I have been writing a story called Neighbor Libby for quite some time now. I just decided to put it up here because a friend of mine showed me his blog and got me all inspired-status.
Here it is so far!
Neighbor Libby
Copyright!! Written by Stacy Morgison
----Chapter One----
She was there, the neighbor girl, with her hair blonde and curly as ever. I admired her party dress. It was pink with daisies. Mine was a light blue and white plaid. Mom had brought it home yesterday from Thrift N Save. "Happy early birthday, sweety!" she had said.
Being eight wasn't all that different from being seven I decided, except for Libby, the neighbor girl, would speak with me now. When she had turned eight a few months ago, she wouldn't talk to me. Now here she was, in my yard, drinking my punch, and wearing a prettier dress. Why did mom invite the neighbors?
"Hi Chealsea," Libby was standing in front of me now, fruit punch in one hand, her other hand twirling around in her hair. I watched her fingers run smoothly down to the ends of her hair then reach back up to her neck, "happy birthday."
"Thanks," I sighed.
"Oh no problem. See, now that we are both eight, we can be friends!" Libby smiled and took a sip of her punch. I looked down at her white strappy sandles.
"Uh huh," I was suddenly distracted by Jonny, who lately asked us to call him "Jon." He had just arrived with his mom, and he was carrying a great big orange present. I watched him hand it to my mom, then he ran over to where Libby and I were.
"Happy birthday, Chelz!!" he shouted, "did ya see your present?! It's really big!!"
"And really orange!" I laughed. Orange was Jon's favorite color, "I'm so glad you came! Do you want to go play ball with me?" I gestured to the garage with the tattered hoop above the door.
Libby tapped her foot and crossed her arms the best she could with punch in her hand, "Chealsea, we are eight now, we can't play boy games any more."
I looked at her. Awe and anger flooded my face with red. How could she think she could control me this way? My bottom lip slowly worked its way inbetween my clenched slight overbite. Then she did what made me turn around and walk away. She smiled - ear to ear- and laughed.
"C'mon Jon," I said, "maybe I don't want to be eight like Libby," I want to be eight like Chealsea, I added in my head to make myself feel more important.
After just shooting a few hoops, a cake full of eight beautifully lit candles seemed to float around from the back corner of the house. Mom set it on the table, and people whispered to her, "oh Carla you really outdid yourself that cake is lovely," and, "how did you make those little flowers so perfectly?" My mom was a great cake-maker and cake-decorator. Then, Mom started singing, and everyone joined in chorus.
"Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, dear Chealsea! Happy birthday to youuuuu," all smiles, I ran to the picnic table covered in the shiny pink table cloth. I had to blow out my candles.
My eight beautiful candle-- My thoughts had been interrupted by the world blurring up around me and my chin hitting the grass. It only took me a moment to figure out I tripped over a shoe, but who's? I looked up and there was Libby, a slight smirk on her face, offering her hand to help me up.
I groaned, picked myself up off the ground, glared at Libby, and stomped the rest of the way to the picnic table. Everyone's eyes were worried, and a few people asked if I was okay, but I ignored them. I had something important to do.
Looking down at the cake, I concentrated with intense force. I hope Libby never talks to me again. I WISH for Libby to never talk to me again... no that's not good enough. I wish Libby had to go away from here forever. I wish she wasn't my neighbor anymore... I wish... she'd just be gone! Breath bursted out from my pursed lips as I flowed from candle 1 to candle 8. Never had I had my heart set so tight on a birthday wish. The candles went out successfully in one breath. I glanced back at Libby and smiled. Soon she will be gone. I thought, and she looked at me quizzically.
Just then, the earth started rumbling. Then the grass started moving like how the blankets move when the cat is crawling underneath them, and the cake bounced on the table. Libby's punch fell out of her hand. My mom stopped taking snapshots of my face and my cake and looked around, worried. Then Jon yelled, "EARTHQUAKE!!!" and him, Libby, and I screamed and ran indoors with our parents not too far behind us.
Me and Jon dove under the dining room table, but there wasn't enough room for Libby. Our moms all lined up crouched along the support wall in the house. Libby dashed around, trying to find someplace safe. Our moms were all shouting different things, "Coffee table, Libby!" "Get in a cupboard, Libby!" "Stand in the hall doorway, Libby!" and she ran from one place to another. Glass was rattling and cupboards were booming. A lamp fell from the entertainment center and Libby screamed and got under the coffee table. Jon looked at me.
"What did you wish for?" he whispered, surveying the room with a puzzled face.
"I can't tell you or it won't come true," I said.
"So it wasn't an earth quake?" He asked, and I shook my head. Then we heard a loud crack. There was a ceiling fan in the living room and it was starting to rip out of the ceiling. The blades of the fan swung back and forth so far they were hitting the ceiling one at a time.
Libby shouted, "What was that?!"
That's when I noticed where she was. The coffee table was positioned directly below the ceiling fan. Our moms couldn't see her. Jon and I looked at her white knuckles gripping the legs of the table as hard as they could. She was lying on her back because that's the only way she could maneuver her body to fit under the little crescent shaped table with six legs. Tears made her cheeks reflect the light that, along with the earth, would not hold still. I found myself wishing with all my might that I hadn't made my wish, and Jon glared at my terrified face.
"I know what you wished for." He said, "That is not cool, Chealsea."
"I didn't wish for her to die!" I protested, realizing that my wish could easily be inerperted that way,"I just wished she would go away forever," I felt my nose stuff up and get cold, and my eyes started overflowing. What had I done? Was a birthday wish really this powerful?
----Chapter 2----
I sat in the hospital chair next to Libby's bed, reading her my favorite book. When the ceiling fan fell, it had landed on the far end of the coffee table, where her head was, and the legs of it snapped. Libby has been in a Coma since then. It was almost my 9th birthday, and I looked at Libby, who had missed her own 9th birthday, and wondered if she would be talking to me now, anyway. After all, she was 9 and I was 8 still.
I reached the last page of The Many Adventures of Whinnie the Pooh. She was supposed to wake up when I finished the book. I always set little goals for myself. It started out with she'll wake up when Jon wished her to at his birthday. She'll wake up when the first snow falls. She'll wake up for christmas. She'll wake up when her favorite cd has played all the way through. I was always there trying to wake Libby up. I was all Libby had, besides her mom's flowers sent every week from her work. Libby's mom came in every day for the first two weeks of the coma, but she just had to go back to work. "The hospital bills won't pay for themselves." She said, and now she only comes once every other week.
I took a deep breath, "maybe tomorrow, Lib." I said. I scooched of the chair, and walked to the library. It was between Pacific Medical and my house. I returned the book I had checked out the day before on Comas, and went to search for a book on birthday wishes. I found a few, but most were fiction novels, and the only nonfiction one I found did not look promising. There was one book left that was checked in, but I couldn't find it. With only that thread to hang on, my feet shuffled over to the tall librarian desk, and i grabbed the edge to lean on my tip-toes. The librarian at our library was not a typical librarian. She was about 28, with a nose ring and black and pink hair. The job made her dress professionally but she made every attempt not to within the rules. She had on a button down blouse, but a big necklace with a black spider that sparkled on the top of it. She wore a skirt with black tights, but her black tights had holes in them. She had to wear black dress shoes, so she figured big black boots with shiny silver buckles would do just fine. She looked down at me and smiled with her red lipstic amplifying her happy mood. We were good friends.
"What's up, Chealz?" She asked, leaning forward and resting her elbows on the table.
"Can you help me find this book, Penny?" I asked, sliding the piece of paper over to her. It had five crossed out books and one circled.
"The Deepest Secrets to Birthday Wishes, I never hearda that one," she came out from behind the counter, "Where have you looked already?
I pointed all around the store, explaining I searched everywhere, and she nodded. After a minute or two of glancing around the library, she got down to my level, like she was going to tell me a secret. It was like the air stopped moving in the whole place. Time stopped even. She rested her hand on my shoulder.
"There is something you have to see," she whispered, and slid her hand down my arm until it held mine. In one fluid motion she was suddenly holding my hand and walking me to the back of the library. A short dusty shelf filled with foreign encyclopedias seemed to approach us, rather than the other way around as we glided to the far back corner. She continued to hold my right hand in her left as she motioned to help her move the shelf. I turned to take in the moment, and noticed that no one else was in the library. Once I helped Penny move the shelf, a waist high tunnel revealed itself.
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that's what I have thus far
