Stories by Makayla

The Popsicle Man

Based off of Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs.

There I stood. Disgusting, grey wind blowing my hair way out of place. It was pretty hard to walk through the wind going 60 miles an hour, let alone breathe. I could barely hear the person calling my name as the wind whistled through my ears. I looked around the best that I could through the dirty wind.

"Twister!" I heard someone shout nearby. I turned my head and saw the huge cloud twirling its way towards me. I ran to my family's bomb shelter faster than a leopard after its prey. My heart was beating so fast and my legs were beginning to cramp, but I kept running. I finally reached the bomb shelter and my parents quickly pulled me in.

    "Izzy!" My parents cried in relief. I could tell they've been worried sick about me. Their breath was heavy and my mom's face was tear stained. They embraced me into a warm hug, their breathing still fairly heavy.

    "I'm here, guys. I'm alive." I breathed on their shoulders. Growing up and living in Kansas, this was pretty much a weekly thing, but it didn't make it any less terrifying. We were never surprised when we got a tornado, though.

    Besides the fact that twisters are incredibly dangerous, I kind of enjoyed them. My parents always told me a new story when we were stuck in the old bomb shelter. Most of the time it was about our family history. Sometimes it was just a random story they made up themselves to entertain me for the time being.

My mom handed me a box full of pictures and told me to pick out my favorite ones. They looked as if they were hundreds of years old. They were black and white. There were two specific photos that caught my eye; ones that I felt the need to know more about.

When I finally picked a couple that I liked, I handed them to my mom and walked over to my sleeping bag laid out on the floor. I sat cross legged and folded my hands together waiting for her to tell me the stories. The silence was killing me while I waited for her to begin the story. It was the kind of silence that gave you goosebumps and made your ears feel like they were ringing.

The first picture mom held up was of a man trying to eat a huge popsicle all by himself. I thought it was pretty interesting. His mouth was wide open trying to eat the huge thing.

"This is actually your great grandfather," my mom said with laughter in her voice. "He was a pretty competitive guy, if I'm being honest. He was always competing in the silliest competitions. Most of the time it was to prove himself to other people."

I frowned a little bit because the way she said it made it seem like he had to do some cool stuff for people's approval, not because he was probably an amazing person.

"This was when he was at a party with one of his so-called 'friends'," she sighed. "They had told him he couldn't eat an entire popsicle by himself."

Before she could continue, I interrupted her. "How does that make them fake friends?"

"You didn't let me finish. They knew he wouldn't turn down their bet because of how competitive he is. Little did your great grandfather know they had put some kind of pill in the popsicle that could kill him." She didn't cry, but I could hear the hurt in her voice. "This picture was take. Minutes before he was rushed to the hospital."

I pictured him being on a stretcher and having a breathing mask on. The thought terrified me, knowing someone in my family had to die like that.

She put that picture down and picked the other one up. It was a beautiful young woman. She had jewelry covering almost every inch of her body. She had no makeup on, but still looked so stunning.