This is being posted for a friend of mine. Yes, I know it’s stupid and trite. Feel free to laugh. I know I do.

I hope you like it, Rino. ;)

Big Things in Small Packages

“Don’t go, ReeRee!”

A young boy of six ran to his best friend and doubled over when he got to her from the exertion of running all the way across the street. “Don’t go,” he repeated as he straightened up from his crouch. “We don’t need that Frisbee anyways.”

Renee turned away from the old house in looming in front of them with her hands on her hips and a huff. “Come on, Davie! That’s your favorite Frisbee in there! We gotta get it!”

“But ReeRee…” David looked up at the decrepit building with a mixture of longing and fear. He shuddered once and continued: “We can’t go in there! You know we can’t! We’ll get in trouble.”

She sucked on one of her pigtails for a moment, thinking hard about their dilemma. Then, coming to a decision, she spat out the blond hair and looked at her friend gravely. “It’s okay if you dun wanna go,” she said as quietly as an energetic child can. She hugged her friend once and turned to face the house once more. “I got it in there, I gotta get it out.”

David looked at the dark house, the thing that was every child’s nightmare incarnate, and then he glanced back at Renee. “But…”

But Renee could no longer hear her friend; she had already pushed the wrought iron gate in and was walking through the jungle of snarled weeds that covered the front lawn. Shards of green glass from broken beer bottles shone like malicious teeth hiding in wait sprinkled throughout the grass and lying on the porch. The house’s façade was charred from some long-ago fire which made it look as if it were scaled like some great and terrible dragon. The windows were barred with stark iron bars, as if to keep people out.

Or to keep something in.

A fierce breeze sprang up out of nowhere and yanked at the young girl’s clothes with fingers cold as ice. She shivered and clutched herself in a futile attempt to keep warm as she continued walking. The wind grew stronger the closer she got to the house’s door. A dead tree’s branches scraped against what was left of a shattered windowpane. It created a thin descant to the wind’s howled warning.

“Go back from here,” it seemed to moan as the house yawned and gaped at its young visitor. “You don’t belong here!”

Heedless of the tripping plants and sharp glass, Renee ran the last few feet to the front porch and the open door. She cowered against the door frame as the house shook under the onslaught of air. When nothing came out of the shadows to attack her, she looked up for a second.

For a moment, it seemed as if she could no longer see the road; the only things she could see were the wild, thorn-infested weeds and the sharp-edged glass daggers. For a moment, she had lost sight of the road and the comfort of her home just across the street.

For a moment, it looked as if she could not possibly go another step.

But the wind, preparing to redouble its attack upon the sleeping dragon of a house, slacked off for the briefest of seconds: a mere heartbeat’s worth of time, the space of a blink. In that time, Renee could suddenly see the street and David, who clutching at the black iron railings and staring in single-minded purpose at the house as only a six year can.

She took a deep breath to call encouragement to her friend, and her brief respite from the assault was over. The gale came back screaming louder than ever, whistling between the gaps in the porch railing to beat against the frail scrap of humanity crouching defenseless there. Renee was no longer defenseless, however. She quickly stood as straight and tall as her three foot seven inch frame would allow and turned so she was facing the empty door frame and the inside of the house. She couldn’t give up so easily! Someone was depending on her.

Someone needed her, and she couldn’t afford to let them down.

Renee took a moment to steel herself against the unknown terrors that awaited her in the gloomy interior. With one last look in David’s direction, she plunged out of the screaming wind and into the belly of the beast.

For a few frantic heartbeats, she could not see anything. The darkness draped across every surface like a heavy brocade curtain. Renee felt like she couldn’t breathe from the weight; it was as if her lungs had turned to lead. Before long, she would start reeling…

A particularly sharp jolt of air suddenly burst through the door frame. Its cold bite was a slap to her senses. Quickly, before the dark could overwhelm her once more, she stepped further into the room. Her eyes darted around the now visible lower floor, roaming across overturned wooden chairs and peering through the black skeletons of long-since crumbled walls. As she continued to examine her surroundings, she discovered that light was everywhere: through the cracked walls, the murky, shattered windows, even the door hole through which she’d come shed a little light on her dark predicament.

One light source in particular interested her. On the floor to her right was a thin rectangular point of light. But this light was not the dim blue illumination of a tempest-tossed twilight. It was, quite definitely, the special artificial red light of glow-in-the-dark paint, the tint of which that was only ever seen with a certain evil Sith Lord.

Renee was never so happy to see Darth Vader as she was at that moment.

Unable to contain a cry of delight, she ran the five feet to David’s special Frisbee and bent to pick it up. It was then that she saw there were two extra lights directly above Vader’s lightsaber. Ones that she didn’t remember seeing while she had been playing with it that very afternoon before a freak wind had blown the disk here. Perhaps the most surprising thing about these lights was that they could squeak. They also had lovingly curled a fleshy pink tail around the rim.

Renee screamed and jumped back, terrified, as the huge black rat that had taken up residence on the Frisbee let loose an answering squeal. She moaned in despair as she stared hopelessly at the rodent. If a rat had David’s disk, how could she get it back now?

The rat cocked its head and regarded her curiously. It looked so much like Renee’s puppy dog begging for a treat that she almost laughed in spite of her misery. The rat’s attitude gave her an idea, however, and she quietly spat the bubble gum that she’d been munching on all day into her hand. Silently she offered the small fuchsia pile to the hairy beast. Her hand trembled in her effort to stay still and not run away screaming.

The rat looked at her offering as if debating whether the gum was worthy of it. It then scrambled off the Frisbee to snatch the treat from Renee’s outstretched palm. It scurried off into the dark of the house as Renee quickly grabbed the hard-won disc and walked back to the door frame. When she glanced back one last time, she caught a final glimpse of two glowing beady eyes and a pink stain across a coal-black muzzle as a muffled squeak could be heard above the squalling wind.

She jumped down the steps two a time in her haste to return to David. The wind thrust her from the brooding house and tugged her along the trail she’d plowed out when she’d first made her way to the porch. “You’ve got your prize,” the air rang out grudgingly. “Now leave us be!”

“ReeRee!” David screeched in ecstasy while Renee banged the gate closed behind her. He hugged his bud enthusiastically (oblivious to the bloody scratches on her hands from the weeds) before looking around expectantly.

Renee giggled at her friend’s one-track mind and held out the Star Wars Frisbee. David snatched it away and cradled it to his chest, murmuring reassuringly to the traumatized piece of plastic. Eager to get out of the freezing air, Renee waved goodbye to her friend and started to race home.

“Hey ReeRee!” David shouted to the girl who’d helped him. His words were carried to Renee on the wind, little more than a breeze by now. She turned to face him from her front porch with the front door half open. “Thanks a lot! You rock!”

Renee grinned and waved again in acknowledgement of his belated epiphany. She then proceeded to dash into her house for a well-deserved nap in her warm and bright bed with all thought of a dragon house already banished from her six-year-old mind.