Lizard Corporation started as a tiny, innocent store in Miss Angelica Plum’s basement when she was only 18 years old. “Want an invention of your very own? A novelty item to show off to your friends? Come on in!” she shouted, in her loud voice with an accent nobody could identify. Those were the first words she mentioned about her company, back when she was young and innocent and didn’t know the horrible things she would go on to do. She stood outside, twirling a bright, colorful sign advertising her products. With her dark hair in a ponytail tied off with a pink ribbon, too much lipstick, and a skirt so short it would earn her a very long lecture from an old lady, she didn’t look like someone who could turn the world into a wasteland in just seven years. Not at all. This was back when the world was sunny and pure. When the world was full of light and hope. When the sun shone bright in the sky and cast black shadows across the ground. When she was just a kid with an impossible dream. “This is never going to happen,” “It’s impossible,” “You’re just a kid,” people said, sometimes with a condescending laugh or a wink. But she didn’t listen. Her first customer was an old man by the name of Frederick Lizardworth. He bought a device she had nicknamed “voiceover.” It was practical, it was useful, it was amusing. He was impressed with her. He told her that when you have a dream, you don’t let anyone stand in your way. Mr. Lizardworth told everyone he knew about the remarkable young lady over on the corner of Starling and 34th, and soon, people were coming in great crowds to get a genuine hoverboard or the 100 percent authentic “glove phone.” She made enough money in just one week to open up a real store in an old garage. People came from miles and miles to see her and buy her products. She hired workers, got clients, and sponsored sports teams. She was a local celebrity. Until one day, she wasn’t just local anymore. Word went overseas, and gossip spread like wildfire. Pretty soon, people were flocking in from other countries just to see her, and soon she opened her first factory and named it “Lizard Corporation,” in honor of Mr. Frederick Lizardworth, the man who got her started. Her dream of a worldwide company was now a reality, and bright-red Lizard Corporation logos began appearing everywhere, plastered across billboards, airplanes, and buses. After a while, other people sponsored Lizard Corporation and made new stores all over the world, and Miss Plum made more and more money. The factories began spewing smoke into the air, and though some people complained, Miss Plum just said it was “for the greater good.” The demand for Lizard products grew so high that they began making factory workers go faster and faster, and paid them less and less, the lowest wages they could get away with. There were casualties, there was pollution. In only a few weeks, the complaints began. They came in the mail, pouring out of mailboxes like flocks of birds. In white envelopes with colorful stamps and Angelica Plum, 9924 Lobster Way, Yellowseed, NX, lot 511 scrawled across all of them in a myriad of different handwritings. They looked like pretty white snow as they were dumped into the recycling bin. And the ones that came in person, from the workers themselves, were not treated with any more thought. When an enraged worker, overworked and underpaid, came up to her and demanded a change, Miss Plum just laughed and told them, “It’s for the greater good!” before tossing them a buck or so, then walking away to go count her money. That’s when billboards started popping up, with the brand-new Lizard Corp slogan: “For the greater good” and Miss Plum’s face showed up in magazines, in newspapers, on TV with the words next to it, reassuring people. The factories went up everywhere, lining every cityscape in the world. The sky turned black, and the oceans turned brown. Sometimes people worried about it. Sometimes they said it was dangerous. Sometimes they questioned it. But then they saw Miss Plum’s face up on a billboard, or in a news report, with her accent, her warm smile, and her eyes sparkling and full of dreams, they reminded themselves that it was for the greater good. After all, nobody that sweet and innocent could cause something so horrible. So people ignored it. After all, she was just a kid. A kid with a dream that maybe wasn’t so impossible anymore. And now, only seven years later, Miss Plum has the world under her illusion. She’s smart. She’s rich. She’s powerful. She’s admired. People want to meet her. People want to be her. People will do anything to defend Lizard Corporation, because without Lizard Corporation,we wouldn’t have glovephones or hoverboards or all these magnificent things. We like to say we’re just buying these things to support Miss Plum, and sometimes it really seems like we’ve even convinced ourselves of that. In fact, every month Lizard Corporation comes out with a new and improved version of an old product and people just have to buy it. Because buying things is fun. Thrilling. Trendy. Every time they launch a shiny new product, the blue plastic trash cans lining every alley in the city are piled high with the old, “inferior” products as the looming Lizard Corporation factories start up for the day, spewing their smoke into the already black sky. Cardboard boxes roll out with the new device, and they’re loaded into trucks and distributed all over the world. Huge mobs of screaming people pour through the gleaming glass doors into the immaculate Lizard Corporation shops, and the telephones in each shop ring furiously with excited consumers on the other side, ordering the new trend. Customers scream, employees scream, and telephones scream, till
Morality
The Man on the Bench
“Wait up Maggie!” Helen yelled at her older sister as they raced towards the Rite Aid at the corner of Montgomery Street. Every day they would meander in with their fifty cents and buy the blueberry Pop Rocks in the candy section. Maybe they would have a small conversation with their friend Rhonda who worked at the register. Rhonda would tell them how cute their new dresses were, and that they have gotten so big, even though Helen didn’t feel any bigger than she did the day before. Helen would admire the long, tight, dark braids that hung down from Rhonda’s head, and Maggie would talk to Rhonda about “grown up stuff” as Helen felt the popping of the Pop Rocks on her tongue. However, things were different that fall day. As she skipped across the sidewalk to catch up to Maggie, Helen saw the old, blind man sitting on the dirty, tattered bench outside the Rite Aid. His ripped wool hat was lying upside-down in front of him. His pursed lips slid the side of a harmonica in his hands, a beautiful tune. Helen couldn’t help but wonder why he decided to sit on that old, dirty bench, getting the remains of his clothes all muddy. She looked inside the upside down hat and saw one penny lying there, almost lonesome. Helen reached her hand down to the bottom of her back pocket and slowly pulled out the fifty cents that she planned on using for her blueberry Pop Rocks, and dropped it into the almost empty hat. “Bless your soul,” the old man smiled at Helen, as if he could see her. Something about that moment made Helen’s heart feel warm, almost like she put a brand new wool sweater around her soul. “No Pop Rocks today, Helen?” Rhonda questioned, frowning, “You’re too young to go on a diet. Eat while you can because when you get to this age—” “I’m not going on a diet Rhonda,” Helen chuckled, “I just gave my fifty cents to the man with the empty hat in front of him.” “Oh, I see. Well, I suppose a good deed like that deserves a reward. Here you are.” Rhonda held out a pack of blueberry Pop Rocks in front of Helen. “No Rhonda, it’s okay. I don’t need Pop Rocks.” Helen didn’t know why she felt a sudden impulse to help the old man, let alone ignore free Pop Rocks. It felt like it was her duty, her duty to help this man, this stranger, somehow. Over the next three weeks, Helen gave her fifty cents to the old, blind man sitting on the dirty bench outside the Rite Aid. Every week the man, who through small conversations Helen eventually learned was Salvatore Johnson, would smile and thank her. With time, Helen seemed to forget her childlike ritual of buying Pop Rocks, and she was only concerned now with her new friend Mr. Johnson. A few days later, Helen was walking to the Rite Aid alone. Her sister, who used to accompany her, was home sick. She skipped down Montgomery Street and pulled out the fifty cents from her back pocket, but when she looked up she was surprised. Mr. Johnson wasn’t on the bench. There was no one there. Helen frowned when her eye spotted two words encrusted in the bench that she had never noticed before. She traced the letters with her finger: MARY JOHNSON. Helen didn’t know who this Mary Johnson was, or why her name was on this bench, or why her last name matched Salvatore’s. * * * Helen didn’t know what happened to Salvatore Johnson. She hoped that his life improved for the better, and that was why he was no longer on the bench every day. She hoped that her good deeds brought him good fortune. Helen’s eyes went from the dirty bench to the window of the Rite Aid where she saw Rhonda smiling at her. “You buying Pop Rocks today, pumpkin?” Rhonda asked Helen as the bell over the door rang when it opened. “Yeah,” Helen said, “I think I’ll get some Pop Rocks today.” As Helen ambled out of the store and past the bench with her Pop Rocks, she noticed an unusual feeling that she never had before. She felt aware, selfless, and humbled. She knew that she would be forever changed, all because of some Pop Rocks, some spare change, and Mr. Johnson. Ella Glodek, 11Denville, NJ
Sprinklers
I didn’t mean to set off the school’s sprinkler system, it just happened. It was stupid to put my plastic lunch silverware into the cafe’s microwave, I admit. Maybe I shouldn’t have gone along with Delilah’s dare, but I guess it couldn’t have gotten any worse than it already was. Let’s start at the beginning of the story, where the dares got out of hand. It was a cold, windy night, right on the verge of being winter. The moon was out and bright, shining in my best friend’s bedroom window. We were sitting on her baby-blue shag carpet, playing a round of Dare. Dare was a game we played at every sleepover with one another, almost like our own tradition. On this night, however, the dares were more intricate, more dangerous. “Delilah, I dare you to go drink milk from the gallon!” I dared her. A scared look crossed her face, because she knew that if she drank from the gallon and was caught, she could get grounded for a week. “OK,” Delilah finally answered, “but watch my back, Alice.” I nodded and followed Delilah out of her room, into the upstairs hallway, which was decorated with pictures of Delilah and her two brothers, Ellison and Penn. They were older than Delilah, but they spent lots of time with her, unlike my brother. Sneaking down the hallway as quietly as we could, I tried to listen for any noises from downstairs, and there were none, thankfully. We snuck down Delilah’s carpet-covered steps and tiptoed into her big, modern kitchen. Quickly, with me standing guard by the kitchen entrance, Delilah opened the refrigerator door, took out the gallon of milk, and took a big gulp of it. Laughing, and waiting for Delilah to put away the milk, we rushed up to her bedroom and fell into a laughing lump on the floor. “How long should I put it in for?” I asked Delilah “I can’t believe you did that!” I giggled. “Me neither!” she laughed. “OK, time for your dare. You have to melt a plastic fork in the school’s microwave on Monday.” Delilah lost her smile, and she looked very serious. “Really? Doesn’t that seem kind of harsh?” I ask, suddenly uncertain. I nervously toyed with my long dark braid and didn’t look at Delilah. “Oh, come on! Don’t be a sissy!” Delilah groaned. Neither of us had ever not done a dare, so what I was doing was like breaking tradition. Staring at Delilah, I realized she really wanted me to do it, so I sighed and mumbled, “Fine, I’ll do it.” On Monday, I wasn’t ready to melt a plastic fork, but Delilah was. She was so excited, so ready, that it was like she was doing the dare. I would gladly let her do it, but I wasn’t about to break my streak. When it was lunchtime, after Delilah and I had gotten our lunches and had finished eating, we went over to the microwaves. “How long should I put it in for?” I asked Delilah. “Thirty minutes,” she answered right away. Slowly, I opened the microwave door and set the plastic fork on the glass plate in the microwave. I quickly closed the door to the microwave and glanced around to see if anyone had spotted me doing this. No one seemed to be looking at us, so I set the time to 30:00, then hit the start button. Delilah and I watched the plastic fork go round and round for a while, then we went back to our seats. We forgot about the fork for the rest of the lunch period, but it didn’t forget about us too quickly. In fifth hour, when I was drawing for art class, the intercoms crackled to life. It was the secretary, Mrs. Junebee. “Will all students and staff please evacuate the building. I repeat, will all students and staff please evacuate the building.” “You heard her. Everybody up and out the door,” Mr. Keisker, my art teacher, said. With a pounding heart, I stood up and followed the rest of my class out the classroom door. We went down the hallway and out the closest door to us that led outside. Conveniently, my art class stood next to Delilah’s gym class. “You think this has to do with the fork?” I asked Delilah. My face was pale, and my hands were shaking. “No. Maybe. I dunno,” Delilah answered. Mrs. Lusko, the female gym teacher, was doing roll call, and when she called Delilah’s name, she piped up with a “Here!” I turned away from Delilah, suddenly too scared to talk anymore. I felt cold, even though it was almost ninety degrees out. Mr. Keisker finished roll call for my class, then spoke into a walkie-talkie that had been attached to his belt. A little while later, the secretary came outside and told us it was OK to go in. We were at the back of the building, so when we went inside, we were surprised to see that firefighters were scattered everywhere on the arts floor. They were everywhere on every floor, I heard from one of the teachers. We finished the day, and after school Delilah called me. “So, did you hear what happened?” Delilah asked me, once I answered the phone. “That a sixth-grader is going to be expelled for blowing up her school?” I asked. “No! One of the ovens blew up in the cafe, and it took the microwave with it. I saw it on my way back to the gym. It had nothing to do with your fork, Alice!” Delilah laughed. I suddenly felt very relieved, but still kind of guilty. “Well, I’m going to eat dinner. Bye, Alice!” Delilah laughed. I didn’t get to say goodbye before Delilah hung up the phone. Tuesday morning, I went to the secretary and asked for Mr. Ervin, the school’s principal. “Sure, dear, right this way,” Mrs. Luvaskuah, or Mrs. Luva, said. She led