The Big Burn

• Abigail Wright, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2015

In the ashes of ‘the burn’ people stand, in shock. The girl walks over to see her father, but all she could see was the ashes of his body. As she walks away she sees a light, she turns and gets closer and closer, now all that she sees is ‘before the mine burn’. She steps into the light and runs as fast as she can, she keeps running and stops! She can see her dad, she calls to him and says, “I’m here dad,” he looks back but keeps walking.
She was terrified, she runs, she grabs his arm and pulls, she stops, she looks and she thinks. She thinks really hard then wakes up. She sighs, she goes back to sleep, she has the exact same dream over and over.
She wakes up, goes down stairs to see the television is still on, she goes to the carport to see if the car is still there, but it wasn’t. Concerned, she sits down to wait for the news, she hears that the mine broke and a fire started. She hears what has happened; she knows that because her father is a miner that he was gone. She ran into her room and screamed, “I don’t want to see the future!”