BUCKEYE VALLEY MIDDLE SCHOOL NEWSLETTER

Language Arts Spotlight

We’d like to congratulate Shirley Stansted for winning our 6th Grade Flash Fiction Contest! She was presented with the “Golden Typewriter Trophy” at the ceremony last Wednesday night. Shirley and her family also won a free steak dinner at Meat Habit on Sandusky street who, by the way, is one of BVMS’s favorite boosters. Also, as part of the prize package, Shirley gets to have her story published in this newsletter! So without further ado, allow us to present you with the winner of the 6th Grade Flash Fiction Contest!

“New Gear” by Shirley Stansted

Danny’s favorite day of the year was always the first day back to school because he got to see all of his friends and show everyone his new clothes and school supplies. On the first day of school this year, Danny and Cindy were the first kids to show up to Mrs. Flannigan’s homeroom. They both had their new backpacks, lunchboxes and bullet-proof vests. They gave each other a high-five and said “Back to school!”

They sat at their desks and waited for the others to arrive. Danny couldn’t keep quiet so he held up his blue, K-Mart backpack and said “Look at this bad boy!” Cindy cringed and said “That’s all you got?” She held up her fancy, white leather backpack and said “Mine is expensive!”

Lucy walked in with her new backpack, lunchbox, and bullet-proof vest. Cindy’s eyes turned big and said “Hey no fair! You have Kylo Ren on your vest!” Lucy smiled with pride and said “Any shooter will think twice before provoking the wrath of Kylo Ren,” then sat at her desk.

Tommy walked in with his backpack hanging from his shoulder, but it wasn’t much of a backpack. It looked more like a ratty, grey pouch from a thrift shop. He wore a homemade bullet proof vest that was made of two thick, rotten phone books connected to ropes that hung over his shoulders, covering his chest and back.

“Nice vest!” Cindy shouted, as Tommy took his seat. They all laughed and pointed at Tommy who wrinkled his face and said “Aw maaan. Don’t laugh. Mom couldn’t afford a nice one.”

Everyone looked to the door as Chad entered. Lucy shouted “Hey look, Chad has his vest turned inside-out!” Everyone else responded with ”Wow cool!”

“Wait, I thought we weren’t allowed to wear our vest inside-out,” Danny said. To which everyone else exploded with “Even cooler!” They all turned their vests inside-out, except for Tommy, who had trouble flipping his phone books around and said “Aw maaan. Can someone help with the back?” Danny walked over and flipped it around.

Frank entered with his new backpack, lunchbox and vest and said “Who cares about vests. Did you guys get new thermoses with your lunchboxes?” Cindy pulled her thermos from her lunchbox, held it high and said “Yep, tomato bisque!” Danny followed Cindy’s lead and pulled out his thermos and said “Chocolate milk!” Lucy did the same and said “Rubbing alcohol!” Then she pulled out a pair of long tube-socks and said “So I can clean my wounds, then tie off the blood-flow!”

“Hey that’s a good idea, but check this out,” Frank said. He opened his lunchbox and pulled out a bunch of large packets of freeze-dried food and said “In case we have an extra-long hostage situation!” Cindy shook her head and said “That ain’t nothing.” She held up her lunch box that had a big, square patch of some sort of hard sticky substance. “What is that?” Chad asked. Cindy scratched the substance and shoved the lunchbox under Chad’s nose. He almost barfed from the smell. Cindy laughed and said “It’s Scratch & Sniff Chloroform! So I can make myself pass out if things get too stressful!”

“What about you, Tommy? What kind of thermos you got?” Frank asked.

“Aw Maaan,” Tommy said, then reached into his pouch, but instead of pulling out a lunchbox, he removed a flimsy, brown, paper sack. He dumped the sack onto his desk, and out came a can of tuna, a plastic fork, and an empty styrofoam cup for water.

Stephanie walked in and stood at the front of the class and waited for everyone’s attention. Once everyone was looking at her, she slowly lifted her pant-legs to show off her new shoes. Danny shouted “Hey look, Stephanie has the new Non-Slip-In-Bodily-Fluid-Jordans!” Stephanie reached down and pressed a button on her shoe, which made the soles light-up and said “So I can see where I’m stepping in the dark!” Cindy groaned “Such a show-off.”

“What about you, Tommy? What kind of shoes you got?” Stephanie asked. “Aw maaan,” Tommy said, then frowned as he lifted his feet to show his raggidy flip-flops.

Everyone flinched, as a loud, piercing alarm bell sounded, followed by blinding, red, flashing lights. “Wowzers, we have an early bird attacker!” Frank said. “Cool, he didn’t even wait till first period!” Cindy shouted. Lucy chimed in with “Yay we get to try out our new gear!”

“Aw maaan,” said Tommy.

Chad stood up and said “I guess this is as good a time as any. Cindy, will you go to the homecoming dance with me?” Cindy jumped to her feet and ran towards Chad shouting “Yes yes yes!” They french kissed. Chad’s tongue looked weird when it came out of her mouth and onto her cheek.

At that very moment, Mrs. Flannigan ran into the room. She was out of breath and her face had a look of panic. She seemed really scared and screamed at the top of her lungs “Chad and Cindy! You have Saturday school for public displays of affection!”

THE END

We’d like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that our annual Pancake Day is coming up in two weeks and we’d love to have a rotation of volunteers in-place to help keep everyone nice and full throughout the day. It would be especially appreciated if someone could be at the tent by 6:30am on Saturday to help Roger and Sue unload the crates of eggs that they are so kindly donating.