The Plastic Duck and His Boy

“The Plastic Duck and His Boy” is one of the outstanding stories of the first biannual International Short Story Contest 2018 written by Olivier Badzioch, Prywatna Szkola Podstawowa "Smyk", Bielsko Biala, Poland.

The Plastic Duck and His Boy

It was scorching midday on the beach. The sun was shining, the gulls were squawking, and the waves were muttering. When my boy finished building canals in the sand, his sweat sparkled like diamonds, and his red cheeks glowed like ripe cherries. Then he set me on the channel and exclaimed, "Go and float my wind up yellow duck." I started swimming madly about; he rushed to find his friends.

By the time he and his friends had come, I was bobbing far out at sea. All day long my boy wept and mourned the loss of me. But my adventures were just beginning.

Sunny day turned into cold night. Stars glinted in the darkness like dew on a summers' morning, and the moon was like a shining golden coin in the middle of a dark sapphire wallet of silence, waiting for something to happen. A ship slid into sight. It looked down on the sea creatures in an ominous manner and dumped an enormous mound of rubbish into the ocean.

I swam away not wanting to be caught in a cascade of rubbish and be concealed in a plastic bag. I watched sympathetically as the small fishes nibbled at the plastic thinking it was plankton. Slowly a net crept into the ocean silently like a cat stalking its prey. My heart sank when I pictured the poor creatures one day landing on plates.

Suddenly, I found myself in a circle of rubbish! "What are you made of?" said one. "I-I don't know," I stammered. "You're plastic, you don't belong here," They cried in chorus.

They informed me I was the foe like them all along and could be mistaken for food by the sea creatures and poison them.

So, with this knowledge, my fellow litters and I decided to set away to leave the ocean and come back from where we came from. We swept from wave to wave without a glimpse of land.

When at last we got into sight of the coast, I saw... a capsized boat and half a mile away there was a boy - who was apparently my friend - was kicking frantically and shouting, " Please, someone help me!" I cried, "Let's rescue him!" My army of rubbish came to his aid and settled him comfortably on a tyre.

"Thank you; you have saved my life. I shall grant you, three commands." After short conversation with the rest of the rubbish army, I proclaimed, "Firstly, convince people to use reusable materials, Secondly, please persuade them to recycle and do it yourself, and thirdly, please coax humans to clean up their rubbish toxins,"

Next, I told him my story, and we sailed him back to safe land. The first thing he did when he got changed was to write a story about what he had found out from me.

Dear reader, you have just read this story, and please do spread the word around the whole world!