Mysterious Morning

“Mysterious Morning” is one of the outstanding stories of the first biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Dulce Gonzalez, Klem Road North Elementary, USA.

Mysterious Morning

Chapter 1

James woke up, his eyes fluttering, the morning light was coming from his window. He had a headache from the night before, so he decided to walk and get some Tylenol from the kitchen. He rolled over the side of his bed and pushed his feet over the end. Just as his toe hit the floor he jumped, “It's so cold!” he exclaimed out loud. He looked out the window across from his bed, the window was open. He got up on his feet slowly and crept toward it, shutting it with force and clicking the lock, although it had not felt the same as it had before. Yet he carried on tiptoeing out of his room, so not to wake his daughter, Liz who was sleeping in the other room. Then he swiftly scurried down the stairs, and ambled into the kitchen. His wife was sitting at the breakfast bar, then she turned to look at James. She uttered the word “Breakfast?” “You read my mind,” said James. He walked over closer to Bayley and the stove, and saw a fresh plate of fluffy pancakes. He picked up a pancake and saw steam come off it and his hunger grew. With a plate of pancakes ready to bring two Liz, he walked towards the stairs and inched his way up, carefully balancing the plate is one hand and the fork is the other. He got to the top and went into his 10 year old daughter’s room. James uttered the words softly and said “Wake up Liz.”

Chapter 2

Liz woke up, mumbling and squeaking. “Dad five more min…” And she had fallen back to sleep. In a mellow yet stern voice, James said, “I brought pancakes. Liz still lying asleep, made a snort sound and that made James almost drop the pancakes on his daughter. He waited a couple seconds and then left the room, eating the pancakes. He pitter pattered back down the stairs enjoying the stack of golden brown deliciousness. He heard a sound behind him so he turned around to see his daughter is her onesie, slugging down the stairs behind him. Then he felt his foot begin to slide forward and his hand came back; he was falling. He saw his daughter try to catch his arm, but he jerked it back, so that Liz did not fall with him. His wife, who was in the other room, heard Liz’ yell for help, “Mommy, Daddy’s hurt!”

James was knocked unconscious and so his wife Bayley called an ambulance.

Chapter 3

The ambulance arrived and Liz hid in her room, just hoping her dad was not badly injured. Bayley took Liz to the car, quickly started it, and drove. In the middle of the drive, Liz spoke, she said, “Is dad okay?” Bayley took a while thinking about what to say. When they arrived at the hospital a nurse calmly walked toward them and squatted down to Liz’s eye level and started talking. She was informing them where the waiting room was, she gazed at her and smiled. That made Liz a little more hopeful that her dad was okay. Keeping eye contact with Liz, the nurse stood up and turned around, in a calm voice she uttered “follow me”. They followed the nurse, whom they quickly learned was named Tammy. Liz watched as the hall went on and on feeling like forever until they got to the room. She watched the nurse as she followed close behind, her tag hanging from her pocket. The nurse halted at a big white door, “We’ve arrived!” she said in a cheery voice. “But before you go is, you need a wristband so you can get back in the room, if you leave”. The nurse grabbed two bright orange wristbands and stuck them around the wrists of both her and her mom. Then the nurse opened the door, Bayley walked in first, Liz eagerly following behind. The waiting room was uninteresting and boring like most others Liz has seen. It had only been twenty minutes, but to Liz it had seemingly been hours.