MYSTERY

BY PRIYANKA BHARGHAVAN, AGE 9, 2012

The alarm clock yelled and screamed that it was 6:00. Time to get ready for school - Another horrible day of fifth grade! She hated fifth grade because she was the one kid who had no friends and was teased. Gina got out of bed and got ready. She pulled on her jeans and a purple t-shirt, and then quickly brushed her teeth and long brown hair.

“Morning mom, dad!” Gina cried to her parents and grabbed a donut.

“Good morning dear”, they yelled back.

As Gina walked down the block to the bus station, the wind blew furiously. It blew her pink and orange scarf off. She ran to fetch her knitted scarf and found it near a lamppost. She picked up her scarf, but found a little kitten underneath. The cat was gray and very dirty. It was very skinny and thin. It’s pleading eyes screamed help. The cat reminded her of her old cat Pinecone. She remembered how Pinecone trembled and screeched the night she died. At least she died of old age!

She decided that she would take that cat home and care for it. She picked up the fragile creature and wrapped it up in the scarf. The cat meowed half out of pain and half out of gratitude.

At her house, Gina made sure her parents were gone when she took a bowl, filled it with milk and took it upstairs to her room where the cat was.

She put the milk next to her and watched their cat gulp down the liquid mouthful after mouthful. Gina took a washcloth and dabbed it in water to clean the kitten while she drank the milk. After she cleaned the cat she put out some pillows for it to sleep on and refilled the bowl with fresh milk and put that next to the pillows. Then she took a box and filled it with grass and dirt for her pet to go to the bathroom in. She watched her curl up on the pillows and purr.

“AH, my little cat,” Gina, said soothingly as she pet the cat, “You are such a mystery. I’ll name you Mystery”.

“What a tough day at work,” Gina’s dad said as he came through the door.

Fear struck Gina like a lightning bolt. If he knew that she had ditched school without telling him she would be grounded for life. To add to it she was keeping a sick cat hidden in her room. She tried not to make a sound and hoped that Mystery would keep quiet.

She spent the rest of the day eating left over Halloween candy and reading until her mom came home. She snuck downstairs and pretended to be coming home.

“Mom, I’m home.” Gina yelled trying to act casual.

“Hey sweetie,” mom said. “How was school?”

Gina gave a fake explanation for her day at school. That night Gina heard a door open, but no footsteps. She held her breath hoping it wasn’t her mom or dad calling because they would see Mystery. She lay awake for almost an hour, but grew drowsy and fell asleep.

Beep, beep, beep…Gina woke up yawning and stretched.

She was confused. Why was the alarm clock beeping on a Saturday?

“Good morning Mystery”, Gina whispered and yawned at the same time.

Sunlight poured through the window urging her to wake up. She slipped on her puffy kitty slippers.

She looked at Mystery’s corner and saw she was gone! She knew she had to do something. Gina raced down the stairs and skidded to a stop by her parents.

“I need to talk to you!” she declared.

Gina explained her predicament in a way that she kept her parents calm, but mad.

They agreed to look for Mystery. The family put out missing signs. Gina feared that Mystery was gone forever. Her eyes filled with tears and her head hung low.

She wore a green shirt, jeans, tennis shoes and a blue and green scarf because her pink and orange one was missing and went jogging outside. Her ponytail swayed side to side.

As she neared the library she found her pink and orange scarf by a lamppost. Hope swelled up inside of her. She picked up the scarf and was delighted when she found a clean little kitten underneath.

“Mystery” Gina cried loudly, “I found you. Oh, come here, you’re safe now.”

She took Mystery home and took care of her. Her parents loved Mystery too.

Why You Should Recycle

A PERSUASIVE ESSAY BY NATHAN LUE, AGE 10

Don’t you love a healthy environment? I do!

Pollution is a problem because it hurts all parts of the world. If you recycle, the whole world will become less polluted. We need to stop throwing away our reusable plastic, paper, and food waste to landfills. Doing this makes the environment and water less polluted because the landfills spill into the ocean and kill animals. We need the marine animals because they keep a balance in the environment. We also need the fish for food.

The consequence of throwing away these reusable items is that there are fewer trees and less plastic and oil that we need to make products. It is already hard to make them in the first place. Reusing materials is good because we take from what we already have instead of using more material from the environment.

To stop this, all you need to do is recycle bottles and cans, and put your compost in the compost garbage can. When you recycle cans, bottles, and paper, they get remade into different items. The cans can be made into different products like ornaments for a Christmas tree. Plastic bottles can be made into rugs. Paper can be made into many different recycled products, like paper bags and shirts. That is all you have to do. Finally, imagine how life would be in a clean environment and now, imagine how life would be in a dirty environment. A clean environment would have clean air, water, and many trees. A dirty environment would have no trees, polluted water, and lots of being affected by it. See the difference?

I imagine that you probably want a healthy environment for your kids. So now go recycle! It’s good for you and for the environment!