Writer’s Club Term 2 Year 3 story: magical realism
By Adele S
The snow began to fall. Crisp, clean and cold, the snowflakes danced like ballerinas, glinting in the watery afternoon light. In the bleak streets, people pulled their coats tighter, wrapped scarves around their necks and slipped in the icy sleet that was building in the streets. Winter had set in for real now everyone was prepared, least of all Christie. From her tennis court sized balcony, she watched the first snowflakes fall, one by one. Almost bored, she fished out a remote. Clicking it absentmindedly, she lounged back in her chair as if it was a throne as a retractable roof expanded over her head and fans blasted warm air into the cool evening. The sun began to drop in the sky and the temperature suddenly plummeted. She pulled on her designer fur coat and watched the last people disappear from sight. Christie sighed and marched down the marble stairs of her grand mansion, annoyed but unsurprised to find that her parents weren’t at the dinner table. She pulled some cold leftovers from within the fridge and ate alone,surrounded by everything she could ever want, but hollow inside.
She woke up early in the morning, deliberately. Maybe her parents would be free if she called. She dialled the number and waited. And waited. Nothing. She held the receiver up to her mouth and left a message.
“Hi mum, hi dad, I just wanted to say…I love you.” She put down the receiver, her heart as cold and empty as a stone.
The school corridor was buzzing when Christie entered, feeling subconscious. She tried to keep her head high, a good way to hide her lack of height. Fingering her spun gold locks of hair, she looked around, trying to find someone to pick on. Her eyes landed on a small girl struggling to padlock her locker door. Bingo, this was her specialty. She strutted over, trying to radiate power. The small girl looked up at her, rosy faced and smiled.
“Can I help you?” she asked politely.
“Ha! ‘Can I help you?’” Christie mocked, sticking out her tongue. “Get out of my way.”
Pushing her aside, Christie swiftly wrenched the lock of the door and pulled it open, sneering at the contents.
“Do you call this a plant? It’s more like a twig!” Christie jeered, pouncing on an ornate succulent sitting in a corner. But this wasn’t her final act. She swept the contents of the locker aside, ruining the perfectly colour coded books, making sheets of paper fly everywhere. Without missing a beat, she rifled through the unordered heap until she found what she was looking for; a sweetWithout a second glance, she tore it open and read it to the rapidly growing crowd.
“Dear Mum,
Happy Birthday! Thank you for being the light of my life and thanks for being the best Mum ever! I love you.
Lots of love,
Julia. xxxooo”
The girl burst into tears and sank to her knees. A cruel smile grew across Christie’s face. She slowly walked up to the still sobbing girl and right in front of her face, tore the letter into tiny strips and let them flutter to the floor. The bell sounded and the crowd dispersed. Christie strutted away, slamming the locker door with a bang, trying to ignore the way her conscience was pricking painfully.
On her balcony, her breath turning to fog, Christie watched as posh business people streamed out of their dull grey buildings and bustled on the streets. As the last people returned to their homes and Christie was about to go back inside, a strange man caught her eye. He was dressed in a smart black suit, complete with a top hat and mahogany walking stick, though he is not old. Looking behind him as if checking that no one was watching, he briskly strode down a complex backstreet, kicking stray bricks away and dodging overflowing rubbish bins. About half way down however, he abruptly stopped. Bending down low, he ran his fingers over something in the ground. Even though she was squinting hard, night had beaten her and it was way too dark to see a thing from her balcony, six storeys up. But as she started walking inside, the burning question still nagged her; what had that shifty man been up to? There was nothing for it. She had to investigate.
Christie knew her neighbourhood like the back of her hand, but even she didn’t know this part of town well. She assumed it was a poor district, full of lower class people that ought to be sneered at. And by the narrow beam of her torch that made the shadows on the walls loom above her. As she walked farther and farther along, she became increasingly aware of how narrow this alleyway was. She hunched her shoulders, trying to avoid the chewed up bit of bubblegum plastered to the walls in the remaining space that all of the graffiti didn’t take up. Finally as she was about to turn back, her shoe hit something hard and round. She shone her torch towards the ground and saw a small manhole set into the ground. The top was rusty and plain as if it had not been used in many years. The only decoration was a small brass handle that was well oiled; quite a contrast to the rest of the top. In fact, as she looked closer, the sides were also lubricated and when she tugged on the handle, although it ground and screeched against the cracking pavement, it was quite easy to move. As she was about to move it back into place, a gruff voice shouted from the end of the alleyway.
“Whatsthat noise Benny?” the voice asked.
“Dunno Mitchy. Maybe a wimp we could pick on?” a new voice answered from the other side of the alleyway. Christie’s heart beat so loudly she was sure they were going to hear. Blood rushed in her ears and her forehead became clammy. She switched off the light of her torch and heard footsteps coming closer by the second. She was surrounded. There was only one option. She ran forward and jumped into the manhole, falling down, down, down.
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