Campfire Story

Once upon a time... Callie sat at her desk staring through the white board at the front of the class. Whatever Mr. White was saying was lost on her as she debated her Halloween costume for Mackenzie's party on Friday. Everyone would be there and everyone had a great costume. Her mother would freak out if she wore what the other girls were planning on. Short shifts with fishnet stockings and bunny ears wouldn't get past the door at her house. Why did her parents always treat her like a child, she wondered. She was 16 afterall and hardly a baby anymore. Maybe she could sneak a costume past her parents and change at Mackenzie's. The bell rang and Callie jumped, her heart pounding. Maybe sneaking wouldn't be such a good idea. If thinking about doing it was going to rattle her this badly she wouldn't have any fun at the party. Smiling, Callie grabbed her backpack and headed home. There was always Grandma's trunk in the attic.

Callie knew that she wasn't supposed to go through Grandma's things. It was a family rule, one that no one broke, but desperate times called for desperate measures. Plus, who would really know, she would put whatever she took back the next morning.

As she wiped the dust off the trunk looking for a way to open it, her mind drifted in and out of the stories Grandma told her every Halloween. The stories often started off with Grandma sounding as if she had actually been there and was part of the story but would then suddenly, as if awoken from a dream, she would finish the tale with some typical ending one would expect from such stories. She always felt a little shorted, like she was only told part of them.