn’t talking, I had decided this morning not to. Nobody really cared, so I just kept it up. I was putting up a silent protest to our moving. I honestly wouldn’t have minded… had the circumstances been different. The only reason we’re moving is because dad is having a mid-life crisis. He wants to—how did he put it?—oh yeah! “Find himself by rediscovering and becoming one with nature.” I think he’s being childish; he needs to just deal with it.
Mom has been gone for a year now, but my dad just can't get past it.` Sure it’s everyone’s problem, but we deal with it in a way that doesn’t affect everyone we come in contact with, in short, we pretend everything is okay, even if it’s not. I guess I’ve gotten used to the pretending on the outside enough that I can pretend on the inside too. Now I do feel rather fake, but it’s better than what dad’s going through. It was too painful for dad to be reminded of mom, so we’re moving because the house reminded dad of mom. The city reminded dad of mom. Apparently paved roads, real toilets, electricity, running water and beds remind him of mom too, so we’re moving to Arkansas. Jay says he’s going to run away the first chance he gets, but I figure we’ll move again before he gets it. Doesn’t Dad realize that anywhere he goes he won’t be able to escape the memories of mom? He knew her too well to be able to forget by simply moving where we live.
“Joy! What are you doing?” Jenny squealed.
I looked at her and she rolled her eyes, “Joy, you dropped my doll! It fell out of your box.” Ten-year-olds are so annoying, especially when they’re your little sister and you have to live with them.
I looked down and saw her shiny porcelain doll from Grandma in the box, and a dumb rag doll on the floor, she really needs to get her priorities straight. She picked it up and then went off dancing around getting under everybody’s feet. I sighed and set the box in the trunk of the bus. We had a 1950 VW microbus. It was pretty cool and we all had more than enough space for our junk. Dad had taken the back seat out since we could all fit in the first two rows and he used the extra space for our belongings.
“Guys!” Dad suddenly exploded from the front door, “We’re trying to get away! Not take it with us.”
“Huh?” Jenny asked, pausing her dance long enough to gape at dad.
“This is way too much stuff; I don’t want all this stuff.” Dad explained
“You’re kidding, right? What do you want us to do?” Jay asked opening a box, “Throw out all of our food and clothes?”
“You each will get one box and one suitcase. Nothing more. Do you understand? I’ll take care of the food. There’s not enough room for us to take our house along with us.”
“You know Dad, you keep saying ‘we want to get away’ but you don’t seem to realize no one else wants to!” Jay shouted angrily.
“You are still in my house, and until you leave you will want what I want! You will do what I want you to!”
“I’ll do whatever I want.” Jay practically screamed.
“Oh no,” Roy whispered to me, “Do something!”
I glared at him; then started unloading the boxes I had just loaded. I tried to block out the sounds of my dad and Jay arguing, but, not making any noise myself, it was too loud to drown out with footsteps. They argued all the time now, but I never got used to it. I wish they would just shut up, but that won’t happen. Mom used to keep the waters calm between them, now the role was switched to me, but I’m not mom. I’ll never be mom, but nobody will believe that.
I stared at my boxes now on my bedroom floor. I dumped them all out after thinking it over a second. I began to organize. My dolls could mostly stay, all except one, of course, my poodle skirts and purses wouldn’t be necessary. I didn’t wear make-up anyway, so why bring it? Finally I had all the clothes I would need in the suit case, along with absolute necessities, like soap. Then there was the box to fill. I had a lot of stuff I wanted to bring, but I couldn’t fit it all, so this is what I brought:
Mom’s sewing kit, which was basically all the sewing supplies our family owned stuffed into an old tea tin. I also brought my porcelain doll, the one my mom had given me. The doll had dark ringlets framing her face and a floppy hat sitting primly at an angle atop her little head, I wasn’t really into lace and such, but this doll somehow looked beautiful to me anyway. I grabbed some of my favorite books, though my practical side told me I wouldn’t have any time to read, I just couldn’t bring myself to leave them. Then I stuffed in my journals, every last one of them. They stored all my memories, pictures, ribbons, certificates from school, a piece of fur from my favorite stuffed animal that Jay had hacked to pieces with some scissors while we were playing hide in seek, stuff like that.
I looked into the box and decided I could fit in some more stuff, then a cold draft blew in and I knew what I had to bring. I slowly straightened, and peaked out my bedroom door. There was no one in sight, so I crept across the hall and into my parent’s bedroom. It smelled of honeysuckle and fresh air, but the windows were all closed tight with the curtains drawn. The scent was only a vague trace of the happiness that used to inhabit the house. I crept towards the closet, groping through the dark and stubbing my toe on the bed. I felt around for the doorknob on the closet door, and, finding it, held it for a moment. I felt the rough, delicate coolness of it and envisioned the leafy pattern carved into it; then slowly I turned it and walked into the closet.
It smelled like mothballs and the carpet was thinning beneath my feet like my dad’s hair. Dampness swelled around me and moist clothes brushed my arms softly as I felt around for the item. Finally my fingers brushed against the plastic bag and I froze. Slowly pulling it out, I gazed at it. In the darkness it looked like a messy lump, but I knew better. I stood and slipped back to my room. In the light from my window I could now see the intricate designs that my mother had embroidered into the quilt, the patterns in which she had arranged the fabric, and her signature sewn onto the bottom left underside corner. A tear began to form in my eye, but I swiped it away and stuffed the quilt into the box. I was as ready as I would ever be.
Snow was falling as we drove past trees, trees and more trees. The road was a zigzagging, hilly, slushy mess and the sky seemed determined to make it impossible to see. The car was chilly, despite the heating system and I pulled the one and only coat I had brought closer around my shoulders.
“Daddy, it’s cold.” Jenny complained; kicking Jay’s chair to get their attention.
“Don’t kick my seat!” Jay exploded.
Jenny yelled back, and the fight was on.
“Sit on it Jenny.” Roy groaned after about four minutes. Jenny looked away and slouched down, I figured she was crying. I felt bad for her, but I had a headache, so I wasn’t really in the mood to try to comfort her. Plus always got stuck in the middle of things, so this time I was relieved to just keep my peace.
“Be nice Roy.” Dad yelled.
“It was Jay’s fault, he got her crying.” Roy protested.
“She kicked my seat!” Jay growled, glaring out the window.
“Both of you, enough!” Dad said, jerking the wheel to keep on the road, “No one talks for the rest of the trip. I need to concentrate.”
Silence then ruled, except for the occasional screech of tires and the constant blast of the wind. No one spoke and I became lost in my thoughts. It was peaceful… for the moment.
“Daddy, I’m cold!” Jenny wailed again after almost an hour of silence, this time kicking dad’s seat.
“Jenny Rae Caraway!” Dad screeched, “Joy, why can’t you keep her in line?!” Dad went on, but no one was listening. We had turned onto a dirt road, gone over a hill and BAM!! reached our destination. I knew it had to be the “Old Caraway Farm” because there was nowhere else that it could be: The road ended right there. A steep drop-off showed that we were right on the edge of the bluffs and the river rushed below. I also could tell by how old it was. It had to be the OLD Caraway Farm. There directly before us was a group of buildings, or lack of. The roof of one of them had collapsed, and the others looked close to it. There were about four buildings scattered through and surrounded by trees. Trees were everywhere. The building that didn’t have a roof had a tree coming out of it, the others were overwhelmed with trees and vines, so you could hardly tell where the buildings ended and the woods began. It was a bizarre clash of humanity and wildlife.
We were all thinking the same thing, but Jay was the only one who dared to interrupt dad.
“We’re supposed to live here? What the heck? This place is a pile of crap!” He blurted, throwing his hands in the air for what he called “a dramatic affect”.
Dad stopped talking and we all stared at the odd sight: a house, two barns and an out-house. Nice. We got out, slowly surveying the landscape.
“Well, let’s see.” Dad mumbled, “We’ll need a fire, and somewhere to sleep tonight.” He turned quickly towards us. “Joy, Jenny, go gather firewood, try to make it dry. Jay, Roy, go gather rocks for a fire pit. Go.” He swung around again and strode inside.
I wanted to see what was inside, but Dad was pretty clear that we needed to leave “Now!!” So we started off to the woods. The trees glared menacingly down on us, sticks and brush and tree branches jabbed our legs and arms and caught in my hair. We couldn’t seem to find any dry wood, it was all covered in melting snow, even the dead limbs hanging in trees were dripping wet from a recent ice storm.
“Joy, why aren’t you talking?” Jenny asked, after the silence seemed to be choking us.
I didn’t reply, I wasn’t quite ready to break my oath of silence yet.
“Where are we going to get firewood?” she grumbled, kicking a clump of snow in frustration, “Maybe there’s a shed around here somewhere? Maybe there’ll be firewood in it; then we would hardly have to do anything but find it.”
She thought for a minute; then tripped over a log, just barely catching herself. Then she laughed, “I guess we’ll just see if we can’t stumble over—“
I grabbed her arm and pointed, there ahead of us was a tiny, ramshackle, run-down shed. Its roof sagged and the door had a board over it, but there was a space large enough for us to crawl through and we did. In our haste, however, we failed to see smoke that was pouring from a crudely made flu. We squeezed through the doorway, and just as we got through we head-butted a pair of legs.
Slowly I dared to look up. It was a teenage guy, maybe my age. Long, shaggy, dark hair met his eyebrows and covered his ears. He wore extremely baggy clothing and shoes that looked to be two sizes too small. Then there were his eyes, black eyes that glared at me, and then I realized they weren’t completely black. No, they were hardly black at all. They were purple! They were the darkest shade of purple that I could imagine, and they glared at me. They flicked back and forth, seeing everything at once; then zeroed in on me. Our eyes locked and I shuddered.
After a moment he spoke, “What do you want?”
Jenny cut in for me, “We were looking for firewood. What are you doing here?”
The boy’s glare never left me, “Get out, there’s no wood here.”
“You can’t tell us what to do.” Jenny growled, straightening to her full height, and only had to barely look up to glare into the boy’s eyes, “Who do you think you are?”
“River Inman. Who do you think you are?” It was a weird way to ask our names, but I figured that’s what he wanted to know.
“I’m Jenny Caraway, this is my sister Joy.”
“Don’t make yourself comfortable, you’ll be leaving soon.” River threatened.
“What makes you so sure?” Jenny asked, “Our family owns this land. You have no right to be here.”
In one swift motion River had a knife aimed at us threateningly, “Oh, you’ll leave, and if you say anything, I will hunt you down.”
We walked into the house empty handed to find Dad at work building a support for the roof. It was time to explore while he was busy, before he had time to give us another load of work. It didn’t take long to realize that there was no electricity. And to make matters worse Dad actually expected us to use the outhouse! We were all horrified, but I figured the sooner we got it cleaned the sooner we wouldn’t puke every time we use it. (That might be a slight exaggeration.) So I went looking for some rags, some soap and some water. Roy saw what I was doing, offered to help, and got dad to make Jay help me as well.
“Dad, where’s the water?” Roy asked after searching the entire premise for “some kind of cave-man pump.”
“Outside.” Dad said, as he dropped another load of firewood that he had just chopped.
“Water? Outside?” Roy asked.
We all three marched outside to find the water. I guess we expected to find a hose, or a pump, or something, so when we happened across a hole full of water we were naturally surprised.
“What the heck?” Jay blurted.
“Quit saying that!” Roy protested, punching Jay in the shoulder. Jay punched him back, though a lot harder.
“What is it?” I asked, trying to distract them enough to keep them from fighting.
“Ha! You broke your silent protest!” Jay shouted, shoving me with his shoulder.
“Shut up,” I decided that I was just protesting dad.
“Well, I think it’s a cistern.” Roy said, gazing down into the chasm.
“Like, it catches rainwater?” I asked, looking down too.
“Yeah.”
Suddenly Jay shoved us both. We staggered for a second then he caught our shirt collars and pulled us back. Hilarious laughing followed, until me and Roy starting walking back to the house.
“Hey, wait! You guys are supposed to help me get the water!” Jay yelled, putting his hands on his hips and looking like an idiot.
“You get it yourself.” Roy called, not even looking back.
“Whoa!” I yelped, tripping and doing a headlong sprawl into a mud puddle, “Hey, what’s this?”
There was something hard and sharp where my hand had hit, and I pulled. Stuck, wouldn’t you know it?
“Roy, help me with this.” I grunted.
“Yeah right, I’m not getting in the mud. Here, give me your hand and I’ll help you out.” He held out his hand.
“No, wait!” I dug around some and got the object free.
I pulled it up to look at, and screamed. I dropped it instantly and grabbed my brother’s hand. We stared down into the slushy, half-frozen mud. I was completely freaked out. I starting shivering, and my teeth started chattering, and my knees started knocking.
“I guess you need a bath now, which means we have to clean out that lousy-excuse of a bathtub so let’s go help Jay with the water.” He sighed, “He’d better not push us in again.”
Probably a week passed before the things started to happen. Sure, it took some getting used to sleeping in sleeping bags, drawing water and cooking for everyone over a fire pit, and most of all not having electricity, but we actually adapted fairly well to those things. No, when I say “things” I don’t mean changes. I mean… well, problems, weird occurrences, spooky stuff, and I had a hunch they were all connected to it. That skull I had found in the mud. That freaky skull, bleached white by the sun and scribbled all over with red ink. Why it had been there I don’t know. It looked like some Indian’s prize from so long ago, but that it had been at the surface of the earth and not buried beneath layers of sediment didn’t make sense. There had to be a reasonable explanation, but it sent shivers up my spine thinking about all the witch-craft and sorcery that could be connected to that skull.
The first thing that happened occurred on Monday, while Roy and I were walking back from gathering firewood. It had snowed more than when we had first got here, but with no more ice storms the dead limbs hanging in the trees were finally dry enough to use. Roy and I both had armloads when we came across River’s shack again.
“Look, there’s no smoke! Maybe he decided to leave.” I gasped, carefully stepping closer to the house.
“Who?” Roy asked, stepping away from the house.
Suddenly a warm breath-like breeze brushed past my ear and rustled my hair softly. It felt soothing, but how could there be a warm breeze when the temperature was below freezing. It dawned on me that it could have been a breath and I whirled around. No one was there. A tickling sensation went up my back then something smacked my arm! I spun around. Nothing.
“Joy, what are you doing?” Roy asked, turning to stare at me.
I turned to look at him, but saw something else instead. There, dangling on the makeshift flu was the skull that had been in the mud. I screamed so loud that I nearly hurt my own ears. Roy stared at me, and I just managed to point at the roof. As soon as he saw it he gasped and there was River. One minute there was nothing, then the next he was there.
“I told you to get out of here!” He yelled, but his voice sounded different, strained and crackly. His dark eyes dull, no longer dancing around everything. He had lost something, or maybe he gained something: fear played on his face.
“Get out of here. Leave me alone! You don’t want to be around me anyway. I’m cursed. This whole place is haunted.” River shouted.
Then that thing shoved me, this time from behind and sent me sprawling towards River. My firewood scattered everywhere. I looked to see Roy staring horrified at his wood scattered before him as well.
“We’ll be leaving now.” He stuttered, and then broke into a run. I followed at fast as my legs could take me.
Back at home there was suddenly nothing to do. Roy and I just sat there, in the emptiness of the house. Everyone else was gone. Dad had set Jenny to school, where as, for some reason, the rest of us got to stay home and work our butts off.
“Roy,” I whispered, “How did that skull move?”
“Maybe it didn’t, maybe there was two.”
“That would mean the other one would still be there!” I exclaimed, jumping to my feet and entangling myself in a cobweb.
“Let’s go see.” He whispered back, “By the way who was that guy, how’d he know you?”
“Me and Jenny ran into him a couple weeks ago.” I replied shortly.
We reached the mud puddle and rolled up our sleeves. After searching awhile we knew: It wasn’t there. The skull was gone.
“What now?” I asked.
“I don’t think this place is really haunted. That squatter is just making it up to keep us out. I say we sneak up on him tonight, while he’s asleep and find out the truth.” He wiped the mud on his arms into the grass in an attempt to clean up; he just got cold snow and dried grass all over his arms along with the mud.
“What if the truth is scary?” I asked, “Don’t you believe in ghosts?” I shuddered; then started to try to scrape the mud off my arms with my fingernails.
“I don’t believe in ghosts. There is no such thing. Once somebody dies they’re dead. No spirits come out of them, they don’t magically fly away. Nothing. I mean, you saw mom in the casket.” He paused; I couldn’t believe he was actually talking about that. It had nothing to do with ghosts. Mom was real! “She was dead.” He continued “Can you imagine mom’s ghost floating around here somewhere?”
“Shut up Roy!!” I screamed. I suddenly didn’t care about the ghost, that was the most awful thing Roy had ever, could ever say to me. Anger swooshed around me until I couldn’t think straight. I’d held in and covered up how I really felt for so long I was just too tired to do it anymore. It’s funny how emotions can change that quickly.
I didn’t want to be around Roy anymore, so I took off running. Without realizing it I was running straight towards the bluffs. When I reached them I paused momentarily, and then spotted a grassy way down that wasn’t too steep. That would be a wonderful way to spend the day. And I could do it alone. I began the descent.
“Joy!” I could hear Roy far above me, and I hoped he wouldn’t follow, “Joy!” He shouted again, this time closer. I looked up to see him slowly picking his way down the path that I had been following. Then out of the blue something pushed me again. It was the same thing as when it had happened at River’s place, but River wasn’t here, and to my knowledge never had been here. Whatever-it-was was pushing hard. I fought to keep control, but it was so strong.
“Help!” I yelled, “Roy! Help!!”
Roy didn’t hesitate, even though he was afraid of heights. He came plummeting down the path as fast as he dared go, slipping and tumbling, practically falling down to me. He didn’t stop until he had a hold of my arm. That was when I decided to look down.
“Roy! It’s a cow down there. And train tracks!” I yelled.
He just barely managed to reply through gritted teeth, “This is no time for sightsee--!”
He never finished his sentence for “it” pushed on me with such strength that I toppled over the edge, screaming as Roy struggled to hang on to me.
“Help!!” I screamed, “Help!!! Help!!!”
Then Jay’s face appeared a few feet above us. I saw concern cross into his eyes for the first time in years, and he actually rushed down in just the same fashion Roy had.
“I’m coming!” he yelled, “You guys are idiots! Plain idiots.” He rambled about how stupid we were until he reached us. When he got there something weird happened. To me it looked like he had too much momentum, but Jay would be too smart for that, and the look on his face told me otherwise. He went soaring over the edge down past me, just barely catching a ledge. He yelped in pain as he caught his grip, and jolted suddenly to a stop.
“What the heck was that?” he shouted.
“Jay?!” I yelled down.
“Someone shoved me. Something shoved me. What was it?”
“I don’t know.” Roy yelled, “It pulled Joy over too. What are we going to do? I can’t hold on much longer.”
“You’re a wimp!” Jay yelled angrily, “Don’t you dare let her go.”
I was utterly amazed. Jay didn’t care about me. What was he doing?
He took a deep breath and slowly began one hand at a time, making his way up towards us. Foothold. Handhold. Handhold. Foothold. He was getting closer and closer when all of a sudden Roy’s hand slipped. I was falling! I opened my mouth to scream, but then another hand had my ankle. I flipped in midair and hung there, dangling by my foot. Slowly but surely I began moving up. Up. Up. Up. Until a hand reached to grab my arm and pull me upright onto a ledge. I looked up wondering how Jay had managed to catch me in his precarious position, and saw River.
His black eyes flickered again, locking with mine, glaring at me. If he hated me as much as it seemed he did, then why had he bothered to save me from my ultimate doom?
“Don’t move!” It was my brothers now far above, coming down as fast as they could, “Leave her alone!” Roy yelled.
Then they were there, pulling me away from the edge, and stepping between me and River.
“Quit fooling around with that ghost nonsense!” Roy growled, “Joy could’ve died.”
“That’s the thanks I get for saving her too, huh?” River turned and started to walk away, but Jay grabbed his arm.
“Keep away from us.” He ordered.
“You stay away from me.” River challenged, jerking his arm out of Jay’s grip.
“Get out of here.” Jay ordered.
“Make me.” River growled.
My heart was still racing from my quick descent, and I couldn’t understand the sense of this argument, one minute River is leaving, and then he’s refusing to go. Then a fist flew, knocking River square in the face. He staggered momentarily, and then swung at Jay. Jay was at least three years older, and a good fighter. River had no chance. Before long, he was pinned against the rock wall with a split lip and bloody nose.
“Get out of here.” Jay growled.
Then I got it. Jay wanted River to leave. He wanted him to leave the farm, find somewhere else to live. River had no choice now, but I kind of felt sorry for him.
“Get!” Jay shouted.
“No.” River replied firmly. His eyes were flickering with hate, and anger that could only come from years of build-up.
“Wait.” I cut in, but I was too late.
Jay whirled him around with all his might and sent River sailing over the edge.
“River!” I squealed as he plummeted towards the ground at top speed.
Jay grabbed my arm and began pulling me up the bluff. I wriggled and yelled at him, but he was much stronger than me or Roy. I looked down one last time as Jay dragged me over the edge of the bluff and was horrified. There was the skull again! Sitting in a bush like it were looking out over the river. A hiss of laughter reached my ears, it had come from the direction of the skull, and I could’ve told if it was Jay or Roy. It wasn’t.
The next day was totally weirder than the day before. Everyone else had already left, the house was completely deserted and it was well into the morning. I slowly rose, forcing my exhausted feet to move. Slowly I began to wake up, and the fatigue slowly slipped away. I looked around and saw a note sitting on the bench that we had been using as a table. It was from Roy.
Hey, good-morning sleepy-head. Jenny’s at school, dad is out hunting, and me and Jay
are going fishing down in the river. We were going to invite you, but you looked so tired
that we decided to just let you sleep. We’ll all be back by lunch, dad wanted to have
fish, so we’ll bring you some up in time for it to be done cooking for him. See you.
Roy
I sighed and put the note down, it was awfully lonely up here with no one around, and I was suddenly scared. That skull had just appeared in the snow. Every time something spooky happens River’s either there, or arrives soon after. Maybe he is cursed... or was.
The thought frightened me enough to know that I didn’t want to be up here all alone, so I started making my way down to the river. That’s where the boys always go to fish; I decided I would join them today.
“Roy! Jay! Roy! Jay! Where are you? Roy!” I called over and over.
I had reached their fishing spot, but no one was there. I had been looking for at least thirty minutes, thinking that maybe I had the spot wrong. No. They weren’t anywhere in sight. I sat down in disgust, they must be at some creek, or pond, or something and I would be all alone until lunch. That was at least two hours away. I was completely alone and totally freaked out.
I sighed, a short, scared sigh, and stood. My heart was beginning to race, and my hands were shaking. I had a feeling something was about to happen. Actually, I had this weird noxious feeling in the pit of my stomach that there was something happening already, something that was almost complete; it was like there was a countdown.
I didn’t know what to do next. I didn’t want to go back to the house, I didn’t want to just hang around here, and I did not want to be wandering around by myself. The only place that I was okay with going to was River’s shack. I wanted to see if he had somehow survived, but I was scared to go into the woods alone. I decided that maybe I would be fine and I started off; then thought better of it and made a u-turn back towards the house. As long as I was alone I could smuggle some of the wintergreen berry jelly I had made to River, if he had survived, that way I would have a reason to go and it wouldn’t be as weird. I decided that if I brought the jelly in my multi-pocketed messenger bag, then I could bring some… other stuff. That way if I ran into anything unusual, I would be prepared. I evaluated all the things that could happen, and this is what I brought: a pocket knife, a big rock, and a piece of rope. With that multi-pocketed bag-of-protection slung over my shoulder I felt a little safer and set out.
It was a trek of about thirty minutes and to me that was 1,800 reasons not to go. Every second was another chance for something to happen, but I ignored my better sense and left… and it wasn’t ten minutes before I ran into my first hint of trouble. Okay, maybe it was a little more than just a hint.
A cackle came from behind a bush. I pulled out my rock and peeked behind it. Nothing there. Suddenly something moved behind me. I whirled around just in time to see a cardinal dart into the trees. I breathed deeply in an attempt to calm myself, but my heart raced on without my permission. I stepped forward and went sprawling. I looked down; my shoe laces were knotted together. What on earth?
I sat up to untie them and was confronted with a shoe in the back. I was flung to the cold ground again and this time I rolled over to see a masked man towering over me. I flung the rock that I had managed to keep in my hand straight at his face. He staggered a minute, which gave me the chance to kick off my shoes and take off running.
I felt like I was in one of those movies, you know, where the teenage kid is running through the woods. Jerking her head at every twig snap, every gust of wind, every rustle of leaves, any little sound, she desperately runs away. But the ax-murderer is right behind her, slowly gaining on her as she tires, never making any sound himself, and then he’s in front of her with the ax raised above his head—
The maniac was about to bring it down when Jay came out of nowhere and screamed. I promptly took this opportunity to slip away, except it was more like crashing away. I could hear Jay yelling angrily and another voice booming out even louder. I didn’t stop to worry about Jay, though I probably should have, I was a little too caught up in the fact that I had almost been killed. Finally I stopped. I was outside River’s shack, but the place was deserted. I gasped for breath, my legs felt like limp noodles beneath me, like at any moment they would give way and I would slip to unconsciousness. But, to my surprise, I stayed standing, and very conscious. My wits were beginning to come back, and I began to think straight again. There had to be a place where I could hide that no one could sneak up on me from behind. The only problem with that would be if someone did find me I wouldn’t have anywhere run.
“Think! Think!” I muttered absent-mindedly.
“Hey!”
A whisper had come out of nowhere and I spun around trying to locate it.
“Hey!”
There it was again, it was coming from River’s shack! I crept inside and saw that it was empty.
“Hey!”
It was coming from beneath me! I jerked my head, desperately attempting to prove myself wrong. There it was, the skull. A peel of laughter rang around me, echoing, and continuing. I couldn’t bear it any longer; I pulled the jar of jelly out of my bag and swung it with all my might, smashing it and the skull into a thousand pieces. The laughter instantly stopped, and I noticed metal mixed in with the bone fragments. A speaker, genius.
“Hey!” The voice came again, and this time I was sure it was below me.
I got down on all fours and felt around on the floor boards, but I was too late. A twig snapped outside and I dove for the fireplace. Thankfully the fire was out. It was one of those clay oven things, except it stood on four legs, up off the ground. I climbed in praying that it wouldn’t break, and curled myself in a ball.
Moments later Jay and the masked maniac crawled through the little door and stood listening in the room. After a moment they started talking.
“You know that killing Joy wasn’t in our agreement.” Jay growled.
“It wasn’t in our agreement that I couldn’t.” The other man whispered fiercely.
“Just leave her alone.” Jay ordered.
“Fine, as long as I have River, the filthy—“
“Hey! Look, you said you wouldn’t—“ Jay cut in, then paused, “What was that?”
“River.” The man cackled and pulled up on a knot in one of the floor boards. It came up with ease, and uncovered a hole.
The man pulled out several more boards, and then reached down into the hole. A minute later River was thrown against the floor in a mangled heap. He was bleeding badly, and his left leg was twisted at an odd angle, but his face still showed rebellion and anger.
“What do you want him for anyway?” Jay asked, looking down upon River curiously like he was some real important guy wondering why a bug was being deemed important enough to capture.
“I have a score to settle.” the man growled, “but what’s it to you? You have your train ticket; you can get out of this dump. That’s all you need to know.”
“Whatever.” Jay replied, turning away from River, “Hey, I still can’t figure out how you pushed me and Joy over that bluff.”
“It was simple; I created an air compressor, and hid in the brush with it. It blew hard enough that it knocked your sister off balance. You were already off balance, so I just helped you along a little.” He laughed, peering down his nose at Jay.
“So, you’re some kind of scientist or something.” Jay asked suspiciously, “Isn’t the evil scientist thing a little overdone?”
“I’m not an evil scientist, I’m a Nazi scientist.” He cackled.
“You’ve lost your marbles,” Jay accused, “but that’s your business. I’m outta here.”
“The deal’s not complete yet.” The man hissed, grabbing Jay’s arm.
“I told you I don’t think Roy saw you.” Jay snapped, “The deal was I’d help you get rid of people who saw you, not people who might have seen you.”
“You’re not leaving until he is as helpless as…” he paused, trying to come up with a good analogy, “As helpless as River here.”
“Fine.” Jay conceded, “I’ll help you, but if Joy ever finds out about this—“
“What? You have nothing against me, no evidence, nothing that you can hold over my head. You’re in this now kid, all the way.”
Jay glared at the man, then lowered his gaze to River, “What are you going to do with him?”
“Oh, I’m a very creative man, I’ll think of something.”
He hoisted River over his shoulder, and I could see River gasp in pain from my hiding spot. Then they were gone. I was alone again.
I had to go warn Roy, but where was he? Fishing? Running desperately around the forest trying to escape the jokes of an evil man, or… I glanced at my watch, 11:45. Maybe, just maybe, he was on his way home to bring dad his fish.
There I was, crouching at the edge of the forest watching it all happen. Jay and the masked maniac had reached our house, and Roy, first. I didn’t know what to do, and as they pummeled Roy more and more, I thought less and less clearly.
Suddenly a gunshot rang through the air, and I knew what I had to do: face dad.
I turned silently and sped towards the sound of the gun. I paused, listening, then took off again after hearing another shot. It wasn’t that hard to find him, he was closer to our house than I had expected. Obviously he had been on his way home for lunch and caught a rabbit in his sights.
I came bursting through the trees and started yelling.
“Dad! Dad! Daddy!”
“Joy?” he lowered the gun and gaped at me, “What are you doing here? What’s wrong?”
“Dad, Jay… Roy… River.” I gasped.
“Slow down! Jay and Roy fell into the river?” Dad guessed, dropping his gun, readying himself to jump into action.
“No, not a river, River! River Inman! The person. Jay teamed up with some freak so that he would get a free train ticket and get outta here. They kidnapped River and are beating up Roy!”
Dad scooped up his gun again and took off towards the house. I ran after him, but soon gave up trying to keep pace and fell behind him. I slowed to a walk. All that running was killing my lungs; I figured I could walk just for a minute. Then I heard dad yell and took off once again.
By the time I reached dad my lungs were on fire and I was gasping for breath. My legs ached, and my head swam. Dad wasn’t out of breath at all, but he hadn’t been through as much as I had that day.
Dad motioned for me to be quiet, and I forced my breathing to slow, though it felt like I was holding my breath. We slipped into the outskirts of the clearing, right up near the house.
“Stay here, don’t move.” Dad ordered, and I didn’t argue, I was too busy trying to calm my breathing to be able to do anything anyway.
Dad stood and raised his gun.
BANG!!
The sound reverberated all around me. Dad had shot a hole into the house right next to where Jay, Roy River, and the maniac were.
“Freeze!” Dad ordered.
Jay took that as another way of saying “run away as fast as your legs can take you to the woods.” And when dad turned his attention on Jay the masked maniac took off over the edge of the bluff still toting River over his shoulder. Dad was too busy with his own two sons to worry about two complete strangers, so I burst out of my hiding spot and made a b-line for the river. I got to the edge of the bluff just as the maniac was almost all the way down. With nothing else to do I flung myself over the edge and ran down the path, slipping and tripping the whole way down each time just barely catching myself.
But I couldn’t go fast enough. They were at the river before I was two-thirds of the way down. I watched in horror as the man whipped a rope out of his belt and quickly secured River. Then, with a flick of the wrist, River was in the freezing water, sinking fast.
The next thing I knew the maniac had dove in as well and swum across. I raced to the river, and momentarily paused, then without a second thought I pulled the pocket knife out of my bag and dove in.
The water burned my skin it was so cold, but I pushed on, knowing that River was in here too. I couldn’t leave him to his doom just because I was cold. The cold water was all around me, in my nose, in my ears, and after a minute I forced my eyes open and let the water go in them too. It burned like crazy, but finally I made out the shape of River drifting down, down, down, struggling weakly.
I dove towards him, forming a plan as I tried to reach him. My only hope was to cut him free, but would I be able to use my brother’s pocket knife? I had never tried to cut ropes before.
My skirts weighed me down and I wished with all my might that I hadn’t worn the biggest skirt I owned, but I couldn’t change that now. I reached River, finally, and managed to get the knife open. From there I just guessed at what should be done. I stuck the knife under the ropes and sawed and pulled and sawed and pulled until, snap, I got though them and freed his hands. I was surprised that I had cut it and was flung backwards with the force I had previously been putting on the ropes. Regaining my composure I dropped the knife and grabbed River’s arm. We struggled to reach the surface, but he was too weak, and I wasn’t strong enough to pull him up. I began to lose it. I couldn’t tell which way was up and I was only barely aware of a sudden splash nearby. I was losing all hope when I realized that there was someone else in the water. I composed myself enough to look up and was surprised to see Dad. Dad was coming to save me? A sudden realization hit me like a rock: If dad were coming to save me then he would have to actually care about me. Dad loves me. I think I probably knew it all along, I just wouldn’t admit it to myself until now.
By now my lungs were burning, and I was finding it hard to keep my mouth shut. Dad swum as fast as he could towards us, but my struggling became weaker and weaker until we were sinking again. River was completely limp and heavier than ever; I kept a hold of his arm, but the rest of my body sagged with exhaustion. My eyes fell out of focus and I started to lose consciousness, when a hand grabbed my arm and began to pull. I concentrated all my attention on keeping a hold of River.
Another hand grabbed my arm, a smaller hand, and started pulling as well. Suddenly we broke through the surface and a balloon air filled my lungs. I gasped and coughed, and sputtered. Dad pulled me to the shore and the other person dragged River behind me. My eyes were beginning to focus and with a fearful realization I saw that the person dragging River to the ground was Jay.
“Jay?” I whispered feebly.
He turned to give me his full attention, “Joy, I’m sorry.”
With that I lay back into my father’s arms and let him carry me back home. As he laid me in my sleeping bag, I realized that this was home not because of where it was or what it looked like, but because of the people who lived here.
As I was about to fall asleep I glanced up to see River, conscious, in Jay’s sleeping bag, Roy cooking his fish over the stove and Jay and Dad shivering under mother’s quilt. Jenny wasn’t home yet from school, but when she got here… well, we sure have a whale of a tale to tell her. “Maybe, just maybe, we’ll all get along after all.” I thought. That thought warmed me, and I grinned as my eyes closed.
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