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350 for 50

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350 fo 50_2017Announcing the winners of our annual 350 for 50 writing contest!  This year, young writers were challenged to compose a short, 350-word story that included the sentence, “The numbers changed quickly.” Winners from our four age categories enjoyed a $50 shopping spree on Amazon. Congratulations to all!

Illustrations by Aliisa Lee

THE LOTTERY
by Sasha Greenfield, age 10, California

Amy chewed her bubblegum slowly. It was a hot South Carolina day and her visor stuck to her forehead. Her summer job at Joe’s Convenience Store was excruciatingly boring. The few times the door chimed the costumer who had opened it only wanted a soda or a lottery ticket.

Suddenly, Amy was pulled out of her dreamy state. The door chimed and a tall man walked through it. “Hello.” Said the Man. “May I purchase a lottery ticket?” He asked. “Sure.” Said Amy, further sedated with the dullness of the purchase . She scanned the ticket. “$2.99”. He handed her the money. The man walked out of the store; the door flapping closed behind him.

A few moments later the door chimed again. Then again. Soon the store was full of people, all wanting lottery tickets. Amy scanned and scanned. She looked at the screen of the cash register. The numbers changed quickly. A wide grin spread across her face. At this rate the amount she was going to be paid at the end of the week was enough to keep her out of work for the whole summer. She had really won the lottery.

KID IN A CANDY LAND
by Maddie Morris, age 11, Mississippi

Would you like to spend your summer vacation in a land comprised of candy? Where I come from, as soon as vacation starts, everything turns into sweets! Sugar flowers bloom, boulders become rock candy, and chocolate waterfalls flow. It’s a kid’s whimsical dream! I looked down hastily at my watch; time seemed to drag as the minutes counted down until summer. When the school bell finally rang, I practically flew like a bird down the front steps. This year, I want to do something extraordinary with my best friend, Maria.

I biked over to her house as quickly as I could manage. We had been pondering what adventure we should have this summer. I had an idea so earth shattering that I had to tell her immediately: we should build our own gingerbread treehouse. Maria and I decided on what additions we would make, and then we got right to work. What took the longest was baking the gingerbread. It took us a while to find an oven that big! Once that was completed, we built a Life Saver tire swing and an Airhead slide. When we finally finished, we gazed through the isomalt spyglass that permitted us to look down on the sugarscape of sweets below.

This was the best summer of my life! We had so many adventures, and I really felt free. At the end of summer, Maria and I devoured our candy treehouse. It took us some time, but we invited our friends and families to come help us with this impossible task. On the morning of the first day of school, Maria and I met at the spot where our treehouse once was before we ravenously finished it off. As we counted down the minutes til the end of summer, we remembered the fun times that we had. My favorites were climbing a tree made of peppermint bark and jumping a candy-floss rope. Suddenly, I glanced down. The numbers changed quickly! Five… four… three… two… one… and summer was over. We can’t wait until next summer, minus the stomachache.

REMEMBER THE PAST
by Rafael Ramos, age 14, New Jersey

Sitting at my desk, I typed vigorously. This ‘job’ I had was the worst, but I had to do it. I needed to. Typing a bunch of old stories on a computer was unsurprisingly boring when doing it for hours straight. News outlets stated that the world’s remaining governments ‘hired’ a ton of unemployed people because the rising sea levels stole homes, including mine, but in reality, it was enslavement. The previous generations neglected to look for solutions to their own problems and we paid the price. I’m not saying this generation of people is any better because my ‘employer’ decided we should leave for space. This is why I was typing.

From movie scripts to baking recipes, thousands of people with my job were creating an archive that would serve two purposes – they told us. One archive to send to the stars and another left on Earth for the unfortunate who are left behind. Oh yeah, only the elite would leave the place. World leaders, influential corporations, and some celebrities got to say “sayonara.” The rest of us were left here to suffer mother nature’s retribution. Talk about fairness.

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. My sector’s lunch break started. My coworkers and I in our white jumpsuits all stood up almost simultaneously and headed to the cafeteria. We walked down a wide hallway with a counter above. It tracked every person who passed through it so we were accounted for like products, going up one per person. The numbers changed quickly. Armed guards and cameras watched our movements so nobody ever picked a fight. I sat isolated from others, the way I liked it, and ate. After lunch was over and I had to head back to my sector, I felt a hand on my shoulder while getting up. Before I could turn to see, a voice said, “I remember who you were in the past. I got a plan to leave this prison and I’ll need you.” I then whipped around only to see another white jumpsuit disappear into the crowd.

WHAT HAD ONCE BEEN PERFECT
by Karen Yang, age 16, New Jersey

What did you expect? It was never going to be perfect. You took a look at the machine and sighed. You had spent eons coding, working on this hunk of slow-moving computer, tweaking the controls until you could indicate a year and the computer would broadcast a memory about your family, your friends. Likewise, thanks to your efforts, the computer should’ve been able to show the lives of the people you had left behind.

But now, it was all for nothing. The machine would need years to recover from the pile of scorching red nuclear ramen noodles you had accidentally spilled. Though it was useless, you had wiped the oily noodles away, revealing a red film of fat where the computer glowed with the present year, 2081.

You started groaning but stopped when the computer began buzzing again, awakening from its hours long hibernation.The numbers changed quickly. 1994, 2004, 1990. Memories flashed on the screen; dances at Long Beach Island, Mom and Dad cutting a slice of peach pie as a baby (you!) watched on. You glowed as the computer continued to hum. Perhaps, in a miracle of all miracles, it had worked! You inched closer to the screen, eager to remember Maisy’s squishy pug face, to taste the texture of pistachio ice cream, to hear the song your friends sang in the underground library, to honor what was now gone.

You grimaced at the next number: 2021. The year you had left this all behind, this life that had once been perfect. The computer, as if understanding that your life had ended this year, decided to crash as well. It shut off, accompanied by your loud wail.

It was all futile then. There would be no speculating, no looking to see whether Mom and Dad were still well, still eating fruit pies in their salmon colored beach house. There would be no spying on Maisy, watching for her antics in the dog park. There would be no more memories, no more cathartic songs and orange juice the next morning. There would be no more guessing, no more you.

350 for 50

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350 fo 50_2017It is with great pleasure that I announce the winners of our annual 350 for 50 writing contest! Each writer was challenged to compose a short, 350-word story that included the sentence, “The surface began to move.” Winners from each of our 3 age categories enjoyed a $50 shopping spree at Labyrinth, our local bookstore. Congratulations to this year’s talented authors!

IMPACT
By James Bertrand, age 10

Impact artwork by Aliisa LeeI checked the clock. 11:59. One more minute until I turned eleven. Beep. I sat up, bumping my head on the concrete wall above me. Groaning, I gingerly touched my forehead with my hand. Ouch, I thought. Dragging myself out of my bed, I thumped through the hallway and down the stairs. I didn’t think about the fact it was the middle of the night. I just crept through the ghostly rooms, silent. That silence was broken by an eerie creak when I stepped on a broken floorboard.

The pure blankness of everything was pretty creepy. I could see dust particles float and twirl in the slightly chilly air. I peered at the living room table. Then the surface began to move, pieces sliding and grinding away from each other. Then I remembered. Today was the meteor shower, right on my birthday. Traversing through the hall I found my presents. I was really tempted to open them right then and there, but I didn’t.

I stepped into the kitchen to find my phone lying on the counter, buzzing. I walked over to the island and I turned it on. I had tons of texts from my friends about my birthday and the comets. Then my phone beeped again. It was happening now! Climbing out the front door, I wondered how amazing this would actually be. As my feet touched down on the wet, soft grass, I heard sirens. Nothing unusual, I thought.

People were screaming and crying, sirens were blaring and my heartbeat sounded so loud, I thought people in China could hear it. I didn’t understand what everyone was so scared about until I glanced at the sky. Sure enough, there were meteors. A large white rock was hurtling across the sky, growing larger each second as it got closer to the ground. I didn’t have time to think when someone yelled “Brace for impact!” I dropped to the pavement and curled into a tight ball as bright light and the smell of smoke enveloped me.

Taken Literally artwork by Aliisa LeeTAKEN LITERALLY
By Jieruei Chang, age 12

Don’t fly into a rage, my father always said. I never knew he
meant it literally, until now. This is the story he told me.
One day, my father tripped over a rock.
“THAT ROCK!” He yelled, kicking it over and over.
At that instant, there was a blinding flash of light. The surface
began to move. He was lifted off the ground by an invisible pair
of wings, flew through the air and landed headfirst on a
deserted island.
“That rock,” he muttered.
As he brushed himself off, he noticed a sign that said,
“Welcome to Arage, where what you say is reality.”
As he looked around, a pack of hikers flew through the air and
landed in quick succession on top of him, still arguing when
they found themselves in a much hotter climate.
“How do we get out of here?”
“The only way is to swim.”
“Yeah, right,” another hiker responded with a sarcastic tone.
“As easy as falling off a log.”
The hiker fell off a log that had somehow appeared.
“Ow!” he said. “How’d it get here? I think I have a concussion now.”
“Quit that! There’s an elephant in the room! We have to get off
of this place called Arage!”
All of a sudden, they were in a room. An elephant appeared,
smashing through the door and waving its trunk in the air.
At that moment my father understood. “Whatever we say
actually happens.”
“So that means…”
“When the cat’s away the mice will play.”
Playful mice appeared. The elephant’s eyes nervously swept
side to side for a few moments before it crashed out the door,
making another hole in the process.
“Now that’s proof. I think I know what to do. We’re all in the
same boat on this, right?”
A boat appeared and they all were thrown onto it. “Well, let’s get out of here!”
And so they rowed through the night (and a knight for good measure) back to shore.
So hold your temper, or you really might fly into Arage – but at
least now you know what to do.

I CAN’T CONCENTRATE
By Abigail Reytblat, age 14

I Can't Concentrate artwork by Aliisa Lee“The surface began to move,” she says, and then stops reading.
“What?” she asks.
She’s annoyed. I can tell because of the way her eyebrow twitches, for just a moment, before she speaks.
“Nothing. I just coughed.”
She looks at me, for one, two, three moments, and then raises the textbook to her eyes again. “ The surface-”
“But,” I interrupt, “That sentence seems very cliche. I mean, it’s not descriptive at all. It’s redundant, actually. It’s already told us before what happens during an earthquake.”
She glares at me. She knows this game. It’s a dance I play, one that she hates. “Tam, it’s a history textbook. About an earthquake from 1906. No one cares if it’s well-written. All you have to do is read it.”
“I care. I think many other people would care about it more, too, if it was well-written.”
“Tam!”
I grin. She touches her glasses, compulsively, pushing them farther up on the bridge of her nose, so that for a moment her eyes are covered. “Fine. Do you want to read?”
“No, no. No, you keep on going. I’ll be quiet, I promise.”
“No, you won’t”
“No, I won’t be.”
“Tammie, this project is due tomorrow.”
I’m just saying that, perhaps, the author should have chosen her words more carefully.”
“No. Focus.”
“Focusing, Samantha, focusing.”
There is silence as she flips the pages, trying to find the right one. “The San Andreas Fault- what? ”
“Hmm? Nothing, nothing. Nothing at all.”
She starts the sentence over again “The San Andreas-” and now she’s the one who laughs. “Is it going to be like this all day?”
“Yup, pretty much. We should take a break.”
Her mattress creaks as she rises. “I’ll be back. Just getting some water. You want to come?”
“No,” I say, watching her. “No, I think I’ll stay here.”
In a moment, the sound of her footsteps have faded from the hall. I pick up the fallen textbook, running my hand over the tattered book jacket absentmindedly, before opening it- “The surface began to move.”
I’ve finished reading by the time she returns.

Artwork by Aliisa Lee