Week 10 Story: Recess RIP

Recess RIP

There once was a young boy playing on the playground of his school.  On the playground, there was a manhole leading to the sewers that all the teachers warned the students not to go near.  The boy was always curious about the hole and what might be down there.  Why would the teachers not want him down there?  Is there a secret tunnel leading to a secret meeting room that the teachers use?  Is there candy in this room?  He was set on finding out, but could never get it open.

It is the fall, there are leaves everywhere.  Big, beautiful golden leaves practically cover the entire playground.  The children gather the leaves into many piles and jump into them carefree.  However, the boy is fixated on the manhole.  It has yellow tape around it and there are construction workers working on it.  He watches as they leave on their lunch break and realizes this might be the only chance he has to find out what is in the hole.  Leaves are clogging it up so much that he can't even see where the hole is.  He waited until the teachers weren't looking, slid under the yellow tape, and instantly fell into the hole.  He is so scared that he can't even scream.  He hits the ground hard and it feels like he broke his leg.  He then looked up and saw Pennywise the clown staring at him, holding a red balloon.  He lets out a big yell when seeing him but it is no use, he is too deep in the hole for the teachers to hear him. 

Pennywise the Clown sourced via Wikipedia

Pennywise smiles at him and asks if he would like to float back up to the surface.  He screams no and starts running down the labyrinth of a system the sewer is.  He runs for what felt like ages until he reaches a ladder that led to the surface.  He climbs up, cautiously opens the hatch, and there he finds a meeting room.  The principal and all his staff are there at a table laughing about how they are going to cut recess time by 30 minutes.  He was right!! There really was a secret meeting room.  He looks to his right and sees a big bucket of candy.  He starts to go toward the candy when Pennywise grabs his leg.  He starts to get pulled back in and he knows he can't scream or else the teachers will hear him.  He then remembers that Pennywise can only exist if he fears him, so he lets him take him into the tunnel.  When taken down, Pennywise asks if he is ready to float, and the boy starts laughing hysterically at him for looking like such a stupid clown.  Pennywise keeps trying to scare him by transforming into terrible things but they only make the boy laugh harder until Pennywise explodes.  The boy then sneaks back into the teacher's meeting place, steals the candy, makes it back to the playground, and gives the candy to all the boys and girls and he becomes the coolest kid in school.

The end.

Author's Note:

In the original story, a hunter travels to a family's house and is warned not to hunt on the north side of the land because of a deadly snake.  The hunter's curiosity gets the best of him and he goes there anyways.  When he finds the snake, he tries running away but the snake gets him anyways.  He struggles to get away and finally does when he wafts his body odor in the snakes nose and it runs away.  I wanted to keep the similar theme of curiosity nearly killing the cat but the cat getting away barely.  I also wanted to get a little more creative and make the theme more modern.  I also figured since Halloween is so close that I would make a story with a more spooky theme!

Bibliography:

The Hunter And The Uksu'hï by James Mooney