That One Day

• Lillian Wenmohs, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2022

I walk in the door, my eyes go wide. Clatter from left to right. Books torn, plates shattered. I ran to my room. It’s destroyed, completely destroyed. I stare in agony. Everything was out of place. My life has been destroyed, completely and utterly destroyed. I gasp, holding in a scream. My safe with everything, all my prized possessions, had been broken open. My money, my ID, it had all been taken. Nothing was right, nothing was in order, nothing was clean. My worst nightmare had just come alive. It was coming to haunt me.

Mess. The worst thing that could possibly happen, a mess where things are all out of place. Mess is the worst thing EVER. I only had nightmares about this at a young age. Nightmares that crept up on me in my sleep. They haunted me in my dreams, but now they haunt me in real life. This is the last thing I ever wanted to happen and now it’s happened.

Not only that, all my valuables had been lost. Taken by someone cruel, someone heartless, someone greedy. Someone that only has one mind, one life, one goal. Someone like a robber. They may be on the run now but they can’t run for long nor can they hide. My first resort was the police. I ran outside and found the closest payphone. I inserted the coins and listened as they clinked in the machine. Normally an emergency call would be free but in the rules it says it has to be urgent and mine wasn’t exactly urgent. A cold breeze flew by teasing me as it picked up leaves and twirled them around. The Police finally picked up. The conversation went back and forth. In the end it was a waste of time, I had hung up in anger and stormed back to my home.

When I came home everything looked worse. There seemed to be more mess. There was food all over the floor. Pillows ripped open. A crack from the top to the bottom of my little Tv. My life has been drowned in a pool of mess. My couch was ripped open with fluff pouring out. I took a deep breath in and smelt canned beans and pineapple. Cleaning time!

It took a long 12 hours of work. I scrubbed like it was the last thing I could do. By six hours beads of sweat were rolling down my face creating an ocean. It felt like a year of cleaning but there was one last misplaced object. I slowly slid the book into its rightful place. A wave of relief hit me hard. Clean and perfect once again. My house was no longer a mess, it was livable and clean. I still have bad dreams about that day. Dreams that wake me up at night in horror. But luckily they are still dreams that can’t come true ever again. Or can they? “AHHHHHH! WHAT A MESS!”