Fiction Friday: Chapter 1

Summer was ending, but the sun was still hot on the girls who had been sent to the backyard. Their parents didn't do this often, but today they had pushed Mom right to the edge. They knew by the tone in her voice there was no point in arguing. Even Sierra, who seemed to resist a little more than the others, kept her comments to herself.

The yard wasn't that big. Weeds grew up from the cracks in the patio and the grass needed to be cut. The dog, who spent the most time out here didn't care, but everyone else would have rather stayed inside. The plastic house was too small for anyone but Sienna, who was six and the apple tree they used to climb was mostly dead.

Savannah was the oldest, by all of two minutes, and when she wasn't trying get her sisters to leave her alone, she was trying to invent a game or start a club. She tried to make the best of every situation. Today, after being tossed outside, she decided to start a nature club, which she had appointed herself president. She found a stick she was using as a walking stick was using to both search for leprechauns and exaggerate her talking.

Sierra was the only sister not in the nature club. She didn't really do the "club" thing and she especially didn't do the club thing when Savannah was president. She sat on the patio reading her book. She would have preferred to read inside, less insects, but in fifteen minutes she figured she could sneak back in. She, like Savannah, was twelve and getting ready to return to middle school.

Shelby had dirt across her face and was arguing with Savannah about the nature club they had just started. Shelby thought she should get to use the stick too, while Savannah thought she should have to find her own. The discussion ended when a few kids came into the backyard behind their yard and shelby started talking to a redheaded girl she didn't know. She seemed to get along with everyone, except her sisters.

Sienna played with a few small rocks inside of the plastic house with a pink roof. Apparently, the rocks were talking to each other. The biggest rocks were the mom and dad, the others children. After a few minutes she got board with that and went to see if Sierra, who she called Sissybug, would play with her. Sierra, who was not at all drawn into the charm of her six year old sister, told her she should go talk to Vanna.

Savannah was shooing Bailey away from something. It was in the hole at the base of the apple tree. She couldn't see what it was, but there was something there. The rotten wood had broken away revealing something. An iridescent, dark blue something. A mystery object. Her sudden attention to this spot had first drawn the dog, but a moment later her two younger sisters were there as well.

The part they could see looked like it might have been a fragment of colorful cloth. It felt really soft. They didn't want to pull on it, afraid it would break. So the three of them got down, real close and started to dig with sticks and their fingers trying to be careful not to ruin this mystery object. It seemed to almost be growing out of the ground. It even had a kind of central stalk the held the colorful plumes. After a few inches, the digging slowed way down.

"We're never going to get it out," Shelby said rubbing a little more dirt on her cheek.

"Inside the garage, on Daddy's work table, there is a little shovel," Savannah said like she was solving a puzzle,"Go get it."