I had met our neighbors, Randy and Britt, who were close to my age and a lot of fun. One night, when it was time to go in due to our curfew, I stayed out talking to my friends after Rose went in the house. When I finally went in, I quietly crept upstairs without turning on any lights. My sister had anticipated my every move and had piled chairs in the entry to our room. Of course, I came crashing into them and had to bite my lip to keep from yelling when I smacked my knees!
My surprise and anger turned into a plan to do a payback the next night. So at bedtime, I turned off the lights when my sister went to brush her teeth and took out a hidden bottle of airplane glue, which I poured onto the middle of her pillow. I had a vision of her waking up with the pillow all stuck to her head. But my plan was destroyed when she came in and smelled the glue.
“What is on my pillow?” she asked with wide eyes as she turned on the light.
“I don’t know,” I said innocently. Then I started to laugh so hard that I couldn’t breathe.
“Mel Ann, you are so stupid!” she said with controlled anger in her voice. “So now if you don’t want me to tell Mom and Dad that you ruined my pillowcase, you’ll go make me a sandwich.”
“Fine,” I answered with resignation. I didn’t feel like getting grounded, so I quietly went downstairs to the kitchen without waking my parents. But once I got there, more thoughts of revenge got the better of me, and I mischievously added hot sauce to Rose’s sandwich. Rose got a hot mouthful in the first bite, so she yelled, “That’s it! Now I’m telling on you!”
“No, no!” I begged her.
“Okay, then you eat it!” she demanded. So, I took a bite and instantly my mouth was on fire! I quickly and quietly went through the upstairs hallway to the bathroom for a glass of water.
When I returned, Rose said, “Okay, if you eat one more bite, we’re even.”
“All right, give it here,” I said with a growing frustration about the mess I had created.
But this time when I took a bite, I gagged! I ran out of the room and back to the bathroom. Rose had put cold cream in the sandwich! That was it. I hit her really hard with a pillow and started chasing her around the room trying to whack her again. Finally, our yelling woke up our parents, who were not pleased about being awakened from a sound sleep late at night by ridiculous stunts— especially the night before the first day of school. We tried to explain, but in the end, my mom just sternly said, “I don’t think this is funny. Now go to bed! And . . . you’re both grounded!”
As she walked out of the room, Rose mumbled, “This is your fault! You got us grounded!”
“My fault? You started it with those stupid chairs!” I replied with anger.
Finally I went to bed and knew I’d think of an even better payback the next day. But little did I know what startling surprise the next morning would bring me. When I woke up, I went to the bathroom. As I walked by the mirror, I suddenly stopped to stare at my reflection. My sister had taken a black marker and drawn a long mustache on me that curled up onto my cheeks.
“Mom!” I yelled and ran to show my mother.
But my tired and grumpy mother was in no mood for more pranks. So, she simply grounded my sister (again) and told me to “go to school.” I was horrified! I scrubbed my face until only a little marker still showed, but then the hard rubbing made raised, red welts in place of the marker! I showed up at school looking totally ridiculous and realizing that paybacks never end; they only escalate into bigger messes.
Even if you think you’ve pulled off the greatest joke on someone, like your sister being glued to her pillow, you’ve only invited trouble to find you next—like a big, black mustache.
Mel Ann Coley
I Wish You Were Dead!
There is no man, however wise, who has not at some period of his youth said things, or lived in a way the consciousness of which is so unpleasant to him in later life that he would gladly, if he could, expunge it from his memory.
Marcel Proust
Even my locked bedroom door couldn’t keep out the aroma of my mother’s homemade spaghetti sauce. As I flipped through the pages of Teen, checking out the latest fashion trends, the celebrity scoop and my horoscope, my mouth began to water.
Just then, I heard my doorknob turn, and then a soft knock.
“Shannon, honey, can I come in?”
My mom hated it when I locked my door. What she didn’t understand was that if I didn’t, Brian would barge in and destroy my room. Ever since my brother grew armpit hair, he had turned into the biggest jerk in the world. He was either ignoring me or annoying me.
His latest torture was to walk into my room while I was in the middle of talking on the phone or writing in my journal. He wouldn’t leave the first time I asked. Instead, he’d lie on the bed and tease me about whoever I was going out with at the time.
Then he would proceed to toss my stuffed animals around the room and move around my knick-knacks until I was screaming for him to leave. Last week, he got me so mad that I yelled after him, “I wish you were dead!”
Mom usually sided with him even though I was the youngest and I was used to getting my way. She was probably at my door right then to tell me that I needed to help him set the table or something lame like that.
Instead, she walked in and told me something that would change my life forever. Her eyes were swollen, and she covered her face. I told her to sit down, and I put my arm around her shoulder—not knowing what else to do.
“Mom, you’re freaking me out. What is it?”
“Shannon, you know how your brother has been having joint pain and how we’ve been going to the doctor a lot lately?”
“Yeah, so?” I was really worried now. All along, I had thought his legs and arms were just worn out from tennis tryouts or that he was having another growth spurt.
“Shannon, your brother is sick. He has leukemia.”
“What is that? Is that like a kind of cancer or something?” I scooted away from her and stood up to walk around in my room, which suddenly felt a lot smaller at that moment.
“Yes, honey, it is. Don’t worry, though. Brian has the good kind.”
“The good kind?” I stared at her in disbelief. “There is no good kind.” All I had ever known about cancer was that when you get it, you lose your hair and die.
“Shannon, please sit down. I know you’re upset. I’m upset too. The only people I’ve ever known with leukemia were two boys that I grew up with in Ohio who died from it. But treatments have changed so much. He’s going to make it. I promise.”
As we held each other, my mom’s tears drenched my cheek and collar, and I could hear her muffled sobs. When she stood up, wiped her face and took a deep breath, I couldn’t tell whether five or thirty minutes had passed. She flashed me a weak smile, told me that dinner would soon be ready and headed back downstairs.
I collapsed onto my bed, feeling paralyzed. I remembered the awful thing I had said to him, “I wish you were dead!” Was this my fault? Had I actually played a hand in my brother’s getting sick? At that moment, I would have given anything to be able to take back those words that I had so passionately screamed at him. Then all kinds of images began to swirl around in my head like the flakes in a shaken snow globe.
There was Brian in his magician’s cape finishing a trick with me, his “assistant,” at his side. There was Brian interviewing me, in his most serious voice, for our taped news broadcast. There was Brian, laughing and smiling his big, buck-toothed grin as we watched Saturday Night Live together. There was Brian holding my hand, as we got off the plane to go visit our father in Texas.
In an instant, I knew exactly what I needed to do. I knew how bad I felt, so I couldn’t imagine how bad Brian was feeling. I cleaned up my face so it didn’t look as though I’d been crying. I grabbed a piece of poster board and my markers and headed downstairs.
When I entered the living room, he was sitting on the couch watching television. I placed all of my materials on the floor and began workin
g on a science project that was due that week.
“Brian?”
“Yeah?”
“Can you help me with this stupid thing? I can’t draw an elephant, and I have to have an elephant on it to get a good grade.”
“I’ll try.”
As we sat on the living room floor, drawing and coloring without saying a word, I knew that something had changed—something big. While he was concentrating on the elephant’s outline, I watched him.
All those fights. All those cross words. All those times he made me mad. All the times he got to do something that I didn’t get to do. They just didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered was being next to him, right then, in that moment.
Shannon Griffin
[EDITORS’ NOTE: Brian fully recovered and to this day is cancer free. To help them both through the tough times, Brian and Shannon relied upon the support of an organization that sends kids with cancer to camp: Happy Days and Special Times, “The Loving Answer for Children with Cancer.” If you, or a sibling, are dealing with cancer, try going to www.cancersourcekids.com for information about camps to attend.]
A Life’s Moment
Consider, when you are enraged at anyone, what you would probably think if he should die during the dispute.
William Shenstone
One cold morning, I was getting ready for school. Our mom would be late if she didn’t leave for work soon and she and my sister, Kameron, were fighting over something that had happened the night before. Mom left for work in a bad mood because of the fight they had, and my sister was really upset about what had just taken place. She came upstairs and told my brother, Shawn, and me to get our coats because it was time to leave.
Shawn and I hurried and got in Kam’s car so we wouldn’t be late for school. I asked my sister, “Are you okay? What happened between you and Mom this morning?” My sister looked at me with the glare that I often get from her when she is frustrated about something, and said, “I don’t want to talk about it. We just have a disagreement over something and it’s just confusing to me right now.”
I looked at Shawn and he looked at me, and I could tell from the look that Shawn gave me that he was trying to tell me, “Don’t ask about it—just keep quiet.” Kam backed out of the driveway and we headed up the street. We were going pretty slowly, and Kam was watching out for other cars. Then she started to talk to me about what had happened with her and Mom.
“We had a fight, and it’s nothing bad; but we both just really believe strongly in our own opinions. I really hate that, because we get into fights a lot because of it.” As my sister was talking to me we had gotten to the end of our street.
Then, all of a sudden, a car that was coming from the opposite direction, going 90 miles an hour, rammed into ours. Our car spun out of control and hit the opposite curb. Kam and I were screaming. After our car finally stopped, we all got out of the car to look at the damage. I kept asking myself, Is this real? Did this just really happen?
My sister was in tears because she had just been in a car accident a month before and had to have back surgery. She called 911, and then she called our mom. Everything was a mess. It turns out that the guy who hit us was only eighteen and he had been racing some of his friends. Kam’s car was in really bad shape, and she was in a lot of pain.
My sister talked on the phone to our mom for a long time, crying and telling her that she was sorry, that we could have all been killed and she wouldn’t have been able to say good-bye. Kam could have died in that accident and it would have been so sad because she and our mom had fought right before it happened.
I could have lost Kam that day, and now I tell my family every day that I love them all. It just goes to show you that you never know when you could be gone. You need to appreciate the time you have with your loved ones. Life isn’t promised to anyone, and it could be here one minute and gone the next.
Jordan Mitchell, thirteen
The Great Fish Story
Great things are only possible with outrageous requests.
Thea Alexander
One summer afternoon, my grandpa and I were out in his boat fishing, when I ran out of line on my fishing pole. Grandpa felt sorry for me, so he handed me his best, luckiest fishing pole to use.
On my second cast, the pole slipped out of my hands and went flying into the lake. I tried to grab it before it sank into the dark water, but I was too late. I jumped into the water after it, but it went down, down, down.
I climbed back into the boat feeling totally defeated. Then Grandpa came up with a plan to try to snag the line with our other two poles, by casting them down to grab the sunken line with one of the hooks. We tried about five times, but we had no luck. I felt so bad. It was Grandpa’s favorite pole, and now it was lost forever.
Grandpa, not willing to give up yet, said, “Okay, Max, this will be our last time.” Just then, my grandma, who had died two months earlier, popped into my mind. I thought, Maybe Grandma can help. So I prayed, Grandma, please help Grandpa and me find his fishing pole, over and over while I watched Grandpa hook his special silver lure onto the line.
When he was done fixing the lure into place, he threw it into the lake and dragged it around on the bottom. I kept praying to Grandma as I watched the line circle around the lake. When Grandpa reeled the line in, he had caught the sunken line in the middle! He pulled and pulled on one end of the line and then, out of the depths of the lake came his favorite fishing pole! I couldn’t believe it! As he pulled, he noticed a tug and a strain on the line. It took some strength to bring it in. Suddenly, we heard a splash and there, on the end of the line was a beautiful fourteen-inch bass!
Grandpa and I laughed our heads off, while I thanked Grandma over and over in my head. I decided to tell Grandpa how I had been praying to Grandma as he searched for the pole. “Yep,” he said, “I bet she did do this for us. That would be just like her.”
When we told people what had happened, they said that it was “the fish story of all fish stories.”
Two weeks after that incredible fishing trip, my grandpa died. I lost my amazing and wonderful grandma and grandpa within three months. It was so hard for my family to give them up.
Now I often ask both of them to help me with lots of different things. And you know what? After that amazing moment out on the lake, I know that they haven’t really left me, and they definitely hear me.
Max Alexander, ten
Pap Pap’s Hands
I remember how he used to pick me up
With his strong and gentle hands,
Hold me tight and cuddle me.
He was a person who fought for our country,
A father who loved his kids, the best husband a guy
could be.
He was my savior, hero, a grandpa who meant
everything to me.
As I sit here writing this, I hold tears inside.
I miss the man with strong hands to comfort me,
And tell me that everything was going to be okay.
Samantha Slaughter, twelve
I took his hands. They were old, worn out and shaky, but I held them anyway. He took a deep breath and sang “Down by the Old Mill Stream” to me. His voice was shaky, but to me, it was beautiful. I was amazed. After Mom had gone up to Pap Pap and hugged him, all of the grown-ups went into different rooms.
Later that day, I was lying on my bed at my Nana’s house. As I was remembering Pap Pap’s hands, I realized that his hands actually were not old or worn out, they were experienced. Experienced with love.
He had given love out to anyone who knew him. Especially his family. Oh, how much he loved his family. All of his children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, any part of the family. His hands were shaky, though, because he was in pain. He had been suffering from many things over the years. I didn’t care if his hands were shaky, as long as he loved me.
I thought he would be all right. Every time I visited my great-grandparents over that vacation, I held his hands, gave him a h
ug and said, “I love you.” He got worse when I had hoped he’d be fine. He went into the hospital. I so badly wanted him to live.
But then I realized he was in too much pain. I know there are only two ways out of his misery: a miracle that will make all his pain go away . . . or he will go to heaven.
I know that he will have to go to heaven sometime. Maybe next week or next year. It is just hard to let someone go . . . a person who, while he held my hands, went through my soul and into my heart.
I hope Pap Pap knows I love him, because I really do. I know he loves me. I know God will do what’s best for him.
Nicole Koah, eleven
Just the Two of Us
How rare and wonderful is that flash of a moment when we realize we have discovered a friend.
William E. Rothschild
Sometime, in your lifetime, you may be lucky enough to come across a person who knows exactly how you feel and is always there for you. Someone who loves you for who you are and doesn’t judge you. Someone who believes in you and urges you to listen to your heart, no matter what anyone else thinks. This person helps you through your hardest days and assures you that tomorrow is always another day, a fresh beginning.
I didn’t have anyone like this, until a stranger moved into my house, and became my sister.
When I was seven years old, my mom died, and my life changed forever. My dad became a widower and our family was left without a mother. Then, about two years ago, when I was twelve, my father remarried. My stepmother, Shelly, moved from New York to our small house in Missouri. She also brought along her daughter, an energetic and lively eleven-year-old named Ariele. With her beautiful blue eyes and winning smile, Ariele was always the center of attention. I never thought that I could bring myself to love her as a sister, because we didn’t know each other at all.