Hey Everyone!!
Hope all’s tremendous!! Recently, I’d penned another random practice chapter. Didn’t have any real inspiration or direction, only sat down, thought for a moment, and started writing. Somehow, I wrote about two high schoolers out for a smoothie who then spend the day discussing plans for a portal they’d found in a vacant home nearby (..ha!)! Seriously! If you don’t believe me, enjoy:
Ella turned a straw toward her and sipped. “Strawberry.”
Cristina sighed, straightened her straw, and sipped and then curled her lips.
Ella giggled. “You got chocolate?”
Cristina nodded, spat.
“Shouldn’t have been so cheap as to buy a dollar mystery shake. You know they’re just trying to get rid of stuff.”
“Kevin’s behind the counter tonight. Just thought he would’ve looked-out for me, is all.”
Ella glanced beyond a sea of tables crammed with ninth-graders and at a counter where a boy took an order. “Cristina,” she said. “He only started two weeks ago. How much looking-out do you think he can do?”
Cristina raised a napkin to her mouth and wiped and then nodded, gazing over Ella’s shoulder.
Ella glimpsed behind. “What?”
“The ‘50s.”
“As in, 1950s? What about ‘em?”
“That was a time when a man knew how to treat a lady.”
Ella folded her arms. “Last night, did you and your mom have a classic movie night, again?”
“Never mind that. Just know it was a time when men were gentlemen.”
“So?”
“So the next time we find our portal, we need to try to—”
Ella slapped a hand over her friend’s mouth. “Really? Of all places, you choose to mention our thing at a smoothie place across the street from our school? Are you trying to get us creamed?”
Cristina peeled the hand away and shrugged. “Do you actually think anyone would believe us?”
“I wish it was just about belief. But it’s about people thinking we’re space cadets.”
Cristina slid her smoothie away and her backpack before her and then rested her head on it. “Well, I won’t mention the thing here, but if I could, I’d use it to visit that time period just to see if things were what they seemed to be in the movies.”
“But you know we haven’t figured-out how to control where we go.”
“I know. I’m just saying that if we could that’s what we could do, is all.”
Ella took a sip, put her bookbag on. “Well, what we can do is head to your house, order a pizza, and make new plans for the thing.”
Cristina slid her bag on, as well. “Okay. Whoa, wait—why do we have to go to my place again? Why not your place where you can clean-up after me for a change?”
Ella stood. “Because your place is closer to a certain abandoned house that has the thing… and because I haven’t cleaned-up from the mess we’d made last weekend.”
“You mean the mess you’d made.”
“Close enough,” Ella said and snickered. “Come on. Let’s go.”
The girls speed-walked up streets, through parks, and past corner stores without stopping once. While they passed a library, Cristina was tempted peruse shelves for a book which would help her for a science project due in two weeks, but Ella pulled her past an entrance claiming they’d had more important business to attend to. Before long however, they arrived at Cristina’s who had her father order them a pepperoni pizza with extra cheese – just the way Ella liked it – in exchange for proof they’d planned to study and do homework and study that Friday evening for three hours minimum. ‘I promise, dad,’ Cristina said. ‘No phones, no television.’
So at a kitchen table, the girl emptied their bags, and, until a half an later when the pizza arrived, the girls did homework.
“Finally,” Ella said and took a plate out a cabinet, opened a pizza box, and slapped three slices on it. “Break time.”
Cristina stopped writing. “For folks who hate dish washing, we have paper plates.” She peered across the table at Ella’s paper. “And what do you mean ‘finally’—you’ve done little more than write your name?”
“Shush,” Ella said, walked her to the table, and plopped into her seat. “Do you want your dad to hear? He believes we’re hard at work.”
“He knows I’m hard at work. You on the other hand: he’s seen a test or two you’d left lying around here.” She pretended to tremble.
Ella sighed. “Anyway, I wasn’t slacking… I was thinking about—”
“Let me guess: the thing.”
She nodded. “But we can say portal here. Your folks would just believe you’re talking about some old movie you all have seen or some book.”
“Gotcha.” Cristina ambled to a nearby drawer, snatched a paper plate, and placed a slide on it and then returned to her seat. “So what’s the newest plan: Go to the house, find the portal, and take it to desert island where we’re chased day and night by cannibalistic tribe?”
Ella eyes widened, and she reached for a pencil but Cristina snatched it and placed it out of reach.
“Why would you even thing of writing that down? Are you crazy? Now what were you thinking?”
Ella folded her hands. “Well, I was thinking about the last time we entered the portal we teleported to the same house but in a different time.”
“Yes, that’s what always happens. That’s what we always do.”
“Sure, but we’ve never left the house before. So maybe, next time we go, we could—”
Cristina lifted a palm. “Hold it. Are you really going to suggest we leave the house?” She shook her head. “Bad idea, my friend. Bad.”
“How do you know; you’ve never done it?”
“Neither of us have ever done it or know what consequences there may be.” She raked fingers through her hair. “To get home, we usually have to find a second portal somewhere in the house, correct? Well, suppose if we leave the house, a second portal is twice as hard to find, or doesn’t show-up for five years, or doesn’t teleport us back home?”
Ella giggled. “The second portal will be fine; it always has been.”
“Okay. But what if stepping out the house is a portal in-and-of itself? Do you have any idea what dimension we could teleport to or how we’d get back?”
Ella sat grinning, unmoving.
“What’s wrong: Cat gat your tongue for a change?”
“No. And none of those things will happen.”
“And you know this how?”
Ella shrugged. “Call it a hunch.”
“Calling it a hunch was what almost got us stuck last time.”
“But it was also a hunch which found the portal house, at all.”
Cristina closed her eyes and rubbed her temple and then picked-up her slice and began taking bites.
Ella peered at her.