Old Story Compilation

I wrote this for a short story competition a few years ago. It's called "Seahorse."

   As the car jolted over every bump in the road, I braced myself as each time I was thrown forward into my seatbelt. I loved visiting Mamma. She was kind but feisty, kind of like sweet & sour sauce.
   I looked out the window. The rickety dirt road was surrounded on both sides by the woods. That was the greatest part about sleeping over at Mamma’s. The woods were huge, and she let us explore almost all day. Last time we were here, I found a cave, but there wasn’t time to explore it at all before we had to leave. This time, I was going to see every inch of that cave.
   The gravel crunched under the tires as we drove up Mamma’s driveway. Poppa was sitting in his swim on the front porch, and he waved. Mamma bustled out and shuffled Poppa over to help us carry in our bags.
   As I lugged my bag inside, I thought about the cave in the woods. I wondered how deep it was, and if my older sister would like to explore with me.
   I glanced over at Shannon. Already she was on her phone, listening to music, mouthing along to the words and paying no attention to anything. I could almost hear the music pouring from her headphones. She was going to be deaf by the time she was 21, and right now she’s just 15.
   I tried to think of who might want to explore with me (I wasn’t exactly in favor of going in a cave all alone), but no one came to mind. Then I remembered that Khloe, my TABFFE (Totally Awesomest Best Friend Forever Ever), was coming later to sleep over with us this time. She would love to see the cave!
   As I packed everything away, all I could think about was what I would do with Khloe tomorrow.
        
   The next morning, I ate a breakfast of sausage, scrambled eggs, French toast, and bacon. As soon as I was done, I changed into a T-shirt and shorts, pulled on my socks and shoes, tied my hair back and raced outside.
   It was about 9 am, but Khloe didn’t pull in until around 9:30. As soon as she was parked, I pounded down the driveway and ran into a hug.
   “You are not going to believe this!” I cry.
   “What is it?”
   “There’s a cave in the woods, and we are going to go explore it together!”
   I’m jumping up and down like a maniac, and she’s grinning like a lunatic. After everything is settled in, we head for the woods. I manage to find my way to the cave with only a little trouble.
   “Should we go in?” Khloe is always a little hesitant about things like this, but she always ends up having fun.
   “Of course! Let’s go!” I charged straight in, praying that there were no bats. And of course I was wrong.
   “Run!” Khloe cried.  I ducked and stormed out of the cave, taking cover behind a large rock until all the bats were gone.
   “Let’s be a little more careful this time,” Khloe said. We tip-toed in and followed the winding path. To my surprise, it didn’t have any forks where there were, like, three or four different passages.
   When we came to a dead end, though, it wasn’t that convenient anymore. I groaned.
   Leaning up against the wall, I fell through a little trap door of some kind. I tried to scream, but then I realized I was soaking wet and sitting on a cold, wet, slimy rock who-knows where.
   “Khloe, where are you?” I yelled.
   “I’m up here,” I heard her call from above. I tried to see, but my flashlight had gone out.
   All of a sudden Khloe came crashing down, with a working flashlight. I looked around. We were in some sort of underground cave, and we were on a ledge of some sort. I looked over the edge. It wasn’t that far down. Five feet was my guess.
   “Come on, Khloe, let’s explore,” I said, but it didn’t help much, as Khloe was droning on and on about shelter and food and water and little creatures. I grabbed her arm and jumped down, pulling her along with me.
   “Ow!” she cried. She glared at me, but I didn’t notice much, as I was too busy checking out where we were.
   “Wow,” I breathed. The room looked almost like it was made out of diamond, and it had a little crystal-looking pool on the far end. I started dragging Khloe with me over to the water, ignoring her jibber-jabber.
   The pool was about four feet deep. The floor looked as if it was made totally and completely out of pearl, and it looked as smooth as can be. There was a little coral on the other end of the pool, about six feet away. I walked over.
   There was a little exit, and there were little waves coming in; not crystal waves, like the ones in the pool, but murky, greenish water.
   I clawed at the coral and it gave away. Some of it dissolved in my hand.
   “Whoa,” I gasped, “You’ve got to see this!”
   The coral looked like it was crystal, and I saw something wriggling underwater. It was a seahorse! A diamond seahorse!
   I picked it up gently in my hand. I dumped my water bottle empty and filled it with the pool water. I carefully put the little seahorse inside and closed the lid.
   I had imagined Khloe would be climbing up the walls because I had dumped all my ice water, but she was staring at it in awe as well.
   Well, now we need to find a way out.
   Later, in my room at Mamma’s, I had poured Diamond, my new pet, into a glass bowl. Just before dinner, I ran back and got a lot more of the pool-water and some of the coral. I got permission from my Mamma and Poppa to use their old ten-gallon tank. I placed the coral gently inside, dumped in the pool water, and finally, I introduced Diamond to her new home.
   She swam around and immediately attached to one of the branches of coral. She was so cute, but I had to go eat dinner.
   Throughout the meal, all I could think about was Diamond. As soon as the meal was over, I rushed back to my room. She had the tiniest bit of aqua blue on the tip of her tail. As she swam from branch to branch, I vowed that I would find out what she was and what was so mysterious about the pool and take the greatest care for her as long as it was possible.