Tease!

I haven't done one of these in a while and I've missed it, so I'm posting one again! Remember to enter my Hundred Followers Contest which closes on the 20th.

Now for the tease! :D

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Someone burned down the scouts’ clubhouse last night and now the entire town smells like toast.

I walk down the sidewalk, breathing in the charred air on my way to school. It’s only seven o’clock, but this is Hunter – everyone here wakes up ridiculously early, must be something in the water – so people potter around watering their already blooming gardens, early morning dew drizzling their shoulders.

Sleep rests in the corners of their bleary eyes, and Monday mornings are like that, I guess. But Mrs. Summerfelt’s laugh lines aren’t etched into their usual position, and Mr. Crayburn isn’t wearing his red hunting hat.

The scouts’ hall burning down in and of itself wouldn’t be that scary, but it wasn’t the first building to go.

I pick up a stick and trail the deadened wood over the pavement. It clacks into the gaps and crevices where I refuse to let my red converse sneakers fall. Dirt trails over the pavement behind me in a straight line. Dark. Almost the same colour as the smoke that’s come from the buildings.

The first building to go was the tennis court clubhouse.

Then there was the ladies’ bathrooms by the field next to the local pool.

A couple nights ago I met up with my best friend Leah to get ice cream. As I walked home, the post boxes were orange, flared torches in the dark.

The entire town of Hunter’s been smelling like toast for a while now.

Leah's waiting for me at the top of my street, so we can walk together as always. Her nose is wrinkled and instead of saying good morning like a sane person, she says, “Club house burns down and my parents automatically think that the arsonist’s targeting the children. God. How come no one said they were targeting the letters when they got the post boxes?”

Seven o’clock is way too early for eye rolling, so I answer as sincerely as possible. “Post boxes are expendable, children are not.”