Amazing Stories: Twinkle Dust

I walked across a bridge.

That's when things started to go wrong.

A car swerved to miss a dog, and the dog knocked a cyclist. The cyclist hit me and I swung my school bag as I fell backwards. I let go! It fell into the river and floated away.

Now I was in trouble. All my class mates. And the Principal. Floating down the river. They might drown! I'd be arrested for mass murder! The electric chair. Shot. Something worse!

I ran after them.

The river was quite slow, but the bag stayed in the middle. It floated quite well. I hoped it wasn't filling with water.

Then the match boxes started to come out. One by one. Bobbing along near the bag. All twenty-three of them. And the red one.

I ran along the side of the river. I had to cross roads. Go round people. Get through road-works. It was pretty hectic. The boxes were all out of the bag now, spreading out along the middle of the river. Some of them were sinking. I had to wade in and catch them.

Mum wouldn't have wanted to see me then. I was up to my waist in water. If I'd been as tall as my class mates the water would have come up to my knees. But I was short. Everything was higher and taller for me.

I gathered the boxes. Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three. One missing.

Where was it?

I saw a huge dog chasing a stick. A man threw the stick into the river. The dog jumped in and swam to get it. The dog saw the missing match box and grabbed it with its mouth.

Then I realized which box it was. The red one. The dog had the Principal in its mouth!

"Drop it, boy!" I called. "Come on, there's a good dog!"