Odd Dreams

Fourteen-year old Fallon looked in the mirror as she brushed her long blonde hair.  A sharp rap at the door turned her dreamy smile to an angry scowl.  “What?” she demanded, expecting to hear her younger brother outside.

“Just wondering if you’ll be ready to go soon,” her mother’s voice answered.

Fallon looked in the mirror and blushed, embarrassed by her reaction.  “I’ll be ready in a minute.  I’m putting my hair up.”  She quickly gathered her hair into a scrunchy and pinned back the loose ends.

“Got everything?” Mom asked, keys in hand.  Volleyball practice wasn’t her favorite summer destination, but at least it was early in the morning before the sun got too hot.  “I need to run a few errands on the way home,” she said, tossing the canvas totes in the trunk.  Fallon bounced her volleyball and spiked it to the trunk floor before Mom closed the lid.

“Can we stop at the drug store, too,” Fallon asked, rummaging through her gym bag.  She folded a stick of chewing gum into her mouth and shrugged.  “I need more gum.”

Mom smiled.  “Add it to the list,” she replied, handing over the notepad. 

Fallon selected a pen from the console and scribbled a few items on the list before turning the page.  She had always loved to draw and did so whenever the mood struck;  the mood struck whenever she had a pen and paper handy.

“Another cartoon,” Mom asked, wondering what her daughter would come up with this time.

Fallon nodded and continued drawing.  “Get out of the way,” she muttered, batting at the sunglasses hanging around her neck.  They flung over her shoulder as she concentrated on her art.

As the car came to a stop in the parking lot Fallon blew out her breath.  “There,” she said proudly, holding out the paper.

Mom looked at the paper and tried not to smile.  Dancing across the page were three cheerleaders; but they weren’t just any cheerleaders.  Fallon had drawn three tiny gerbils standing up on their hind legs, each wearing a short pleated skirt and a sweater with the school mascot on the front.  Their tiny hands waved pompoms and the word bubble over their heads extolled the virtues of the team.

“What inspired this?” Mom giggled.

Fallon looked at the cartoon thoughtfully.  “I had a dream last night that my gerbils escaped.  When I found them, they were at a gerbil volleyball game cheering for their team.”

“They didn’t really escape, did they?” Mom asked, recalling the last time they’d had to go gerbil hunting.

Fallon remembered too.  “Not a chance!” she cried.  “That’ll never happen again,” she paused for a moment, pondering the picture once again.  “But if it did, this is what they would do,” she grinned and grabbed her volleyball.

“I’ll be cheering for you.”  Mom raised her hands like a cheerleader and made a chortling noise like Fallon’s gerbils.  “Ra, ra, ra,” she squeaked, waving her invisible pompoms.  “I’ll be cheering for you!”

514 words

Today’s challenge was to write a story or poem featuring a pair of sunglasses, a volleyball, a stick of gum, and three gerbils.