Annie Times - Junior Detective

• Ella McIntyre, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2022

Our story takes place with a young girl called Annabella Times or Annie, aka ‘Times’. She lived in a small hamlet, called Philade. Her hair was curly and had a tone that fell between strawberry-blonde and classic red. She had a crooked nose with a cherry red end. Big round fairy floss splotches fell on her cheeks. Her eyes were quite peculiar, as they were different colors. One was an icy blue, the other was a light chocolate brown. Many people described this eye as amber, which she quite liked. She had a voice like a croaking toad, as she hardly ever used it. She was quite tall and lanky and was able to reach the highest cabinet at Alluring Antiques ( The local discount store ).

Although Times was kind and loyal, she had no friends. Was she okay with this? ABSOLUTELY. Annie Times was quite the lone wolf and got nervous during public speaking. So instead of riding horses, gossiping and goodness knows what else with the other girls, Times was like a library. She loved reading more than you love eating your favorite cake with cream every day. She had bought almost every book at O'Reilly’s Book Shop. She found every story interesting and easy to read. Even though she knew practically every word in ‘Philade’s only dictionary’, she was not a very gifted kid at school. She was always an average student in math, writing, and worst of all…reading. Her teacher was named Ms. Curry, who was recently divorced. She smoked cigarettes and often sent the smallest students to the staffroom to get bottles of wine. She had wild gray hair and long lines on her light caramel face.

This story started on a humid Wednesday. Ms. Curry (Who usually talked about nothing interesting.) Suddenly caught Time's attention. She was talking about a mystery. In her slow, chalkboard voice she croaked ‘ There is a family called the Jones. They had a large safe full of golden cups, rings, and necklaces. The youngest daughter had been in the house, and so had the mother and cat. At 10 am that day the stuff had been in the safe. At 10:02 the safe was empty. Only the golden cups were left. No matter what the police did, they could not crack the case.’ Ms. Curry sighed like a horse. ‘And that’s all.’
Times suddenly perked up. She had never been funny in her life. She didn’t even know if this was a joke. She took a deep breath, cleared her tickling throat, and squeaked ‘ Mabey the cat took the stuff. I mean they like round and shiny things.’
Ms. Curry looked at Annie for the first time. Her eyes narrowed on her toad-like face.
‘ No one’s ever thought of that….’
Annie Times aka Junior Detective had cracked the case.