Finding The Rainbow

• Isabelle Smart, Grade 2, Holy Eucharist School
• Short Story
• 2008

Finalist in the 'Empowered 2008' competition

If all the world was grey, how bad it would be, so in this story you’ll see one version of how colour came to the world.
One day as my best friend Lucy and I were walking through a row of dark green bushes in the park near my house we heard a strange sound. We turned around and saw a small, untidy old man with a huge bag. We stared for a moment only to hear him say, “You have been chosen.” I stood up straight and said, “What have we been chosen for?”
The man looked at us in surprise. “If you Emily…”
I interrupted and said, ”How do you know my name?”
“Well I know everyone’s life.” Lucy nearly fainted.
“So you know about how I don’t have a mother?”
“Yes. You’re making the world grey and gloomy.”
“But how?” I said.
“If you’re gloomy and upset the world will end up like that.”
“So that’s why you have chosen us ” said Lucy.
“Yes. You’re the only ones that can help.”
“Where will we start?” I asked.
“Now you begin wherever I make you.” The man pulled a fan out of his bag and a gust of wind brought Lucy and me to a rainforest. We walked around, then we stopped. Right in front of us was the biggest crocodile that we had ever seen. We heard a voice. “Come on Bern. Stop. You know not to frighten humans.” The crocodile backed away.
“Thank you,” we said. A kind looking man appeared holding a scroll. He gave it to us and we opened it. It said, “Welcome to Bellbow Land, where the rainforest meets Bellbow Land.” On the back it said, “There has been a myth that if you stand between the rainforest and Bellbow Land a rainbow will appear.”
We walked with the man. Lucy asked him, ”Is the myth actually true?” “No one’s ever tried it.” I turned around and said, “We could be the first ones to do it.”
“No one wants anyone to do it, because they think something bad will happen.”
“We’ve been sent on a mission to make the world colourful,” I explained.
“Why didn’t you say so? Come on. We need to hurry to the town centre.”
When we got there, the man stood up on a wooden box. “Two girls, Emily and Lucy have been sent on a mission for colour.”
A sudden shouting noise filled the town.
“Stand in between!” the people kept repeating. I whispered to Lucy, “ The first four letters of rainforest are the beginning of rainbow and the last three letters of Bellbow are the last three letters of rainbow.” Now it all made sense.
We walked between the rainforest and Bellbow Land and made a star shape with our bodies. The biggest and prettiest rainbow appeared.
Out ran my mum. My face lit up. We were happy again. Then a gust of wind brought us home. It had been a wonderful adventure.