Switching the Setting

Samantha's House

Samantha's house was a beautiful place to live in. It was three stories, had a big pool on the side of the house, had a very large front and back yard and consisted of at least 4 rooms on each floor. As you can probably tell, Samantha's house was like a mansion.

I enjoyed being at Samantha's house. I came at least twice a week. When I was over, we liked to swim and compare the things we collected at our barnyards. This time, we were comparing eggs.

While I was in the chicken coop this morning, I reached underneath Glory, my favorite chicken. Her egg was perfect! I decided not to use it for breakfast that day and bring it to Samantha's house to be investigated.

I rang the doorbell on the huge house and waited for a response from Samantha's mother to come in. the jingle that the doorbell made was my favorite of all doorbell rings. There was a high pitched 'ding' and then 3 lower 'dongs', then a low 'dong', and then the high pitched 'ding' came one more time.

Today Samantha personally came to the door. She was wearing a beautiful blue gown, probably one her mother had made.

"Hi Samantha. What's the occasion?"

"What do you mean?" she wondered with a confused look on her perfect face.

"Well, you came to the door instead of your mom calling for me to come in, and you're wearing,"

I gestured to her dress with both hands, " that!"

"Don't you like it? I picked out the fabric and everything," she said twirling the satin part of the gown.

"I asked you a question first Sam."

"Oh right, sorry. We're going to a party later tonight. I probably shouldn't be wearing it right now, Mother could get mad at me. She was just finishing the fittings and the sash around my waist." She twisted her finger around a blue satin sash surrounding her torso.

I always found it peculiar that my best friend called her mom mother, and even with her Tennessee accent. I always thought all the girls in the country would call their moms 'Ma' or just 'Mom'.

Samantha grabbed my arm and beckoned me up the stairs.

"I'm coming! I'm coming!" I exclaimed as she continued to pull.

I entered her room until she pushed me out so she could change into one of her daily outfits.

The hallway to Samantha's room was filled with portraits of herself and the Smith family. There was a photo in a beautiful, gold trimmed, picture frame of Mr. and Mrs. Smith on their wedding day. Mrs. Smith was holding a lovely bouquet of white roses, while Mr. Smith held one hand under her knees and the other behind her back. They were a beautiful couple and still are this day.

Samantha came out of her room wearing red leggings and a red plaid shirt that went to her thighs. She looked great.

"Hey Sam, I love your outfit!"

"Thanks, I got it last week when Mother and Father took me to town," she replied, admiring her new clothes.

I was wearing a plain blue shirt with jean shorts that came to the knee. I liked my outfit, but not as much as I liked Samanthas'.

We walked downstairs, where I grabbed the basket holding my prized egg.

"Okay, are you ready to compare?" I asked, holding out the basket. A thin blanket for a small child covered the egg, and sides of the basket, making my beauty of chicken offering a secret.

"Oh right! I almost forgot! I'll just be one second," she ran up the stairs and came right back down with a basket identical to mine, but with a blue blanket covering the middle unlike mine which had a red blanket.

"Okay. Now I'm ready to compare," she said as she took out her egg and rubbed it gingerly.

I dramatically removed the red blanket and cupped my egg in my hands. I flipped my right hand off the egg and stabilized it in my left hand. It was a perfect light brown and was smoother than the shaved bark of a tree that gave off mahogany.

Samantha's egg was similar to mine but just a tiny bit darker of a brown color surrounded the outside, and white specks were sprinkled all around the egg. It had a perfect shape. It looked like one of the oval shapes you buy in one of those fancy boxes of shapes at the store, but 3D. It was beautiful!

"I love the white specks Sam! How do your eggs turn out like that?"

"Must just be the breed of chicken," she said and shrugged.

"Your color is perfect Utah. Your chickens lay the best eggs. Not only do they look good, but they also taste great!"

That girl sure did know how to butter you up with compliments, "Thanks Sam. Okay, shall we put them on display?" I asked.

Samantha always had solid gold egg holders for Easter time when they dyed eggs.

"We shall," Samantha said, and ran to the holiday closet. She pulled out two solid gold egg holders and placed one in front of me.

"Thank you." I took my egg using only my two pointer fingers, and expertly placed it in the ring.

"You have never been clumsy," Samantha said just as her egg crashed to the tile floor and broke.

"Oh don't worry Sam. It happens to me all the time! This morning I spilled Mercy's milk all over the barn floor."

"Oh come on Utah. You really expect me to believe you? Did that really happen?"

"No," I laughed.

She smacked me on the shoulder.

"Ow! What was that for?" I said while laughing.

"You lied! Okay, well now we need to clean up this mess. We're just lucky we didn't do this on the carpet. Mother would kill me!"

"You mean YOU need to clean up this mess."

"So you're not going to help me?"

"No, I'm going to beat you to the cleaning supplies and clean it for you then tell your Mom."

"No!" She screeched and ran after me.

I hurried to the paper towels and stripped a few out if the bin. I wetted them down then hurried back to the mess on the tile floor. I used each paper towel until the tile was spotless and I had victory over Samantha's race with myself.

"You're not really going to tell Mother, are you?" Sam asked me with a tone if worry in her voice.

"Of course not! Now come on. Let's go do something at your barn. I'm bored."

"You're always bored Ms. Utah Cake."

I loved it when she used my last name in her accusations. It just sounded so good!

"Let's go then, Ms. Samantha Smith."