I felt bad about only posting NaNoWriMo horror/suspense crap. So this was my English Narrative assignment from a while ago. The assignment was to write something that REALLY affected the reader's emotions. So, what else was there to write besides this?
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The dead, glazed over eyes of the statue in the park stared at the little girl as she sat in her mother's car. The five year old tugged gently at a strand of her own curled, blonde hair as she waited for her mother to come out of the bank. After a while, she finally walked out of the building into the gloomy, grey streets of the city. Her daughter perked up a bit and waited impatiently for her mother to come back to the car. After what seemed like forever, in the opinion of a five year old, the woman sat in the car and closed the driver's seat door.
“Now Sarah, we're only going to look. We might buy if we have money, understand?” she asked as she buckled, looking back at her daughter.
The little girl eagerly nodded and squeezed her tiny fingers around her own seat belt. “Mommy, can we go now?” she asked, becoming impatient as her mother was counting the money in the bank envelope.
Janet soon finished counting the money and placed the envelope into her brown purse. Sarah smiled a little as the car started and they pulled away from the park. She set her small brown eyes upon the statue in the center of the park before they drove off towards the pet store.
After ten long minutes of driving, the car finally pulled into the parking lot of Barking Mad. The girl unbuckled herself from her booster seat in the car and whined a bit as she jiggled the door handle, the child lock preventing her from opening the rear passenger's door. Her mother finally got out of the car after checking her make up and grabbing her purse and opened it for her.
“Now Sarah, hold on. Let me lock the car,” her mother said.
The blonde girl obeyed her mother, pouting slightly while Janet closed the car doors, checked her purse, and pressed the automatic lock button to their blue Ford Explorer. She then took her daughter's hand and walked her inside.
Sarah's brown eyes lit up as she looked around the pet store. There were kittens, puppies, fish, rabbits, and hundreds of animals she at her young age couldn't identify. She looked in a glass tank that was at her eye level and hid behind her mother as a large Ball Python stared at her and flicked its forked tongue. She stayed close to the woman, holding onto the strap of the brown leather purse. Her eyes moved back and forth as she observed the various rodents, reptiles, birds, amphibians, mammals, and fish all around her. A small whine escaped her throat when she laid eyes on a large, hairy tarantula that was crawling towards her from the opposite side of its tank.
“Can I help you, ma'am?” a friendly voice asked from their left. A young man, probably in his early twenties, approached them as he pushed messy brown bangs out of his eyes.
“Yes,” Janet said. “We would like to look at a few puppies. Are there any you can recommend that are good with children and can live in a one-story house?” she asked.
The young man thought for a minute and nodded. “I think you're probably going to be better off with one of our hybrid dogs.” He led them to the puppy area and showed them several types of hybrid puppies. As he spoke, Sarah looked at the bottom kennel and stared at the large Golden Retriever puppy who laid sleeping with his head pillowed on a stuffed cat. His kennel had a large, pink $500 off! sign tied to it.
“I want that one, Mommy!” she exclaimed. “He looks like Air Bud and the Buddies!” She pointed at the puppy's kennel through the glass wall that separated the main shop from the puppy room.
“Are you sure, honey? He looks big,” the woman replied, a little nervously.
“Him?” the employee asked. “Goldens are really great dogs to have, actually. They don't mind baths too much, they're great with kids, and they don't need as much exercise as something like a beagle or greyhound would have to have. You wanna play with him in the play area?”
Sarah looked up at her mother and pleaded silently before the woman finally sighed.
“Alright. We'll look at him,” she said.
“Yay!” Sarah shouted. She watched the young man take the large puppy out of the cage, who yawned as he was woken up. His long tail wagged when he was placed on the floor with Sarah and her mother in the play area and the gate was closed. He bounded right over to the little girl and licked at her face as she laughed and hugged him.
“Can we take him home, Mommy?” she asked as she fondled the puppy's ears after ten minutes of tug of war, kisses, and throwing a tennis ball in the small room. “Please? I want him.” She wrapped her small arms around the puppy's neck and looked at her mother.
“Pleeeeeeeeease?”
“But isn't he a little big, Sarah?”
“No.”
“Wouldn't you rather something smaller or fluffier?”
“No.”
Janet was about to make another point, but sighed. She knew that her daughter was a very strong-willed girl, and wouldn't give in until she had her way. She nodded and waved the employee over to receive the paperwork on the puppy. After she had signed everything and purchased a leash, a collar, puppy training pads, and all the other necessities, they led the puppy, whom Sarah had named Buddy, out to the car.
“You know, Sarah, you're lucky he was on sale,” Janet scolded. “Or you wouldn't have been able to get him. I don't want you complaining about him at all, do you understand?”
The little girl smiled and nodded from her booster seat as she hugged the puppy on the blanket next to her in the car. “I won't.”
They had been home for several hours now. Surprisingly, Buddy had been rather easy to train to use his potty pads on the kitchen floor by the front door. After he ate his dinner, played with Sarah, and used his pad for the last time of the night, he was locked in the large dog crate for the night in Sarah's room.
“Good night, Sarah,” Janet said. She kissed the young girl on her forehead and then walked out of the room, closing the door and turning the lights off on her way out. When the room fell dark, a soft whining could be heard from Buddy's crate. Sarah frowned and sat up. She crawled out of her bed and knelt in front of the kennel.
“Don't cry, Buddy.” She turned her pink, star shaped night light on and looked at the whining puppy in the kennel. Her small hand touched the metal bars and the dog's flat, pink tongue emerged and licked her hand. The girl smiled a bit and removed the small silver bar that held the kennel shut and opened the door. She held the puppy's collar and led him to her bed. He immediately jumped up when she laid down and laid on her warm blanket. She kissed the puppy's head and hugged him.
“Good night, Buddy. I love you.”
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Sarah, now eighteen years old, stepped off of the sidewalk into the green grass of the park. She held onto the thick blue leash attached to Buddy's matching collar with her right hand, and patted the dog's head with her left.
She walked him around to the center of park, stopping in front of the large statue of a man and his dog. The plaque in front of the statue was worn down even more than it had been the day that Buddy had came into Sarah's life. She didn't remember the man's name, seeing as History had never been her favorite subject, but she knew he and his canid friend had something to do with the city's history.
Pulling a worn, dirty tennis ball out of her pocket, Sarah sat on the ground as Buddy walked to her, wagging his bushy, gold and grey tail. Just as she had every day since she and her mother had bought the dog, she gave the ball a gentle toss, letting go of the leash. Buddy ran after the ball, despite his old age and arthritis, and picked up his favorite toy. He chewed it as he trotted back to Sarah, dropping it into her palm.
“Good boy, Buddy,” she said, smiling as she hugged him and buried her face in the warm fur on the side of his neck. She threw the ball again and he returned it, continuing their routine that hadn't been interrupted for the past thirteen years, with the exception of the occasional thunderstorm and blizzard.
The blonde girl sat in her afternoon Western Civilizations 101 class, sadly looking at her watch. This is the time I usually take Buddy to the park to play, she thought. I hope he's not upset that I have to take him later. She sighed and started doodling pictures of her four legged friend in her notebook as the teacher droned on about his expectations for the course.
After what had seemed like hours, the teacher dismissed the class. Sarah quickly stood and gathered her things into her black and red backpack. She power walked out to her car and got inside, quickly buckling herself in and jamming the key into the ignition. She started it and pulled out of the parking lot and headed home.
“Buddy, I'm home,” she said as she walked through the house. The dog didn't come. “Buddy?” she asked. She walked out to the backyard and looked around, checking the doghouse. Nervously, she bit her lip and then froze as she noticed a huge hole underneath the fence. “Buddy!” she shouted. She jumped over the white wooden fence, using a garbage can as a step. Looking around, she frantically ran to her car and started it, not bothering to buckle as she drove around the streets looking for her friend.
She passed the park and sadly at the abandoned statue. She caught a glimpse of something golden tan as she drove past a little. Sarah immediately stopped the car and pulled into the nearest parking space, cutting off a large Chevy pickup truck, whose driver angrily honked his horn at her. She ran out of the car, pressing the lock button on her tiny remote as she ran, and went around the statue, seeing her now muddy, golden friend lying on the ground in
front of it, where she had normally sat when they played fetch.
Sarah knelt down by him and noticed he had his tennis ball in his mouth. He opened a tired eye and his tail wagged a bit as he saw her. He dropped his tennis ball and licked her
hand.
“You remembered your way,” she said, petting him and hugging him. The tired old dog licked her cheek and yawned before resting his head on her arm. He laid still after she pet him for a few minutes and she looked at him as her brown eyes filled with tears. She leaned down and kissed his head.
“Good night, Buddy. I love you.”
Fiction: 11/04/09 | Posted By: Die Before I Wake | 6 comments | Personal
