101 Days of Pure Awesomeness: by Samantha Goodyear. Chapter one.

My name is Jenna. I don't remember my last name, partly because when I was 8, I didn't really care what my last name was. I barely remember the last time I was the real Jenna, a 21st century 8-year-old girl. Every morning I wake up in a new place with new friends, and I look very different. But one thing stays the same: I am always red-haired and brown-eyed. Sometimes my red hair is actually red fur, sometimes my eyes are those of a cat's or even an alien's (if alien's have eyes...). This all started one day when I was having a bad day. My best friend Kirsten didn't want to be my friend anymore, my parents were fighting, and I couldn't have my favourite desert in the whole wide world after dinner (which was yummy chocolate cake). I got so angry I left. I just left. Packed an extra change of clothes and went outside. I didn't know where I was going, or I where I was supposed to be, I was just going. Finally I came to an old, dark, run-down building. Most 8-year-old girls would be scared to death of this place, but I was brave. I made run for the door and went inside. I remember an old lady lining there. She asked me who I was and I told her. "Jenna! Want to be my friend?" I had asked her. She nodded. She asked if I was having a bad day and I told her all about it. Then she asked if I wanted to having an amazing adventure and never come back to normal life again. I thought for a moment and then nodded my head. Now here, I am, living a lonely adventure.

This morning I woke up in a dusty cave, surrounded by kids that looked my age, dressed in heavy armor. One of the boys opened his eyes and stared at me for a long time. "You must be the new night guard," the boy said. I nodded hesitantly. He smiled. He had curly brown hair, dark skin, and brown eyes. He led me into a deeper part of the cave and stopped at a ginormous pink and orange polka-dotted dragon.
"That's Mishu," said the boy.
"Oh. Wow, do we guard him?" I asked, staring up at the huge beast.
"You must be from far away. He is King Mishu, our village king. I am Dottru, I will be your guide to the village."


TO BE CONTINUED...

Chapter 9: A Happy Ending.

A man with a long, white beard approached us. Everyone stood there, silently. Finally, he spoke.
"Who are you?" asked the man.
"We were stranded on this island after an incident with our cruise boat" answered my mother.
The man though for a moment. Finally he said, "I can not fit all of you onto my ship but I can take you in groups. Will you accept this offer?" asked the man.
Although this man was a stranger and usually my mom says don't talk to strangers and everything but we were all desperate so I accepted the offer on behalf of the group. Everyone gasped and started arguing so the man stepped in. "I am Captain Jameson McHearty. If you all don't trust me, which is fair, I will just be on my way. These waters are barely sailed, so good luck finding another rescuer within the next two years!" The Captain said. He was walking to his boat when some kid gulped and said. "Two years!?".
Captain Jameson nodded and my mom grabbed my arm and my sisters and led us toward the ship. We sailed to a nearby town's dock and the Captain said we were on our own to find transportation now. He left to go get some more of the group and me and my family headed toward the police station.

A Month Later...


Well I'm home now, and feeling a lot better. We bought a small house by the beach and we're settled in now. We never did find the guy who ran away with our boat, but my mom's okay with that. Well gotta go now! Don't wanna end with a cheesy ending but...

The End!!

Chapter 8: A Plan

This morning is cold and wet. It's gonna be a long day, I can tell. I glance over at mom to see her fast asleep for the first night in months. She even has a smile on her face. Last night the whole group of us had a party to celebrate Mildred being okay, and us all making it this far. We all painted our faces and made hats and necklaces and hula skirts out of long grass and danced and sang around a ginormous bonfire. We had a feast. Well it was as good a feast as your gonna find in the middle of no where with no tools and no proper oven. Mom was the happiest I've seen her in along time, even though she was stranded on an island without her fiance and has been for 3 months.
I'm cold now, so I'm going to go sit by the fire. Pretty much everyone else is up now, I slept in. :)

Supper was delicious. Some sort of mixed juice and tons of fruit and plants. Bill cooked it this time so it wasn't burnt. I actually enjoyed it. But the biggest news of all is what happened after the food. We were all getting ready to take shelter for the night (the reason I didn't say sleep was because no one really sleeps.) when a huge boat cam across the ocean. We were prepared with a plan of what we would do if this ever happened so everyone ran to their stations. A couple guys made the fire smoky enough to signal them, and us kids and a few adults started spreading jackets, hats, rocks, fruit peels, and other bright things to spell SOS and capture the attention of the boat's captain. Some other people waved leaves in the air and shook the trees, and all the others held bright clothing in the air above their heads.

Suddenly, the boat came towards us.

CHAPTER 7: Doctor James

"Mildred, speak. Mildred, are you alright, dear? Mildred! Mildred?" her husband asks her. He's worried. Mom puts her pale hand on his shoulder and leads him (I think his name's Harold) away from the busy scene. She says this is best for him. I look around. The men in the woods look concern. They want to be over here helping, but they have to make breakfast. And collect food for lunch and dinner. I know Damien especially wants to be over here. Mildred is his Grandmother.
Suddenly, Mildred lurches and after a long period of silence.
"What is it??" I ask a man that is nearby.
"I'm not sure what she's got. Do me a favor, kid, go get James Cadron, he's a doctor," the man orders. I usually don't like people bossing me around, but I do as I'm told. I walk quickly over to the stretch of trees and search for a younger man, tall, brown hair and green eyes.
"James!" I call, and he comes over. He pulls his shirt back on and follows me over to Mildred where they need him. He takes a solid look at Mildred and then stares of into space, a stressed look in his eyes.
"Mildred, dear, how are you feeling?" James asks.
"No." replies Mildred.
"Is it your head? Does your head hurt?" James begins his series of 20 questions.
"No."
"Your stomach, Mildred, your belly?"
"Yes."
"Your going to throw up?"
Mildred doesn't even have time to answer before she spews all over the ground. People back up in disgust, but Mildred seems to feel better. It's just a laid back case of food poisoning or something. Mildred stands up and wanders over to find Harold and Damien and the rest of us go back to work. Mom stops James before he can go back to work.
"James, I have a new job in mind for you. Lots of people have injuries and illnesses, your the only doctor around here...are you up for it?'
"Yeah, that's great!" James agrees.
I feel safer now.

CHAPTER 6: A Strange New Friend.

The small fire crackles in front of me, and it is the only thing that allows me to see my own hand. I stare at Bethany. It's still dark. Neither one of us could actually sleep so I suggested we set up a fire, it was freezing out. I cross my arms across my chest. All I have is a T-shirt. Bethany stares at my shivering arms, goosebumps lining it.
"You cold?" she asks.
"You think?"
"You don't have to be rude about it."
"Why do you pick on me?"
There is silence between us. I try to break it with, "I'm sorry, I--" Bethany cuts me off.
"No, I'm sorry. I guess I pick on you because I'm jealous. I know what you're thinking. How could I be jealous? I have rich parents, no siblings, I'm popular, and I'm pretty. But that's the problem. My parents pay no attention to me and they're never home. I am always lonely, and have no one to hang out with or talk to. No one at school is my real friend, they like me because I'm rich. And well, the pretty part doesn't have much bad to it..."
There's silence again. I wiggle my finger in my ear and pull it out again, as if it's plugged. I can't believe what I just heard!
We talk a bit more. I start to like her, understand her. We have more than I thought in common. Our parents are both making big mistakes, mom marrying Dave, Bethany's parents don't spend time with her. Also, we both have sibling complaints, I have too many, she has none. We both have lots of friends and we are both pretty. We also both have old fashion names. She says I should call her Beth and I reply that she should call me Anna. We sit there until the sun just stretches over the horizon. Then we run back to our shelter and pretend nothing ever happened.

***

It's morning. Well it was morning when I came back from my time with Beth, but now it's my kind of morning. It's 8:30. I heard people start waking up at what I figured was about 4:00am. Then I fell asleep. Now I'm awake though, so I pull on mom's sweater and duck out from under the shelter. Mom had left her sweater there for when I woke up. She has a coat plus this sweater, so she can afford to loose it. I have nothing. It was sunny when we got stranded, so I had taken off my jacket. Taylor has a jacket, but it's thin and she doesn't like it because it's pretty ugly. But what choice does she have but wear it? That's my question. I look around. people are surrounding something in a large crowd. I run to get closer. It's an older lady, Mildred! I think she might be having a heart attack!

CHAPTER 4: Learning To Survive

"What are we going to do now, Captain Chapman?" my mother asks. Or captain scratches his head and shrugs.
"There's no dock or civilized island for miles now. An', no offense, Miss, but I doubt Mr. Tame is smart 'nough to sail for help or even to sail back 'ere to us. Guess we're gonna survive thin, ma'am," replies the captain, sadly.
He's probably right. David Alexander Tame would never be smart enough to do anything, really.
"I could use my cell phone!" yells a lady with white hair and a crooked smile that I don't know the name of.
" 'Fraid not, Mrs., no reception for a while now from as far as I can see," the captain looks around, searching.
We all sigh. I hug my mom and whisper, "I'm sorry.". It is only the morning still, of course, so there is no need to rush around for food or shelter or anything.
"Alright, then. Let's split up. It's not a big island so it's okay to do so. Young men all o' ages 13 to 31 can go look for things for a shelter. Ladies all can go lookin' for food. And other ones of you gents and ladies can find water, and set up things for camp. I'll help little bits o' everyone. Meet back 'ere when ya done."
Everyone heads off quickly so that the tasks can be completed before dark. I am off to help mom find some food, when this really mean niece of Dave's comes up to me.
"Um, Anna-Dork! Cover for me. I like would never be caught dead doing actual work, duh!" she snarks.
"Well, Bethany Lattiot, you will be dead if you don't do work, duh!" I snap at her.
I head off with mom and Taylor. We spent only a couple of hours picking berries, finding dead animals, picking fruit, and scraping moss off trees. We figure we should gather food for more than just one meal. Plus, we are gonna have to feed 100 people. So we gather the food in our shirts and purses, and bags, and arms, and anything else we have laying around. We bring it all back to the captain and he starts a fire with a couple other of the men. One of them is Gerald Lattiot, Bethany's dad. He isn't very good at making fires and it keeps smoking up. It takes 25 minutes to start a tiny fire. It's already 3:00 in the afternoon and no one has had lunch yet. Us ladies who gathered food ate a couple of berries, but that's it. So we start up our fire and the captain finds some pieces of scrap cardboard and a bunch of other stuff to cook the meat on. We pick through and find the ripest, cleanest, healthiest food we can. We also cook the bark. Only certain people get to eat fruit, usually the people that did the most work. Everyone gets a thin slice of meat and a handful of berries. The young kids and babies get the bark, because it is "good for growing". We cut the meat with some guy's pocket knife.

Turns out the shelter people did a pretty good job because every family gets their own mini shelter thing. It's made of sticks in a house shape. There are branches with leaves attached to hang over the top. Straw is weaved into the sticks to keep the rain out. Each family, no matter the number of people, gets one shelter. We also get 3 oranges in case we get hungry. We're able to keep everything safe under the shelter.

CHAPTER 3: Stuck.

Right now I am sitting above-deck staring out the back of the boat. After the party last night, Taylor came out to comfort me. I had run down to our room crying.
"Anna, she's just doing what she thinks is best for us!" she had said.
But I ignored her and didn't start thinking about that until now. What if mom was just marrying Dave for us. What if she just wanted us to have a father figure again? Couldn't she have just asked us if we wanted that figure to be Dave? Maybe things just aren't that simple anymore. I pick myself up and head over for some breakfast at the all-you-can-eat counter. I stuff my face with hash browns and bananas, I can feel myself getting chubbier and chubbier. Mom walks up beind me and rests her hands on my shoulders.
"Sweetie, I'm sorry. I thought--"
"I know what you thought, mom. But you thought wrong!" I start to yell, but something stops me.
All of a sudden, the boat comes to a halt. The captain orders Dave to anchor the boat and people swarm out like fruit flies at a garbage dump. Mom grabs a hold of my arm and tugs me over to the side of the boat. She points out at a beautiful little island forest surrounded my sparkling water. The water looks cleaner than the rest of the ocean. It's shallow too. Women begin pulling up there dresses a little bit and trudging through the water, which reaches up to their ankles.
"Anna! Down here!" Dave's sons yell at me--I don't even call them by their names anymore --and I follow the little metal ramp down to the water. I shove my shoes off and kick them onto the boat. Then I start to tippy-toe through the water as I get used to the icey temperature. Once every one has safely gotten onto the island, we all look around a bit and start to go back to the boat for our stuff. But as we move the water towards the boat with our feet, the boat begins to drift away, slower, and slower. Dave's on it to, he's trying to anchor it. But, since he was a first-time sailor, and his dad had done all the work on the way over here, he drifts away with the boat and can't get it back to us. We all watch the boat float away slowly, I am in shock. A couple of men attemp to swim after the boat, but even if they're aable to get to it, what will they do, there is nothing to climb onto or hold onto, and they are not strong enough to pull it. Mom comes up and squeezes me tight, she begins crying, and so does everyone else, as we face the truth: We're stuck.