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Posts Tagged ‘NaNoWriMo’

Down the Mouse Hole – Magic Mice #8

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on November 8, 2017| 2 Comments »

Aric was the furthest from the duo and he called out, “They’re hypnotizing us. How can you be sure they are safe, Ella?”
“Drop it, Derp,” she said without looking back. “They’re talking to us. Can’t you guys hear them?”
One of the deer mice came forward, its nose twitching. Ella knelt onto all fours and let her whiskers touch the other mouse’s. It squeaked audibly, turned and scurried back to its mate before pausing to look back.
“It wants us to follow it. It wants to take us to a safe place, away from the Caw Birds. They came because they sensed our fear, and they didn’t know who we were, but they can only feel peace and friendship from us, so they’re offering us a place to hide.”
“You know all that from touching it’s whiskers?” Gran sounded doubtful.
Ella ignored him and followed the mouse. Billie followed her. Gran came in third, then Dish, Twerp, and, last, Aric. The second mouse faded back into the fern.
They didn’t have to go far: the mouse led them to a boulder under which was a crawl space, it ducked into the crawl space, and Ella got back on all fours. “Oh, boy,” she said. “We get to go spelunking.” She followed the mouse under the rock.
“It’s a mouse hole,” her voice came back, muffled and distant, receding.
Billie looked at Gran before she, too, got on all four. “No more mean birds,” she said before she disappeared under the rock. Gran shook his head and followed. Dish looked back at the other two. Then he, too, got on all fours and scurried under the rock.
Twerp looked at Aric. “Sorry, bud. I think you gotta leave your weapon behind. We’re going into friendly territory now.” Twerp disappeared under the boulder.
Aric threw his skewer to the side and muttered, “OK, but if El is wrong…”
The second deer mouse entered the tunnel behind Aric, blocking off all light.
The tunnel smelled earthy. Here and there, something brushed past Ella’s face, but since the mouse ahead did not startle, she did not. She could smell the mouse, and feel its pleasant thoughts. Happiness. Peace. Friendship. Welcome. It seemed to be talking, but its voice was very high pitched, and she only caught bits of the words – more like images in her mind, than actual words.
This was home, the mouse was saying. We all live together down here. We have many ways out. Caw Birds can’t get to us. Family is here (Ella saw naked baby mice sucking on their mother’s teats). Sleep. Rest. No fear. Happy. You friends. Smell good. We show you path.
The tunnel passed by other openings, and sometimes there was a whiff of something else up those tunnels. The mouse showed her a picture of the creature, and she decided it was a vole. How interesting, she thought. They dropped into a larger room amid high pitched voices and excited chatter. They were in the main chamber, where the baby mice were, and the mother mice, and several older siblings. The mice were busy sniffing, cuddling, and touching each other’s whiskers. So many came at her, that she felt like she was in a very crowded room, with no room to turn around. She felt frightened, and wanted to scream or run out.
Images flashed in her mind. She was picturing words, directions, orders, conversations. Her mouse touched whiskers with her again. It wanted her to keep following, to not linger in the big room. Ella called back, “Guys! Can you follow my voice?”
“Coming!”
“Wow, so many of them!”
“So nice. So friendly.”
“Following Dish’s tail.”
“I’m right here!” Aric’s voice brought up the rear, and they were in a narrow tunnel again, this time, running slightly uphill.
The mouse ahead didn’t seem fazed by the pace, but Ella’s front paws were getting tired, not to mention how her toes felt in her boots. She was panting with exertion when the mouse turned suddenly straight up. Ella followed, her boots making little purchase on the tunnel walls, She heaved herself upward, while Billie yelled from behind.
“Geez, El! Enough with the dirt in the face, Girlfriend!”
“Sorry!”
They came out under a flat piece of tin. The rivulet gurgled merrily a few feet away (yards, by Ella’s view, but she knew it had to be feet). The deer mouse was busy picking rose hips off of a wild rose, hanging upside down to do so. It was humming happily.
Aric was pushed up the tunnel by the second mouse, who kept sending him happy thoughts. Tumbling out into the bucolic scene of his friends eating rose hips and happily humming, Aric stood up. He wanted to be angry, but such peaceful feelings came over him: peace. Love. Happy. Family. Food. Aric knew he was hypnotized, but the sweet aroma of rose hips filled his nostrils, and he reached for one. It was like biting into a chocolate covered pomegranate seed. The energy seemed to go right to his belly and his head.
“Mouse cocaine,” he muttered as he gnawed his way happily through several rose hips.
Sated, Ella dropped down beside a stone, under the shelter of thick, round leaves. Aric dropped beside her. “They left, you know,” he said.
“I know.” She patted her tummy. “They were very nice.”
Gran dropped down on the other side of her. “Weird that I don’t even question their motives, isn’t it?”
Dish, Billie, and Twerp joined them. Billie giggled and said, “I wish I had my phone. I’d post on social media with a photo of Dish hanging from a wild rose bush: Just crawled through a mouse house with naked babies and feasted on rosehips. Life’s so good.”
“Attacked by rabid crows,” Aric added. “Not LOL.”
“Really?” Ella laid back. “I think I would just post something about being so darn tired.”
“Dear Evil Person: We have Kitsune on our side.”
They all chuckled.
“Don’t mess with house mice. Deer mice come to the rescue.”
“#deermiceheroes #underground tunnels #followthestreamlet.” Dish let out a long breath. “Probably a good thing we don’t have cell phones and can’t let the enemy know where we are.”
“If only we knew who the enemy was.”
“What now?” Twerp burped contentedly. “I could use a nap.”
“They showed me a place not far from here. Isn’t it weird that I could see the pictures they sent me?” Ella stood up. “They didn’t even notice we were wearing clothes.”
“Didn’t they think it was weird, us having shoes and all?” Gran fell in beside her as they made their way along the creek, careful to stay under cover and stay alert this time.
“They thought it odd that we walked on our ‘back legs’ at first, but once in the tunnel, we were all equal. They were even going to let us stay in their nest, but I panicked. Claustrophobic, I guess.” Ella grinned up at Gran. “I’m not a good mouse, am I?”
“I don’t know, that was pretty tight back in there. I was beginning to panic, myself.” Dish offered up from behind them. “I wonder how long we were in their tunnels?”
They dodged a large banana slug. It smelled of something sickly. The air was crisp, and song birds few and far between now. They climbed over mossy rocks. Dish lost his footing once, and fell into a hole, but Aric and Billie helped him back out.
Ella found what she was looking for after what seemed like an hour: a blackened hollow in a tree that was mostly grown over by the tree and hidden by some low plants. The picture in her head matched, and she clapped her paws in delight. “Oh! A place to sleep! At least, to rest.”
“Should we set a sentry?” They were inside the tree, smelling the cedar and feeling the lightning-carved walls. Billie was doing what she did naturally: gathering bark shavings into a nest near the back wall.
“We don’t have a weapon anymore.” Aric picked up some boulders and hauled them beside the door. “I don’t know how far I could heft one of these if I had to fight.”
“Can we just hope noone saw us come in here?” Billie stood up and looked around at them.
“Most predators have a refined sense of smell, and they’d likely just follow our scent to us. But I guess mice just live life in the moment and don’t worry about predators much…” Ella’s voice trailed off. She didn’t have an answer.
Twerp dropped down into the nest. “I’m claiming first sleep.” He curled up and was snoring promptly.
“Well, I guess that’s it. We nap, and hope noone follows us.”

14954 words

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The Birds – The Magic Mice #7

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on November 7, 2017| 1 Comment »

The fox disappeared like a mist on a hot day. The mice stared at the spot he had been sitting, their mouths agape.
“What’s a bell weather?” Billie asked.
“Bellwether, one word. An indicator or predictor of something. I think he means I will instinctively be able to tell who is good or bad. I don’t know, though.” Ella wiped her eyes. “I’m really tired, guys.”
“We should at least cross the creek,” Aric said. “There’s a rock we can rest under over there.”
“You mean, wade?” Gran was staring at the water. “It’s really cold.”
“No, climb over on the rhododendron,” Ella suggested.
“Um, right. I guess I should go now.” Horace was still standing under the shelter of the rhodie. “You guys watch for corvids, okay?”
“Corvids?”
“Crows, jays, ravens,” Ella answered, automatically. “Enemies of owls and mice.”
“Right. Okay, Horace, it’s been cool.” Dish held up a fist to the owl. He took it down when the owl didn’t respond. “Maybe see you – you know where.”
“Yes, yes, I do. I think I can find my way. Follow the stream.” Horace blinked again. “Thank you.”
Twerp ran up and hugged the owl. “We’ll get dad out of jail, Horace.”
If the owl could have hugged back, it was evident he would have. He dipped his beak down to touch Twerp’s ball cap. “Yes,” was all he said.
“C’mon, guys, let’s go.”
Horace hopped out from under the rhododendron and lifted silently up into the air. He rose to find a roost for the day, camouflaged by tree bark. The mice scrambled across twisted branches of rhododendrons to the rock and fern protection on the far side of the stream. They found a dry spot filled with soft fir needles, hidden by fern fronds, and protected by the hard stone walls on two sides.
Aric took up a sentry post with his bamboo skewer aimed outward. The rest of the mice scurried around, creating a nest. Aric sighed. He jammed his bamboo skewer into the ground, point outward. He didn’t have anything for the other side, so he just hoped nothing would try to crawl in from that direction. He was getting paranoid.
Ella curled up next to Dish, with Billie and Gran on the other side. Aric and Twerp curled up at their feet. Ella hadn’t realized how tired she was: she scarcely closed her eyes and she was asleep.

She faced a centipede that had somehow grown large enough to knock on her bedroom door. It had a large set of mandibles in the front of its hard, roundish head, and a grouping of ocelli. It was poised as if to strike. I can’t see you, it whispered to her, but I know you are out there. I will find you. When I find you, I will kill you. All of you.
Aric yelled and came down on the ocelli – antennae that the centipede used for surrogate eyes- “Die! Die! Die! Leave my sister alone!!”
The creature reared back, it’s mandibles snapping. Twerp danced in front of it, mooning it. It poised to strike when Dish shoved a rock into its face. Billie came out of somewhere with a pair of scissors which she was using to cut off the centipede’s legs on one side. She was singing a song about how a centipede with legs only on one side was doomed to always walk in a circle.
Gran wrapped his arms around Ella and pulled her into the light. “Wake up, El. Wake up! We have to get moving!”

“Wake up! El! Wake up! We have to get moving!” El’s eyes opened. She was under the canopy of the rhododendron, in the arms of Gran. She started.
“Centipede.”
“What? No? It’s just the sun is setting. We need to follow the stream.”
“In the dark?” She wasn’t quite functioning.
“We hold tails, remember? Aric is leading the first leg. We keep whiskers to the water. Walk carefully.”
“Oh, and there’s helicopters circling, tell her that.” Billie sat down next to El. “Yeah, they’re searching the woods. Guess the old fox was right.”
“Mr. Nagato. The librarian.”
“But only sometimes.”
“Right. Watch out for centipedes.”
“What? Nevermind. Let’s go.”
They hiked in pairs or single file, staying to the cover of the rhododendrons, sword ferns, dying bracken, and huckleberries. There were plenty of dried berries still on the huckleberries, which mice apparently liked, so they picked and ate as they went. The little stream provided water to wash down whatever they gleaned as they hiked.
There were relatively few creatures out: a songbird warbled a tune that echoed off of tree trunks. A busy wren scarcely gave them a glance, except to flutter out of their way with a mild chirp. A very lazy-looking brown and orange newt hissed at them, and they gave it a wide berth. Something jumped into the water, once, but none of them saw what it was, and no other threatening action was taken. The drone of helicopters circled overhead, before drifting away.
A yellow jacket wasp flew along the ground, looking for something. It ignored them as they tip-toed past, afraid to stir up such a large wasp. A late dragonfly, bright grey, landed on a delicate plant stem and watched them as they passed. It looked very mean and dangerous, but Ella assured everyone that it wasn’t hunting mice.
The world was strange here: the sky and tree canopy was too far off to see. Green was more a shade of grey than a color, but there were many shades of grey. Blues stood out. Yellow and brown were bright colors. They could all see better in the daylight, but they still bumped into twisted rhododendron roots, or yet another grey rock, with regularity. Sometimes, they tripped over the creeping blackberry vines.
Mushrooms were all investigated with eager noses.
“First time I ever liked a ‘shroom,” Dish mumbled with his mouth full of chanterelle. “And it not even cooked.”
“I wonder if mice get high on poisonous ones?”
Open spaces didn’t appear as open spaces to the travelers: from their perspective, they were crossing a maze of fir cones and downed tree branches. They climbed atop a fallen tree and raced the length of it, hopping to the next one, always keeping the little stream to the left of them.
They were foolish, of course. The cawing of crows should have sparked a warning, but they were laughing and running with abandon, unmindful of their size and appearance.
The first crow served to frighten them into tumbling off of the log they were on, by diving at them and flying away, caw-caw-cawing in corvid laughter. The tumble was painful, but not injuring, and Gran shook his fist at the bird.
The second crow came from behind Gran and snatched at his paw. It missed, but Gran tumbled forward, which set the crows off on another round of cawing hilarity. Two crows swooped in the third time, and one succeeded in grabbing Billie’s tail for a short moment, sending her somersaulting under a rhododendron.
Ella had ducked under a low log and saw where Billie had landed. “Everyone! Run for the rhodie! Run! Get over by Billie!” Something in her mind told her they would be safe – at least for now – from the cawing bullies. She dashed along under the log before making a short scramble to where Billie was sitting up, crying.
“What awful birds!” Billie sobbed.
The crows kept diving, and one even landed behind Twerp, hopping along and cawing loudly and pecking at his tail as he ran. “Ouch! Ow! Stop it! Ow!” The crow stopped only when Twerp ducked under Ella’s log and rolled into the space under the rhodie. Gran and Dish followed , their paws flailing as if they could ward the black birds off. Only Aric stood up to face the onslaught.
He ran a little ways forward, but when a crow dove, he turned and weilded his bamboo skewer, poking the sharp end upward as if to stab the birds. They stayed above his jabs, cawing and calling. He kept getting closer and Ella stood as close to the edge of the old rhododendron as she could, squeaking at the top of her voice, “Run, Aric! Run! Hurry!”
“Not. Before. I. Make. One. Pay.” Aric thrust his skewer up at the grey feet coming at his face. He hit something and the crow suddenly back-winged, cawing angrily. Aric made a mad dash for the rhododendron then, barely making it under the safety of the low canopy. The three crows landed on the logs and low branches, cawing incessantly.
The mice scooted as close to the base of the bush as they could before taking stock of their scrapes and bruises. Billie was still sniffling, but Gran had his paw on her shoulder, comforting her. Twerp retrieved his glasses from the edge of the rhodie, using a twig. He cleaned them on his t-shirt, muttering that they weren’t broken, lucky for the crows.
“How long do you suppose they’ll wait out there?” Dish peered up, but couldn’t see the crows.
“A long time,” Ella said, dejectedly. “Aric made them mad. Crows hold a grudge.”
“Well, so do I,” Aric snapped defensively. “They were out to hurt us or kill us.”
“Yes, they were. I’m not arguing, Dork. I’m just explaining how crows think.”
“You don’t think – sniff – those are – sniff – someone’s familiars, do you?” Billie wiped her nose with her paw.
Ella shook her head, “No. They are crows being crows. We were mice out in the open, and they saw what looked like a good sporting time.” She sat. “Now what do we do? We have to get beck to the stream, but if we try to cross back out of here, they’ll be right on us – unless we move in the dark.”
“I don’t want to wait until night,” Gran said angrily. “We can’t wait until night. We’re taking too long as it is.”
“Any great ideas, O great leader?” Aric was still holding on to his bamboo skewer. “Maybe we find a bunch of skewers?”
Gran glowered at him, “Cut the sarcasm, Derp.”
“Guys. We can’t do skewers, Aric: we don’t have anything to sharpen twigs, and crows learn. That means, they’ll be ready for skewers next time. They’re smart birds.”
“Mean birds,” Billie pouted.
Ella stood up. “Look, I need to think. Billie? Come with me?”
“Wait, where you guys going?”
“To think.”
“No, you can’t leave the whole group. We stay together. All the time. No one is safe on their own, if all six of us aren’t safe.” Gran as much as put his hands on his hips.
“O Great Leader has spoken,” Aric muttered.
Ella, who had her beck to the group, spoke softly, “Guys. I think we have a friend.”
Everyone lifted their heads and peered in the direction Ella was looking, but it wasn’t their eyes that told them what she meant: it was their noses. A pair of deer mice sat on their haunches just under a sword fern, kindness and gentleness emanating from them.

13490 words

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The Magic Mice: Escape

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , on November 4, 2017| 3 Comments »

“Aric, go check the attic window, see if you can see anything from there.”
Aric sighed loudly, but jumped off the trunk, landing on all fours (“Cool!). He jogged over to the corner where the attic window looked over the front street. He clambered up the rough wood to the sill and peered out. “Nothing. Man, this window is really dirty!”
“Stay there and keep watch. Twerp. I just sent you the photo. Send this stuff there. Then we grab the magic wands and leave our phones here.” Gran sat and started texting on his phone.
Deke was glad they weren’t watching him, because he wasn’t sure what he was doing. He stuck his hands into his deep pockets, closed his eyes. There wasn’t really a noise so much, as a sudden lack of something. Deke was knocked onto his behind, and his eyes opened. The furniture was gone and dust was setting all around them where everything had been. Even the sewing form was gone!
“Whoa!” Aric was looking inward. “That was cool, Deke!”
Gran even looked impressed. “Huh. You are an odd one, Twerp. The magic wands?”
Deke looked up where the four wands were hanging still. How had he not moved them when he’d commanded everything magic to go? Maybe Derp – er, Ella – was right. Maybe they were no more than props for a long ago play. Still… They were all staring at the wands, so he closed his eyes and waited for them to shrink and fall to the floor.
Gran snatched them all up as soon as they hit the floor. “Come on guys. Leave your cell phones here. When they realize they can track us, they’ll come here first.”
“Right.” Aric jumped down and jogged over to the knot hole. He peered downward. “Somehow, down sounds scarier.”
“You take the rear,” Gran growled, pushing him aside before lowering himself down the hole.
“I can take the rear,” Deke said, when he saw his friend’s face drop.
It was a good thing he took the rear, Deke discovered. Once he lowered himself over the lip of the knot hole, he realized he had no strength to hang on. He held as long as he could before squeaking down, “I’m dropping! Heeeeelllp!”
He landed with a thud on top of Aric, who squeaked in surprise. “S-s-sorry. I just feel weak all over.”
“Yeah, wish you had better aim. Hang on, I’ll help us get down. Gran! Wait up! Deke is sick.”
Aric had Deke piggy back on him as they squeezed down the electric wire conduit. When it got too narrow, Deke had to stand on Aric’s shoulders, but he found he could hold some of his own weight by grasping the wire, too. It seemed like it too twice as long to do down the wire as it took to go up.
Gran was waiting in the dark for them. He came over and inspected Deke’s eyes. “You look OK. What happened?”
“I think it’s the magic. I just feel all drained.” Deke sat down. He just wanted to curl up and sleep, right here, in the dust, with the spiders and silverfish. Never move again…
“Not yet. You gotta power through. After we get out of this house. C’mon. Gran helped him up. “No mouse left behind.”
“Goonies!” Aric shouted, soliciting a baleful stare from Gran.
“Grow up.”

Ella heard them first. Her ears picked up the distant sound of their shuffling. Dish was snoring softly, his head resting on her shoulder. Billie was scurrying about, looking for a way out of the crawl space. Ella shook Dish gently.
“Time to wake up.”
“Is it dark yet?”
Billie scampered back. “I think I found a way out. Are they coming yet?”
“I can hear them.” Ella stood and stretched. It was strange how she felt like herself, but looked like a mouse, and then she was wearing her own clothes. How had Twerp managed to do that? There was no logical explanation, other than sorcery, or magic, but how was it even possible? There were laws to the universe, and bending those laws…
Gran entered first. He was followed by Aric, with Twerp leaning heavily on his shoulder. Gran held up his right paw, “He used a lot of magic today. He’s drained, but okay. You find a way out of here?”
Billie nodded up and down while Ella hurried over to help her little brother with his dorky friend. Twerp looked up and smiled. “Hey, Derp.”
“Love you, too, Twerp.” She frowned at him. “Is he, like, drunk?”
“Nah, I’m just tired and honest. You hate me and I hate you. We’re even.” Twerp raised a fist. “”Fist bump?”
“Whatever.” Ella gave him a fist bump. “What did you do?”
“Later,” Aric said, nodding toward Gran. “He goes first.”
Gran nodded. Ella noted that he looked sort of like Splinter, from Teenage Ninja Turtles. Odd.
“Okay, guys. Plan here: get out of the crawl space. We get about a hundred yards from here and we can decide what to do. Right now, we got to ditch our cell phones. They have GPS and can be tracked. They probably already have figured out we’re still here in the house. We left ours in the attic. Billie says she found a way out.”
“Possible.” Billie didn’t sound so certain. “We’re mice, it may work. I don’t know.”
“Well, lead on,” Twerp said. “I need a place to crash, and this is looking really awesome right now.”
“Follow me.” Billie hopped off toward the street side of the house. “It’s like a screen vent thingie. We just have to pull the screen back to get out.”

Half an hour later, they had pulled back a fine-mesh screen that was set in behind a rectangle of cinder blocks. There was just enough room for each of them to squeeze through. Deke was more than half-asleep, so someone got in front of him and Aric pushed from the back, and they dragged him through. Aric picked up his glasses and white ball cap. Gran brought up the rear.
They were in a window well. Bricks and moss and centipedes and roly-poly bugs. Ella Stood on her very tippie toes. UGH. Aric scaled the bricks to the grass above and declared the way “clear”. The problem was getting Deke up there, as he was now snoring soundly. Gran tried hauling him up over one shoulder, but it took two pairs of paws to scale the wall, and Twerp was in the way. Aric scrambled off to find string or something from the yard.
Dish pulled himself out of the window well. “Guys,” he called back down, “There’s a white van parking across the street. I think we need to get a move on.”
Billie rolled her eyes. “How can we, with Twerp like this?”
Gran sat down and exhaled heavily. “If only I knew how he conducted his magic. What he said. Like, ‘Lift Twerp to grass level now.’” Gram was rubbing the side of one of the hand-carved magic wands.
Twerp suddenly jerked upward, and then levitated to the grass level, before moving over the grass and settling down.
Grans mouth fell open. How?”
Dish shouted from above, “EXTERMINATORS! Guys, they’re rodent exterminators, and we need to get off the property now!”
Billie, Ela, and Gran scrambled up the side of the mossy brick. Once on top, they lifted up Twerp’s snoring person and they made their way through unmowed grass toward the cat hole in the back fence. Aric jogged across the back yard to join them, bringing up the rear. He was carrying an old bamboo skewer from last summer’s barbecue. Somewhere, they could hear crows cawing in the trees, and an owl hooting. A dog howled down the street. Men’s boot steps echoed across the street.
Through the fence, they were in the back yard belonging to the Gutierrez family. A friendly pitbull patrolled the yard on the far side, bridle and white, tail wagging as it moved along the leafy hedge. The mice kept as close to the base of the fence as they could, trying not to make any noise that would attract the dog. Six year old Juana Gutierrez sat on the back step, singing “This little light of mine”. She glanced at the fence, and then over at the scary Peabody house.
There were strange men inside the Peabody house. Men who killed rodents and ants and things. There were mice working their way along the fence, and she could see they were dressed in clothes. She looked over at the dog.
“El Ganador! Come. Inside.” The dog happily trotted over to her and she grasped his collar. Looking out at the mice, she whispered, “Vaya con Dios, Ella. Te amo.”
Ella glanced over her shoulder as her favorite six year old disappeared into the house. “Gracias, Juana. I’ll let you have that extra ice cream next time I baby-sit you!”
They mad it to the alley way. A white van was parked directly behind the Peabody residence. The windows were tinted, but the engine was running, and it didn’t take much to surmise what it was doing there. Gran turned left and kept to the high grass, weeds, and garbage. Everyone followed. Aric brought up the rear with his barbecue skewer. He hunched under the fence for a while, studying the van. When he finally made his move forward, he kept his skewer low. He came up short behind the rest at the edge of Mrs. Swainson’s yard.
Mrs. Swainson had a dozen cats. The alley was relatively bare. Bob Freeman’s yard was across the alley, unmown, unkempt, and abutting the first open field they might be able to take to freedom. The sun was beginning to set, but it was still light out.
Now what?

6820 words

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The Magic Mice: The Attic

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , on November 3, 2017| 5 Comments »

The Attic.
Gran led the way. Deacon was in the middle, and Aric brought up the back. They creeped along caves that followed the feed of electrical and cable wires, always moving upward. Deke had wanted to follow the plumbing, but Aric said that ended on the third floor. Only the electrical went to the attic. Deke kept a wary eye on the cords they often straddled. He felt a lot like they were walking blindly in a subway tunnel, and one of those wires would be hot, and they’d all be fried. Any second now.
“Ouch!” Gran stopped and looked back. “Step on my tail again, and you’re dead meat, Twerp.”
Great. Now he had to watch out for the tail, too. Deke glance to his right and looked into the eight eyes of a large house spider. It retreated quickly, but not before hissing at him.
“W-was that Shelob?” Aric whispered from the back.
“No.” Deke concentrated on looking straight forward. Did mice eat spiders? Maybe they were the threat, not the spiders. He couldn’t remember anything from science class about mouse diets. He remembered plenty from fantasy novels he’d read as a kid, and it seemed like mice ate things like dandelions, acorns, and puddings.
“Shit.” Gran stopped suddenly. “Mouse trap.”
The other two crawled up behind him and peered over his shoulder. It looked like a tube set on top of the wires, with a piece of aromatic cheese at the end of it. Deke’s nose twitched and his stomach growled.
“Oh. My dad and I set these. There’s a rubber band thing that shoots when the mouse takes the bait. It goes over the mouse’s head and, like, strangles it instantly.”
“Nice, Aric. How do we get around it?” Gran looked back, and Deke thought he was looking into the face of Splinter, the anti-hero of Teenage Mutant Turtles. Gran even drew out his “s”.
“I suppose we throw something up in there until we set off the trigger?”
“Oh, brilliant. And when we set off the trigger and the little rubber band flies out harmlessly, how do we get through this?”
“Uh.”
“There was a junction back there by Shelob. We could go back and take the junction and hope this is the only such trap Aric set.”
“Shelob?” Splinter – er, Gran, stared down his long nose at Deke. “No, don’t tell me, Twerp. Just lead the way. Aric, you take up the rear.”
“What? Why?”
There was much grumbling as the mice changed positions, mostly from Aric as he squashed himself up along the walls of the tunnel. “You’d think I put that trap down here just to catch us!” he complained.
Deke took the lead happily. He felt like he should have been given it in the first place, because he was the one who had thought of escaping as mice and hiding in the crawl space. It wasn’t hard to find the spider again: it had moved forward of its web after they passed, and it hissed again, as it made a hasty retreat.
The junction was to the left, and Deke turned to follow it. It went vertical shortly after they were into the tunnel, with only a single electrical wire running up the middle of it. A very old electrical cord, way out of code. Deke paused as he looked upward. “This is not up to code,” he muttered. “We could be electrocuted. Fried, even.”
“It’s an old house,” Aric called from behind him.
“If the house hasn’t burned down yet, I’d say we’re fairly safe. Climb. Now.”
Deke swallowed hard. Do or die, right? All that? He wrapped his paws around the rubber-coated wire and began to pull himself upward, using his feet to walk along the wall. He heard, and felt, the others follow. They passed through dusty old spider webs. A silverfish scurried upward ahead of them. The tunnel they were in got wider, until there was no place to place his feet as he climbed, but a hole in a floor above beckoned.
“Gotta freestyle it here, guys,” Deke called over his shoulder. He didn’t feel the confidence. He breathed out before taking in a deep breath and grasping the electrical cord with all the strength his paws possessed. Left over right. Right over left.
He reached the small hole where the cord went through what he thought was the floor boards. One paw grasped the upper surface, and then the other, and he hoisted himself half way up into the space between attic floor and third floor ceiling.
He sank in defeat on the attic sub-flooring. “Really?”
Gran surfaced next and crawled further into the space, keeping his head down. Finally, Aric hefted himself through the hole. He looked upward where he expected the cord to go. “It follows the ceiling?” He sounded as disappointed as Deke felt.
“Explore,” Gran’s mellow voice floated back toward them. “The cord probably goes up the wall somewhere, but there may be a way into the attic from here without acrobatics.”
The friends looked at each other. If Aric could have shrugged, he would have. Instead, he slapped Deke on the shoulder. “We stay together.”
Deke felt weird, crawling with his paws on the floor and the toes of his sandals behind him, but it was all the space allowed for. Mouse sized, he reminded himself a dozen times. Mouse sized.
They heard Gran shout. “I found it! A knot hole. Follow my voice!”
Deke didn’t understand how his body knew where to go, but his ears had swiveled, and he’d turned toward the voice and scurried – yes, scurried, like a mouse – in the exact direct the voice had come from. He was soon underneath a perfect knothole in the pine flooring of the attic. He could hear Gran scurrying around above.
“Coming, Aric?”
“Right behind you.”
Up they went.

The attic was much brighter than the spaces they had been confined in. A single small window to the west let in the early afternoon light. It wasn’t direct sunlight, but it was a lot more light than they’d been used to for the past few hours. The stood, side by side, looking around what seemed to be a huge cavernous room. The attic.
There was a human form for sewing in one corner, and a child’s rocking chair. Five trunks. A number of plastic boxes marked in large lettering: XMAS or EASTER. A stack of cardboard boxes were marked HALLOWEEN. Near the dusty window stood an old easel with a dust-covered painting on it. An old mirror was propped against the slanted ceiling near the body form. The wand collection was in a glass covered box on top of one of the trunks. Latched.
“Now what?” mused Gran.
“We shrink what we need so we can carry it?”
“How are we going to carry it back down those tunnels?”
“We shrink it so we can carry it,” Deke repeated.
“What do we know we need?” asked Aric. He was atop one of the trucks, “I don’t even know what is in these trunks. Hallowe’en costumes? Photo albums? Family diaries?”
“Magic wands. We need those.” Gran was studying the latch on the display case. “Probably don’t need anything else.”
“The mirror, I would think,” Deke replied.
Gran reared back. “We can’t carry everything, Twerp. Concentrate. Can we hide the things we may need later? Do you have that super power, too?”
Deke felt four eyes on him. “Well… Um. I could try. I never tried to hide something before…”
“Except us,” Aric replied.
“Well, yeah, but I did shrink myself into a mouse once, so I was pretty sure I could do that.”
“Pretty sure?” Gran stared hard at him. “You mean, you didn’t know if you could make us all mice?”
“Well, that was easy, I was sure. But getting us all into the crawl space… I didn’t have an exact destination, so, no. I had to just hope there was a crawl space and the magic would know…” Deke felt his voice trail off.
“But you could, like, send the mirror and trunks to the crawl space, right>“ Aric looked hopeful.
“I might squash anyone down there. I can’t place it all exact-like.”
Gran scratched his chin. Deke was certain he was irritated and would take it out on him, but when he spoke, he seemed to have a plac. “How familiar are you with Dish’s family’s cabin?”
“Um, not at all. I didn’t even know they went camping.”
“If I send you a photo on my cell phone, can you send the items there?”
Aric and Deke looked at each other, then checked their pockets. Sure enough, they had their cell phones with them, and the phones had service. “We might want to ditch these,” Deke said. “They have GPS in them.”
“Crap.”

Word Count: 5172 out of 50,000

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The Magic Mice – 2

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged on November 2, 2017| Leave a Comment »

“GUYS!” Twerp didn’t shout, but his loud whisper broke them all from their frozen state like a snowball shatters frozen glass. Everyone turned to look at him.
He turned red. “I HAVE AN IDEA.”
“Make it quick,” hissed Dish, his pale eyes piercing the nervous kid’s face.
“Okay.. We become mice hiding in the crawlspace.”
“Whoa, dude!” Aric scrunched his face in disgust.
“No. Not even.” Billie just shut it down.
Downstairs, whoever had been ringing the doorbell now raised a megaphone and commanded, “OPEN THE DOOR. WE HAVE OBSERVED YOU ARE NOT IN SCHOOL> IF YOU DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR IN FIVE SECONDS< WE WILL BREAK IT IN.”
Ella hugged herself. This just wasn’t real. Nothing was right.
“No, listen, I can change us all, and -”
“NO!” Gran, Dish, and Billie hissed.
“Maybe we can escape through the window,” Gran said, as his fingers worked around the screen.
There was a crash of glass and wood in the foyer. “We’re in!” Someone shouted.

The world went dark. Ella felt herself falling backward into space. Her chest was compressed and tight; she tried to gasp, but it was like those nightmares when you think you’re awake, but you’re not, and you can’t scream. She flailed her arms, felt nothing. Dust filled her nostrils. Was this what it was like when they threw teargas canisters into a crowd? Or was it a smoke bomb?
She came to in the dark. She was on her hands and feet, and it was chilly in the room. A dripping sound came from behind her. Her hear was beating wildly and loudly, and she could hear heavy panting – breathing – around her. Someone sneezed. Overhead, there were thumps and scrapes as someone walked around. So she was in a dungeon of some sort, down below. She heard a muffled, “Clear!” followed by another one, as the steps moved further away.
“Holy crap!” Aric’s voice squeaked like a girl before his voice cracked and went deeper. “Deke!”
Billie said a most un-lady like word. Her breath tickled Ella’s ear. “Do I have paws?”
Ella blinked. Her eyes were beginning to adjust to the dark. “Where are we?” she asked, trying to make out shapes in the dim lighting/ A cell? Prison? Dungeon? Had she been hit in the head during the raid?
“By the surroundings, I would guess we are in the crawlspace of your house, El.” Gran’s mellow voice was to her right. “And, Bill, I believe we all have paws. And large ears.”
Ella raised her hand to the side of her head. She felt short, soft hair, then her her favorite earrings, She moved her hand up the edge of her ear. “EEK!” Her scream came out more like a squeak.
She looked to her right and squeaked again: she was looking into the beady eyes of a very large mouse that was sitting on its haunches, staring at her. It was wearing Gran’s red knit beanie cap, and was dressed in his baggy clothes, right down to his ratty converse. Ella covered her mouth and whirled to look at Billie on her left.
A smaller mouse was standing beside her, running its paws up the side of its head. Feeling the dangly earrings hanging there. This mouse was wearing Billie’s favorite black Kurt Cobain tee, a grey hoodie, and black leggings with little grey skulls all over them. It looks at her and said, in Billie’s voice, “El…?”
“Bill…?” Ella replied.
Someone groaned. “What happened?” It was Dish’s voice. “Did we get flash-banged back there? What is this place?”
Gran let out a heavy breath. “I think Twerp has some explaining to do.”
Beady eyes searched the darkness. Twerp, also known as Deke, or Deacon (his real name) was sitting on a empty thread spool, swinging his legs. Er, paws. Ella knew it was Twerp, because he had on his white ball cap, the red shirt, and baggy shorts he’d been in when he followed Aric into the house. His wire-rimmed glasses perched awkwardly atop his nose. He was wearing – of course, because he was Twerp – sandals. He looked smug.
“I had to act, dogs. They were already in the house, and if we’d tried to go out that window…” he shrugged. “No time, you know? And I knew I could change all of us into mice, it was just putting us somewhere safe that I was a little fuzzy on. But that worked out, didn’t it? Because they don’t know we’re here.”
“What now, Genius?” Gran stepped forward, leaning in a threatening manner.
“Mice?” The sound of dry leaves or paper sounded as Dish struggled to find his feet. “We’ve been turned into mice? And where are we, again?”
“Yes.”
“In the crawlspace under El’s house.”
“But I have my clothes on… And paws. I have paws!”
Everyone groaned. Aric spoke first, “Dude, you sound like Ella, now.” He switched to a falsetto, “’How can I be a mouse? That’s not a scientific probability.’”
“I didn’t say that,” Ella snapped.
“But you thought it,” Aric snapped back.
“Genius,” mumbled Dish. “I didn’t think you had it in you, Deke. So you can change us back when we’re safe and away from here?”

The footsteps above were coming back down the stairs. Someone – either Billie or Gran – hissed a “Be quiet!” and everyone stilled. When the footsteps were overhead, they all looked up. Dust motes fell from above every time someone stepped.
“Mrs. Hazelton was certain the kids were here when she called.” The voice was nasally.
“Well, they aren’t. We’ve looked everywhere. The open window was a ruse, I’m sure, but we’ll have someone patrol the area to search for them.” Sounded like Mr. Thompson, the truant officer.
“Garage is closed up, all the bicycles accounted for. There’s an SUV in there, locked tight.” Third voice.
“No place for them to go. Hal’s checking the attic now. The boss is gonna be pissed.” Mr. Thompson.
“Oh, come on, it’s not our fault we barked up the wrong tree. Mrs. Hazelton just wasn’t a reliable witness. You know she drinks all day.” Nasally voice.
“Ok, but I still want an unmarked patrolling the neighborhood for the next 48 hours. Let’s call the other teams and see what they’ve come up with.”
“No kids in the attic.” This was a deep voice, coming from further up.
“What’s in the attic, Hal?”
“Usual magic paraphernalia. Trunks, costumes, assortment of wands. Christmas ornaments and a fake tree, an old mirror, lots of dust.”
“We’ll have to have someone come in and clean it out, then. Soon. I’ll radio the boss.” Thompson again.
“Let’s get out of here.” The dust continued to fall as more footsteps moved overhead, then the front door slammed.

Slowly, everyone exhaled. “We need to get to the attic,” Gran said.
“They aren’t real magic wands,” Ella said. “They were props for a play my dad was in when he was a teenager. He made them himself, so he’s really proud of them.”
“El, you do realize that coming from you, that doesn’t convince any one of us in this space?”
“What? Why? I just told you the truth.”
Aric stood up. “Right, then. Three of us go up and get the wands. But they’re gonna be people sized. So who’s got a good spell to make ‘em mouse-sized?”
“How do we get into the attic?” Dish asked. He was now standing and Ella could make out the flop of black hair between his ears. His eyes looked old for a mouse, and his paw was shaky. “Why couldn’t I just be a bat?”
It was decided, after a short debate, that Twerp, Aric, and Gran would go to the attic. Dish wasn’t feeling well and Billie wanted him to stay. No one even asked Ella if she’d like to go. Aric was certain they could find a path way through the house’s old ductwork, and surely there’d be a hole in the wall or floor of the attic when they got there. It was an old house, after all. Twerp had already proven he could do a shrinking spell – of sorts. Gran was the natural leader, the oldest, and the most stable.
Billie set about moving things to make the place somewhat homier. “I don’t know how long we’re going to be here, but I don’t want to feel like I’m living like a mouse, too.”

Dish slumped next to Ella. “So, I was going to tell you about why I was having a rough time. Well, me and Gran. Then Billie had the newspaper, and insisted you read that first. And Aric came, which screwed everything up.”
“No, Aric didn’t screw it up. Those men who broke into the house did.” Ella patted her friend’s paw. “Twerp was actually kind of a genius, you know. Not like Gran said, but a real genius. Mice. In the crawl space.” She gave a nervous laugh.
“No, Aric didn’t screw it up.” Dish sat still, looking old. “He even shrunk my glasses.”
“And his.” Ella giggled. “How did he do that? Every detail. This is a pretty vivid dream.”
“I wish.“ Dish sighed, then, “Bill, just come sit down with us. You’re making me nervous.”
“So, why were you and Gran having a rough morning?”
“Oh, the raids, you know. I was sleeping over at Gran’s. My dad was in a fit and I didn’t want to go home. You know how it is? Sometime, really early in the morning, there were these flashing lights out in the street. Woke me up, so I woke Gran up. They were raiding my house. So, me and Gran, we sneaked down the stairs and out his back door, and crawled under the fence to the Cooper’s yard. We watched it all come down from behind the garbage cans. They pushed my old man out, all handcuffed like a criminal. Shoved him into the squad car the way you’d stuff a cat into a cat carrier.”
Billie came over and sat down, placing a protective paw on Dish’s knee.
“Wow, Ella said. “Horrid.”
“It got worse. They turned their spots on Gran’s house. Whole bunch of them – all these dudes in white suits, with the police, came running over and surrounded the whole house. We were right there, other side of the fence. They banged on the door, and Gran’s mum answered. Threw her down on the grass and handcuffed her right there. She was yelling that they had no right and where were their search warrants and they were yelling at her to shut up and waving papers around, saying this was the edict, here was her search warrant, and then Toby came around the corner and…” he choked back a sob.
Ella waited while Dish collected himself, her paw squeezing his.
“They shot Toby,” he whispered. “Just a cat.” Dish began to cry softly. “My cat, not even Gran’s.” Dish leaned into Ella. “They shot my cat.”

Tomorrow: trip to the attic.

total word count: 3,691

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NaNoWriMo – Night #1

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged on November 1, 2017| 2 Comments »

Preface: I am starting this novel tonight, but since the idea was sparked by a writing exercise, I am including that bit as well. This could be a very long post as I’d like to get in 1700 words. I’ll post the word count total at the bottom every night. I will title the ensuing posts “The Magic Mice”, although I am not certain that will be the title of this “novel”. Feel free to leave constructive criticisms in the comments. I may not make immediate changes (in order to get to my 50,000 words), but I *will* consider every suggestion, grammar correction, and editorial comment.

Here goes (italic is from the original post):

She was a fool for it, of course. Magic was in everything she touched. Not believing in it was a rebellion on her part. She just didn’t want to be different, or set apart, from anyone at school. She could hide her parents, downplay magic, even disbelieve in it – her friends accepted her. Better: they didn’t believe in magic. Photoshop, yes. Magic: no.

Anything could be digitally reproduced. Anything could be digitally created. There was no god, no spiritual side of things, and certainly no magic. Everything had a logical explanation.

Except that there was Aric, her brother, two years younger, horizontal to the earth and three feet up from the floor, levitating. He was playing a video game and levitating. She walked by and pushed hard on his shoulder, sending him crashing to the hardwoods.

“Hey!!”

Ella ignored him. She opened the fridge, pulled out a carton of milk and poured it over a bowl of Lucky Charms. Weren’t her parents just quaint? She sat down and scooped a spoonful of wheaty health and sugary death. Crunch.

Aric appeared in the doorway. “That was rude, Ella.”

She shrugged. “It’s not normal to levitate.”

“Magic.” Aric sighed and retreated from the room, too old to be bothered with his sister’s odd logic.

She saw her friends coming up the long walkway and grabbed her bags, clicked on the security code, and uttered a dire warning: “Leaving now, Derp. better come with as I’m arming the alarm. School time, Boyfriend!”

Aric appeared at her right hand as she opened the door and smiled. “It’s still magic, dork.” He ran past her friends and down to the bus stop. Ella rolled her eyes before locking the house.

“Hey.” she said, smiling up at Dish, Gran, and Billie. “Bus stop or did someone drive a car?” She winked at Billie, who had just passed her driver’s ed test.

“Actually, Ella, none of the above. We really need to talk about your denial. You can’t keep this up.” Dish was the tall, lean, dark-eyed one. His face was usually pallid and his eyes looked sunken most of the time.

Gran had a more athletic presence: wiry, compact, and a member of the school’s track team. Tonight, he had an unshaven look about his face, and his eyes shifted from left to right. Billie held his hand in a death grip. “Look, Ella, we really need to just come in and crash. It’s full moon, you know. Gran and Dish are having a hard time right now. Can we just hang in your room upstairs?”

Ella blinked a couple of times, and then looked down toward the bus stop where Aric was waiting. “Sure, why not?” She locked the door behind her friends as the yellow bus stopped to pick up the junior high kids and Aric stepped inside.

“So – what is up. Exactly.”

“Ella, Sweetheart, we need to quit denying the pull of the full moon.” Gran wrapped his strong arm around her shoulder. “And you can’t fool your little brother. He’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“What??!!” Ella whirled before her bedroom door. Had everyone gone insane? They all looked at her with such utter innocence. Billie spoke first.

“I get that you deny magic, Ella, but you are denying the basic truth of yourself. And of your brother. And of your best friends. We haven’t said anything because it didn’t affect us until now. Now they are threatening to put practitioners in jail. Read the news. Your parents have been arrested.” Billie shoved a newspaper under Ella’s nose at the same time as the downstairs doorbell rang.

Everyone jumped, including Ella. Billie raised her hand. “I’ll check it out. It’s probably Aric.”

“Why would he ring the doorbell when he has a key?” Ella started toward the door. Billie stopped her.

“The paper. read it.”

Ella didn’t. She scanned the headlines, which were improbable and inflammatory.

MAGIC PRACTITIONERS HELD IN QUARANTINE

Use of Magic Deemed Illegal by State Governor

“What hogwash,” she muttered. Downstairs she heard Billie open the front door, and the excited jabbering of Aric. Billie was trying to keep their voices down, so Ella couldn’t hear what was being said, but she did hear the door lock click again and then the slap of tennis shoes as they ran up the stairs.A moment later, Billie and Aric rushed into the room, breathing hard. Oh, and Twerp. Great, Ella thought. Twerp.

Aric looked pale. “Did you hear the news, El? Mom, Dad, Deke’s parents…” Deke, or Deacon, was Twerp’s real name, a name Ella never used inside her head.

“You mean this?” She held the paper up.”

“Well… I didn’t see a newspaper, but it was on the bus radio.” Aric looked at Twerp, then at Gran, Dish, Billie and Ella. “El, it’s real. There was a squad car in front of the Hexton’s house and they were leading old Miss Sophy in handcuffs. That’s when Deke and I beat it off the school bus.”

Several thoughts collided in Ella’s mind at the same time. “Miss Sophy? Handcuffs? You got off the school bus? How? Noone tried to stop you?”

“Well, the bus driver did yell at us when we pushed open the back emergency door…”

“We ran through back yards…”

“I left my backpack on the bus with my keys…”

“Saw you guys go into the house to skip school when the bus stopped…”

“Yes, Miss Sophy! Can you believe it!?”

Billie raised her hands for quiet. She was the smallest of all of them, yet when she commanded a room, everyone listened. Her voice and presence were why she nailed nearly all of the starring roles in Drama. “HUSH. Everyone just SIT DOWN. Ella, you need to read the newspaper. Aric, Twerp – breathe in, breathe out. Gran, would you mind watching out the window? You should be able to see the street quite well from here.”

She waited while everyone did as they were told, except Ella, who couldn’t make the letters form into words, much less sentences, now. Snippets jumped out at her, but they were jumbled and confusing. Governor declared… magicians…wizards… witches… magic… illegal… arrested Dr. Pheonix Peabody… warrants for all… holding facilities… safety of our state… religious rights… protection

Dish was sitting on the edge of the bed, his soft voice speaking. Ella looked up and realized her eyes were full of tears. What was happening?

“So, in summary, we have to find a safe place and create a plan of action to rescue our families and friends. We’ll consider all ideas on the table, but before we start, Gran and I were up all night and we think we may have a plan.”

“I’m so confused,” Ella whimpered. “How is magic illegal? It’s … just… sleight – sli – hand. Science…”

Aric reached over and put his arm around her. “It’s OK, Dork. We’ll get them out.”

Billie leaned over and patted Ella’s knee. “You never pay attention, El. Always got your nose in a book or working the back code of a web program. We know. But you have to get a grip. We are ALL wizards and witches in this room. We possess magic, and it isn’t smoke and mirrors. You haven’t figured out your gift, but you will.”

Gran just shook his head. “El, just sit tight and listen to our plan. It’ll start making sense if you just cooperate. Dish’s parents have a cabin up off of Helmet Road. We just need to get there without attracting any attention to ourselves. It’s got food and water, a generator and gas.”

“It shouldn’t be that hard to get there,” Dish said. “It’s thirteen miles off of the highway. We can all walk that in a day.”

“We figure we can walk the seven miles out to the junction today, hunker down for the night at Crazy Sully’s, and then walk out to the cabin tomorrow morning.”

“Why walk?” Aric asked. “Can’t we just drive or something?” Everyone looked at Billie.

“Guys, my dad is – er, was – a police officer. I’m afraid to drive because they’ll run our plates or recognize me, and – besides – we’re supposed to be in school… We don’t want to attract attention.”

“Like a bunch of kids skipping school and walking down the side of the highway won’t attract attention?” Aric made a face and rolled his eyes. “I hate walking.”

“And we’ll get hungry,” Twerp added, pushing his wire-rimmed glasses up his nose. “What if it gets cold or rains?”

Billie rubbed her temple. “I can drive. We’d need Mrs. Parker’s son’s van. It should be parked in the alley today because he worked last night. We could leave it at Crazy Sully’s so they find it and return it to him, so he won’t be too sore at us.”

“Forensics. Science.” Ella looked around the room. “Fingerprints, guys. You can’t just take a car and park it and hope noone knows who took it. They’d have our footprints. Dogs could follow our scent. Shoot, they could track us from here, if we tried to walk our of town – unless it rains. But we can’t steal a car.”

“Well, what other ideas do you people have?” Dish glowered. His mop of dark hair fell across his forehead, making him look almost sinister. You want we should just hole up here and hope the truancy officer doesn’t come around – or the officers who arrested Miss Sophy don’t make it down this street sometime today? We can’t go to any of our houses if our parents have been arrested. There’s no practical way out of this, except to get to the cabin. Unless one of you knows how to make a carpet fly and we can stay off of anyone’s radar.” Dish had a way with sarcasm.

Gran was staring out the window again, his profile unreadable. Ella thought he was frowning, a look that marred his perfect profile. He was flexing his fists.

“I have an idea,” Twerp began.

Aric interrupted him. “What about bicycles? Couldn’t we all ride our bikes out Clausen Way, and then take the cut-off to Coventry? Isn’t there, like, a BMX track or something out there we could get lost on. Who’s going to see us?”

“That might actually work,” Billie nodded. “But we’d have to all get our bikes, which would mean risking going back home. AND we’d have to get to Clausen Way without being detected.”

“Well, Deke’s house backs almost up to Clausen Way, and he and I go out there all the time. Most of the time, noone even sees us going, unless his mom is watching. And we have four bikes here.”

“Guys, I have a better…” Twerp began again. This time, Gran interrupted with a low growl like a grizzly bear protecting its food cache.

Everyone looked at him. He was hunched and leaning back from the window. “They’re coming. Long white van, guys in white jackets. Two police cars.”

Downstairs, the doorbell rang.

1,847 words

 

 

 

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NaNoWriMo 2017

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged on October 30, 2017| 1 Comment »

National Novel Writing Month begins on the first of November. I have made a commitment to write my 50,000 words publicly, here on this blog. I am going to work off of this premise: Exercise #17. It will be a YA novel, and I hope it isn’t too dumb. I created an outline (loosely) of the story.

I do not like criticism, but I need you to be critical and offer grammatical suggestions (no, I don’t want you to edit it) and plot ideas as I go. Let me know what you like and don’t like. I’ll try to post my writings every night, or at least five to six times a week.

Want to be my writing pal on NaNoWriMo? My user name is jacidawn. You don’t have to join to critique my novel as I write this year: I am committing to making it public (EEP!).

I’ll start all of my November entries with NNWN so you will know it is an installment on my novel. Be harsh. Be real. Be honest. Be kind. I promise to listen (but I may not take all advice offered).

This will be FUN. For whom, I’m not certain, but I will try to take it as fun. I started this, after all. 🙂

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NaNoWriMo Procrastination

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged on November 9, 2009| 1 Comment »

I came home with a plan tonight. I was going to work on my blog and then work on my writing for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). I need 50,000 words by the end of November to qualify and it doesn’t even have to be good or published. Just written. 50,000 words is a lot of words and since I accidentally hit “NO” yesterday when asked to save something, I lost about 2500 words.

So I am behind a bit.

That was the plan.

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But this fell asleep on my lap.

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And this kept hijacking my possessions.

I’ll have to go looking for my calculator. Zephan thought he had a cell phone and took off with it pressed to his ear.

Now it is 8:30PM and all the people 25 and under have retired. Us old folks are kicking back with our hobbies.

And I am doing what all NaNoWriMo authors do best: I am procrastinating. And just in case you are wondering, I have taken the challenge before. One year I succeeded in capturing 50,000 words onto paper. It was the worst novel ever. I’ve fallen short a couple years in a row. But I’ll keep playing the game because sometime I will really complete the 50,000 word novel and it will actually be readable.

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He’ll probably be 25 when I do that.

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