cleaning can be fun

So, my bedroom has always been a bit of a pigsty, but even if it appears slightly tidy on the surface, underneath it is a surging muckheap of bad writing. Because in less than three weeks I am moving to Australia for five months, and because while I am gone it is quite likely my father will accomodate family (siblings, nephews, nieces) in my room, and because my family can be quite nosy - I am expunging my room of all potentially embarrassing elements.

Mostly, I have kept exercise books and papers and drawings and folders full of terrible stories I wrote from about ages ten through sixteen. It has been a revealing few days, and I am extremely happy that I did not die at age sixteen, with a lifework left behind me of terrible romances involving characters based on myself and my current favourite rock star/actor, Babysitter's Club fanfiction, and thinly veiled copies of other people's writing.

Today, however, I found something that I thought I would share. They are two very short stories that I and two friends wrote at school when we were bored - you know those stories where you only get to see a line of what the last person wrote? or where you are given one first sentence and have to see where it goes from there? This is the result:

No. 1: written in Classics, 2004, by Allie, Rebecca and Katie - only allowed to see the last line of what the previous person wrote:

Once upon a time when Tommy the Toad was skipping joyfully through the forest, admiring the pretty flowers and the tall trees, he stopped short and froze, dazzled at the sight before him. Through the trees, a goddess-like figure stood, tall, blonde and with an incredible inner radiance that seemed to shine from her very skin. Suddenly, in ethereal, heavenly tones she spoke to him. And as she did so, her heart was thumping and she felt as if every blood cell in her body were having a giant race to her head.
And she blushed. She couldn't help it. His eyes were so warm, so loving... She lowered hers bashfully. He found her irresistible. But then, summoning all of his willpower, he turned away from her. "I'm sorry, but you know as well as I do that this can never be." And ignoring her doleful stare, he continued to walk on through the forest.
She was lost. There was no denying it. The heavy boughs of the trees leaned in on her imposingly and the wind played tricks with the leaves. She continued walking in circles. She began to run in circles, screaming abuses at the sky. "Why? Why?!! WHY?!?!" she shrieked. "How could he do this to me? I feel so alone." And she sank down to her knees, tears plopping onto the forest floor.
The sultry maiden knew, in that moment, why it could never be, and although it nearly destroyed her inside, she accepted it, and remembered her magical goddess powers. With these powers, she would be able to get free of this awful jungle! She closed her eyes, formed two identical circles with her thumbs and forefingers, and felt her body depart from the earth. She was rising; rising above the tree-tops. She could feel the hot sun on her face as she hovered inches above the forest.
And suddenly Colin Firth appeared. "YAY!" she cried. "Now I can marry you!"
"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm in love with Allie." And with that, he got on his horse, and rode off into the sunset.

No. 2: written in English class, 2004, by Allie, Rachel and Katie, with the first phrase, 'The crumpled paper fell to the floor'.

The crumpled paper fell to the floor. "It's terrible," said Joe, without a shadow of compassion. "Boring, average, lethargic, slow-moving... Don't even start again. Leave the paper on the floor, go home, ponder life if you must, but don't write anything else until you know how to write one mildly interesting sentence."
"I thought you'd be nice about it," said Matilda forlornly. "I was inspired to write that!"
"You asked me for my honest opinion, Matilda, and it sucks," said Joe, just as ruthlessly as before.
"Can you not even just show me a glimpse of hope for my future in writing? All you ever do, Joe, is run me down and it creates in me such a feeling of worthlessness," Matilda replied in between sobs.
"I'm sorry, but you have no future in writing."
"I do!" screamed Matilda, picking up the crumpled paper off the floor, and chucking it in his face.
Joe's temper, never good even at the best of times, snapped. In a complete rage, he picked up the closest thing to hand, a phone, and smashed it with alarming force onto Matilda's skull. She dropped like a dead weight, and Joe followed her, dropping to his knees.
"Oh crap. What have I done?" he moaned in anguish.
In that moment of rage Joe had done something he should have never. Anyway he was the teacher, the adult, the older one, and the more mature one he should have been. But no he had destroyed his reputation in that single incident. Matilda is dead. Joe is left unemployed and with a scar on his conscience which will never fade.

There were a few other stories my friend Sarah and I used to write in History in 2002, but they are just so dirty that I'm not particularly eager to share them with the world!