The cricket drones and an eternity passes. As the night whispers on the ground below, perched forever behind the star-soaked curtain of sky. And the rain drips from the old gutters to my windowsill and onto the ground below. Listen. Wait. You may hear the murmuring conversations behind the windows of home. A wisp of music drifting on wind and mist, caught in the dewy grass. This world, half asleep, falling into the arms of unconscious thought and dreamless slumber is a symphony. Norah Brady, 13Jamaica Plain,Massachusetts
September/October 2016
The Hunt
It was a cool fall day and the opening day for archery. My brother and I woke up early and hiked three miles from base camp to find a tall tree that overlooked the meadow. My brother and I had been sitting there for three hours on the edge of a line of trees, sitting on a tree stand almost fifteen feet up a pine tree. There was a meadow with a lot of tall grasses that the deer liked to munch on. Then, finally, it was there, the perfect deer walking across the meadow. It was a four-by-four deer that looked pretty big. It was “the shot” I had to take. The deer turned its head, looking at the arrow so close to his body You could hear the grass that crumpled when its feet landed on the ground. The distant gurgling of the stream on the other side of the meadow. I raised the bow into shooting stance. I nocked the arrow into the nock. I aimed at the deer, getting the green dot on the sight to line up with the deer’s big chest. The air was cool as the breeze tickled the hairs on my neck. My breathing was in slow deep breaths, trying to be as still as I could be. You could smell the pine wood. My finger twitched the trigger. The trigger release popped back into its open position. You could see and feel the bowstring moving towards the body of the bow and hear its whir. The arrow was moving towards the deer. The deer turned its head, looking at the arrow so close to his body. He could hear the hum of the arrow zipping through the air. His reaction was just too slow. The shot went straight at his heart. As the body collapsed to the ground, the blood oozed drop by drop. He was breathing his last little bit of air. You could see the chest rising and falling with each gasp and then there was a long sigh and it was over. Christopher Thien, 13Weiser, Idaho Bedford Stevens, 12Springfield, Oregon
The Service Project
Madeline anxiously gathered her books and half-jogged towards the classroom door, praying that her Civics teacher, Miss Jones, wouldn’t notice her. “Madeline, can I speak with you for a moment?” Madeline’s Civics teacher called in her high, soprano voice. Her eyes scanned the room and then narrowed when they met Madeline’s. Madeline heaved a sigh. So much for being unnoticed. I bet she’s going to call your parents, Madeline silently thought, scolding herself. She made her way to Miss Jones’s desk, prepared for the worst. Miss Jones towered over Madeline and pointed a perfectly manicured finger at her. “I told you last week that you need five community service hours to pass my class. Why don’t I have them?” Miss Jones snapped. “I’m sorry. I guess I forgot. Besides, I have drama and acting classes filling up my time,” Madeline mumbled apologetically. Miss Jones huffed. “Because of your procrastination, I have no choice but to assign you a project.” She rummaged through her desk drawer, searching for something. Madeline groaned. She’d heard rumors about the handpicked projects from Miss Jones. Two kids received trash duty and one even got a job volunteering at the local jail. Madeline imagined herself picking up a rotten banana peel on the side of the road or talking to a prisoner with face piercings and shuddered. Miss Jones finally pulled out a flyer and placed it in front of Madeline. “That’s really cool. Can you tell me about it?” Madeline asked, amazed “This is an advertisement from Nature’s Nursing Home. They are looking for volunteers to help entertain the elderly there. The number and address is at the bottom,” Miss Jones said smugly. “I have to babysit old people?” Madeline screeched. “I don’t have time! There’s a reason why their friends and family don’t visit them anymore. This will be so humiliating.” Miss Jones frowned in disapproval. “You will start next Monday, volunteering right after school. Don’t skip this,” Miss Jones said, shoving the flyer in Madeline’s hand. That night, Madeline tried to forget about Miss Jones’s idea during dinner, but it was nearly impossible. She pushed a piece of chicken around her plate and dug holes in her rice. “Are you OK, Madeline?” Madeline’s mother asked and then shot a look at Courtney, Madeline’s older sister, who was playing on her phone. “Yeah, I’m fine,” Madeline replied, looking down at her plate. “You actually look kind of horrible. Did your friend realize that you’re a doofus? Oops, you don’t have any friends,” Courtney snickered. Madeline stuck out her tongue. She wasn’t in the mood for her sister’s juvenile comebacks. “Courtney!” Madeline’s mother exclaimed. Later, Madeline decided to do her homework. She dumped the contents of her backpack on her bed and searched for her math worksheet. When she was searching on her bed, Madeline’s eyes traveled to the half-crumpled Nature’s Nursing Home flyer that she shoved in her bag that afternoon. Madeline sighed, grabbed the flyer, and went downstairs to the kitchen phone. * * * When Madeline walked inside Nature’s Nursing Home on Monday, her instinct was to run away and accept a failing grade from Miss Jones. Instead, she kept her head down as she made her way to the front desk. “Hi, my name is Madeline. I’m here to volunteer to entertain the old, sorry, elderly people here,” Madeline said politely to the lady at the front desk. The lady smiled. “That’s excellent. We don’t get a lot of volunteers, never mind young ones. Many people are hostile toward the seniors here. Follow me, please.” The lady led Madeline to a door and knocked twice. It was very quiet until a frail voice answered, “Come in.” Inside, the room smelled heavily of perfume and baby powder. A bed lay towards a corner, unmade, and an assortment of cards and game chips were scattered all over the bedroom floor. Sitting on a chair next to a square table sat an old woman with frizzy, gray curls forming a halo around her head. Her floral shirt and blue jeans stood out against her pale skin. “This is Mrs. Blair, the senior citizen who you will be spending time with every day this week,” the lady at the front desk said proudly. She gave Madeline a wink and shut the door behind her. Madeline stood awkwardly in front of Mrs. Blair. She cleared her throat and spoke. “Hello. I’m Madeline.” “Hello, Madeline. You have a pretty name,” Mrs. Blair replied. “Thank you,” Madeline replied shyly. “May I sit?” She gestured to the other chair. “Sure,” Mrs. Blair shrugged. Silence filled the space between them. Mrs. Blair’s eyes shifted to and from Madeline to the room. “Tell me about yourself, Madeline,” Mrs. Blair said suddenly. “Well,” Madeline started, “I don’t have any grandpas or grandmas, so I can’t relate to elderly people much. I love the performing arts. I’m mainly here because I have to volunteer here to get a good grade in Civics.” As soon as Madeline said the last sentence, she winced. Mrs. Blair didn’t seem to mind. “Many people, especially teens, don’t seem to care about old folks like me. Thankfully, I’m going to change that about you. Ask me anything.” Madeline thought for a moment. “What was your job?” Madeline finally decided. “I was a Broadway star in New York,” Mrs. Blair answered, looking down. “That’s really cool. Can you tell me about it?” Madeline asked, amazed. Mrs. Blair grinned. “It was in 1948 and I was fourteen at the time. There was a crazy superstition that the lead actor or actress had to wear a special bracelet or they would be cursed forever in their acting career. Back then, I was the lead in almost all of the plays so I always wore the bracelet. Till this day, I still have it and used to wear it when performing plays for the others here when I was more flexible.” Madeline laughed along with Mrs. Blair and listened carefully to
