Shoey Shoemaker And The Bouncy Castle Of Doom

Chapter One

In my perspective

Hi! I'm 6th grader Shoey Shoemaker, and I absolutely love shoes. At age 6, I invented my own flexible shoes so that I would never go through the sorrow of taking my shoes off. Some people say I was born with shoes already on. I attend Cheese Middle School in Sandwich, New Hampshire, along with my 2 best friends, Mickey Mouse, and Donald Duck (not the fictional characters...people in Sandwich usually name their kids based off of things, or just make it funny, like mine, not realizing how the kid could get made fun of throughout his life, especially middle school). Mickey is very friendly, and has a heart for little kids. Donald has quite a temper, and can be mischievous, but he's not so bad once you get to know him. We have lots of fun together. In fact, later we were planning on going to a bouncy house!

I was walking to the school courtyard to meet up with Mickey and Donald, just like normal. The courtyard is this beautiful place on the other side of the school parking lot, where beautiful flowers surround lush green grass-so green that it looks artificial-but we've been told that it's real. A little bit in from the flowers, six Japanese maple trees circle around four wooden benches. These benches are displayed like a rectangle with one facing in each direction. Then, a pine tree, equidistant from all the benches, lays right in the center. There's also a sidewalk that goes around the whole thing, with a path to each bench. Each bench has a wooden box with a glass window, on top of a pole. Every box has a few books in it and a note taking pad that people can look through throughout the years.

Our tradition is, whoever gets there first sits on the North facing bench, and waits for the other two. I don't know what will happen to that tradition, because our school bully, Jack Jackson, must have figured it out, which is surprising because looking back on his academic record, you can see that he's not the brightest bulb: he's an 8th grader, but he was held back a grade in 6th and one in 7th, so he's supposed to be in 10th grade. I was just walking around, minding my own business, but when I turned the corner down the path, I walked 7 steps, and looked up, and saw Jack, sitting right there on the bench. His glare is so intimidating, plus he's one and a half feet taller than me and probably 120 pounds heavier. My first instinct: run. I really wanted to, but I thought that I should wait until he said something, and if he did anything objectionable, I should stick up for my friends, and our tradition. That was the mistake...

Here was my plan: I would just keep walking down the path to the North side bench. If Jack didn't say anything, I would just sit on the East side bench. I thought it must be my lucky day, because he looked at me and didn't move. Just then, though, when I walked a tad bit closer, he suddenly stood up, pointed, pounded his fist and palm together, and said in a booming voice, "This is my seat from now on, got it! You and your friends can just forget any ideas you guys might have! And if you try to move to any other benches, I'll just take those up too! YOU HEAR ME?"

That's when I did something really stupid... I said, "Yes, I do. But it's unfair to take up all the benches. I know we were kind of taking this bench up as ours, but at least there were other benches for other people to sit on! I don't even care if you're sitting on any of the benches including ours! We'd just go to a random bench every day! But now you're saying we can't sit on any."

Then I got even madder as I was talking through it and I turned from Mr. nice guy to something else, I don't know what. It's a side of me I've never seen before. I said, "You can't go around making rules, just because you're big and strong! You have to think about other people too!"

That's when I just shut my big mouth, because I realized who I was speaking to, and the guinea pig in me kicked in. I didn't think about anything anymore. I ran. I heard shouting, something like "I'm gonna get you Shoemaker, you just wait and see!" I think that meant I was safe for the moment, just not for the day. Remind me that whenever I get free time next, I need to install a shield and super speed on my shoes.

My friends were nowhere in sight, but that didn't matter... I was petrified. I saw my crush Rose Grace Johnson. She was beautiful, freckles, long blonde hair, and still perfectly tanned from last summer. I had no idea she even knew I existed. To her, I thought I was just a weird nerd far off into the distance. I didn't know what to do as she was getting closer, so I just stood like a statue, and tried not to pay attention that much. Then she actually spoke to me! With a voice pure as a crystal she said, "Nice job standing up to that bully, until you, you know, ran off." I didn't want to say something wrong, but I couldn't just stand speechless or I would look like a complete fool too. I somehow uttered the words, "Um, thanks." Then she said, "That's all I wanted to say. Bye." And she was off.

Wow. That was one of the most awkward conversations in my life. I finally got to talk to her and I said, "Um, thanks."!?!?!? I know in all those movies that all the people have trouble with that, but I never thought it was actually real.

I finally saw my friends in the distance. I was thinking that this day could only get better, but I have gotta stop saying that, even in my mind...