Meet The Newly Teens | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: Meet The Newly Teens | Previous Challenge Entry
By Fiona Dorothy Stevenson
07/19/09
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It was a new year, a new town, a new church. With trepidation and excitement, the pastor and his family moved into the church house. The boys left their parents to unpack while they explored the garden and environs.

Let me introduce them: Will was fourteen, a well-built lad with a voice that alternated sometimes between tremulous tenor and basso profundo. In between these unaccountable changes his pleasant boy’s voice returned. Once their father had explained this as a factor of adolescence, the boys accepted it without further comment, although the effects were often quite comic.

Laurie was thirteen, with a nose like a ski slide. He had merry eyes, a very wide smile, and a built-in resistance to chores.

Louis, Tim and Jim were aged between ten years and seven, a busy, inventive trio with insatiable appetites for fun and food.

Those first weeks involved many visits to church members homes, becoming acquainted with the people and the district. This was rural, a widespread farming and mining area. One of the first to be visited was the Sprat family. Charles owned a sand-mining operation and their home was on the mine property. Charles and Melissa had two daughters. Antoinette, the thirteen year old, was classically pretty with short, dark hair. Marty had a mass of tawny curls and a pert nose. She was twelve.

In preparation for the visit, Will and Laurie were frenziedly indecisive about what to wear. Time was growing short and their bedroom resembled a jumble sale. Mother made the decision. Laurie scowled and Will’s voice ascended and descended the scales until he refused to answer anyone.

In the Sprat household, the girls wandered restlessly from window to window while father tried to read the paper and mother prepared for their guests. Charles shook his paper at the girls, suggesting that they should either help their mother or read a book. Their constant movement was unsettling him. Antoinette explained that they were checking to make sure there were no snakes in the garden.

The half-hour journey to the mine property gave the boys time to relax. Will’s voice returned to normal. Laurie regained his wide smile and cheerful disposition. The younger three kept up their barrage of observations about the passing scene.

At last the car stopped with a flurry of dusty wheels before the mine gate. Will and Laurie had spit polished their shoes. Louis was deputed to open and close the gate. Another two hundred yards and they stopped in front of the house.

Charles strolled onto the verandah to welcome the family pouring from the car. “Girls,” he called over his shoulder, “the snakes have arrived!”

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