500 Word Story (kinda)

Jingle

I don't really know how long we'd been there. I honestly wasn't paying much attention to the time, the friends I was with, or the people surrounding us. I was focusing on the animals. I loved seeing them but at the same time I felt sorry for them because they never seemed to have enough space. We'd just seen the leopards, cheetahs, and lions in "The Big Cat Country" when one of my friends speaks up.

"Let's go to Sea Lion Sound." She suggested. We'd all agreed and made our way across the vast St. Louis Zoo. On our way, we'd look at the plates telling what the animal was and some information about them. We'd pronounce them first how we believed they were correctly spoken and then we'd laugh as we purposely said the names wrong.

The normally crowded entrance to the tunnel, that led beneath the waters the beautiful animals were in, was unusually vacant. We'd finally walked the distance to where we were finally underneath the water.

When we'd entered, my friends and I saw a group of people surrounding a girl holding keys toward the glass of the tunnel. One California Sea Lion was swimming gracefully above the glass, fascinated by the keys. Whether it was the sound of them jingling as she moved them or the way the sun reflected off them that captured the graceful animal, no one was sure. As I watched the animal, a smile grew on my face. After what seemed like a few seconds later the girl and her friends left the tunnel, followed by many of the other people who'd been watching and the sea lion began to swim around, venturing out from the tunnel.

Almost in sync, each of my friends and I asked another if they had keys on them. Luckily, one of my good friends pulled a small set of keys out of her purse. Another friend took the keys from her grip and lifted them toward the glass, calling out for the sea lion from before.

"Hey buddy!" She called, lightly jingling the keys. As if out of nowhere, the beautiful sea creature appeared, once again fascinated by the keys. We all laughed in surprise and shock as the sea lion followed the keys as we'd slide them across the wooden ledge of the tunnel. Each of us pulled out our phones to record this magical, to us at least, moment. We would attempt to lead the animal above us and to the other side but each time the animal would resist.

We'd spent at least 30 minutes playing and having fun with the sea lion. Suddenly a booming voice sounded over the intercom telling everyone there that the zoo was soon closing. As we walked to the entrance we'd entered at the beginning of the day, we talked, rambled and babbled about the sea lion that changed the way we'd viewed the zoo and the animals inside it.

We'd even named him/her Jingle.