Unentitled

• Tania Kalsi, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2018

Name my story. My desolate trivial story.
I found a big hollow log from the dump and brought it to a village full of lively music. Food and clothing stalls clogged the place where villagers that wore traditional funky clothing resided. The village was full of colour and dancing; it was a contented place that anyone would enjoy. Anyone? Except me. In my downcast eyes, this place was for someone who had a happy life and unquestionably not a loss of both parents. I felt like a duck trying to fit in with a bevy of swans.
Uncertainly, I flumped down in my itchy straw clothes next to some drummers. I bit my trembling lips and banged my knuckles against the log. Ba-bang! The only way for me to make money was busking. By evening, I had earnt forty pence, which was nowhere near my goal. Suddenly, an oddly familiar lady approached me, her crooked nose bending over her lips. She smelt like burnt ashes, mouth wide and toothless like a witch. She wore a jet black gown which gave me the shivers.
“Come here, boy. See your future with me, Ms Peggy,” the stranger snickered, pointing her long fingernail sharply at me.
I gave an audible gulp and reluctantly followed that mysterious lady.
“Um, where are we going? Because-” I stuttered like a mouse, after a few miles into the inky, chilly woods.
“Dear no-name-boy, where your curse is taking you, that’s all,” Ms Peggy cooed in a hoarse voice.
Me? Under a curse? Th-that was impossible! No wonder my life was full of plights! I felt like weeping into a fluffy pillow.
“After you,” sniggered Ms Peggy, offering the doorway into an abandoned cottage.
The walls inside were exceedingly crinkled and when I ran my finger down the wall, debris shattered onto the ground. Ms Peggy offered me a wooden chair, like the really hard one Goldilocks tried. She sat directly opposite me, covering her face with a pocket mirror.
“Kid, you’ve been under a curse since you were twelve months. Your parents died by a malicious man named Professor Dusk, and since then he put you under a curse to steal your fortune. Your twelfth birthday is tonight and you’re destined to die. In order to survive, you must trap inside bubbles all the people in that village,” Ms Peggy paused for effect, then cackled wickedly, “Ta ta!”
I suspiciously walked out the door, feeling like I was just told a Harry Potter story. Despondent, I peered into the cottage window and noticed an exotic marble jar with rainbow liquid swirling inside it. Curiously, I squeezed through the ajar window and picked it up. Underneath it was that pocket mirror with a crumpled note that Ms Peggy had read, ‘Bubble potion. Kill nameless boy. Parents trapped in cage. Fake name: Professor Dusk…’ After reading that unbelievable answer to everything, I realised she was behind all of this. I looked up. Ms Peggy was staring right at me...