WHAT
DRAMA!
WHAT
TALENT!WAITFOR ME!WINNERS
APRIL 2019 STORY CONTEST
To the RescueFirst prize 10 and under
Ayat Jaffar, age 9
Avon, OH
Helping Out
Over winter break, I went to Umrah. Umrah is an
Islamic Pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia. I went with
my mom, dad, and older sister. We went around a big
black stone and between two big mountains seven times
each in memory of Prophet Abraham and his wife.
Our family and other families who had also come all
the way from the United States were all set to do Umrah.
We each got our own headphones so we could stay in
contact with our religious leader, who would guide us in
prayers.
Suddenly, I saw a mother and her son looking very
sad and gloomy. “What’s wrong?” I asked them.
They explained to me that they had not gotten a set
of headphones because there were none left. Therefore,
they would not be able to hear or follow the group lead-
ers. The mom was almost in tears since she had come all
this way, and now she couldn’t even complete Umrah,
which is done only once in a lifetime.
My mom consoled her, but she was still very
sad. I whispered to my mom, “I could give her my
headphones.”
When my mother offered my headphones to the
women, she immediately became very glad and excited.
She could not believe that I had been willing to offer
them to her. I explained that since I was so little, the
headphones were actually too big for my tiny ears. I
would not be able to use them anyway. It is not manda-
tory for children to do Umrah, but I would be able to
follow my mother and repeat after her.
After we f inished our Umrah, the lady hugged and
kissed me, thanking me for my generosity. We all had
dinner together where she thanked me again, her eyes
tearing up. This time, they were tears of joy.
Hopefully one day I will be able to experience Umrah
for myself, but for now, I am glad that I was able to help
someone in need.
First prize 11 and up
Penelope King, age 11
Pittsburgh, PA
One Man’s Trash
Almost.
Fingers tingling with anticipation, I looked up toward
the dreary, smoke-f illed sky and back again. It was
almost nightfall. Impatient, I hopped over slick tiles until I
reached my home. It only consisted of two roofs overlap-
ping with a tattered blanket on it, but it was home. I slid
in and checked the marks on the wall. Thirty scratches. It
should come tonight.
Creak.
I darted over to the edge of the roof and looked
down. The door was opening now. Yes! Slowly, ever so
slowly, a dark f igure emerged, hauling a huge load in a
tarp. Dumping the tarp into the dumpster, the f igure
disappeared inside.
I knew I should wait until the sun set, but I was too
impatient. I followed my usual path. Slide down gutter,
land on brick jutting out, jump to trashcan, and slide to
the ground.
Crouching behind the dumpster, I smiled. It had
come. I hurriedly sprang up and grabbed the tarp, not
filled with gems or money, but with...
Footsteps pattered toward me. There was nowhere
to hide. Letting go of the tarp and its precious contents, I
scuttled behind a corner. A boy. I exhaled in relief; it was
only a kid. A thief, by the looks of him. Peering around
the corner, I spotted him rooting through the dumpster.
Thankfully, he lifted the tarp up and collected what he
was after from underneath. He f illed a burlap sack with
half-rotten fruit and left.I grabbed my treasure and darted back up to the
roof, heart still pounding from the close encounter.
When I was safe in my corner, I opened the tarp to f ind... books. My treasure. I picked one called The Wind in
the Willows and opened it. Shivering in my only home, I
began to read.
Second prize 10 and under
Meera Solanki, age 10
Sacramento, CA
Seven Ducklings
It all started when I had just gotten home from school.
There were utility workers doing things with the pipes
when my mom and I spotted a mother duck and four duck-
lings circling around a sewer drain. We set out some water
and watched them for a bit, then went inside our home.
Shortly after, I saw my neighbor Eva and her mom
and some of the utility workers near the ducklings. So my
mom and I went back outside to f ind one of the utility
workers down in the sewer rescuing three more duck-
lings trapped in the sewer line.
While this was happening, the father duck f lew over,
but once the ducklings were out he f lew away. We then
put all seven ducklings in a basket, hoping the mother
duck would follow to the park, where there is a pond, but
she didn’t.
So we decided to let the ducklings out and see what
happened. The mother duck started to lead her seven
ducklings down the street. (She seemed very conf ident
in where she was going.)
My mom and I followed and on the way named a
couple of the ducklings. One we named Free Ranger,
because the duckling would not stay in the line. Another
we named Itchy, because that duckling kept stopping to
scratch itself.
We helped the duck family cross a busy road and
tried to coax them toward the park, but the mother duck