I

n

t

o

my

Creative

Mind

By: Kaitlin Gabbard

“Into my

creative mind”

2012-2013

Kaitlin Gabbard

Published at Huntsville School District Huntsville, AR May 8, 2013

I dedicate this book to my friends Aaron Lewallen, Tabitha Corbitt,

and Nichole Simms. They inspired many of the stories, just with some name changes.

Table of Contents

Dedication Page 1

Part 1 2 Fire 3 Echo 4 Train Tragedy 5 Hurricane Sandy 6 Sanity Rock 7

Part 2 8 Interrogation 9 Spring Break 10 Paintball War 11 Castaway 12 Game Rage 13

Part 3 14 Coffee Burst 15 Solo and Ensemble 16 Growing Up 17 Changing the Outcome 18 Jury Duty 19

Part 1

This section of the Anthology represents deeper and more reality-related pieces that were written. This section has devastation, tragedies, wars, and terrible weather destructions. Part 1 consists of “Fire”, “Echo”, “Train Tragedy”, “Hurricane Sandy”, and “Sanity Rock”. The story “Fire” is a true story. I wrote “Fire” the day after it burned.

Fire

Silence, everything is still. The dogs are asleep on the couch, and no one else is in the house. A single electrical spark, followed by a small flame swirls to life. The freezer bursts with the gleaming glow of the treacherous fire, then the washer and dryer. Cabinets char, and plastic melts. One room down, nine to go. The parent’s bedroom catches fire, and the fire dances with joy. Four rooms down, six to go.

Pictures melting, TVs burning, and memories being lost within the depths of the fire. A person comes down the road, and they know the dogs and house well. She bolted to the front door and called the dogs out. She calls the fire department. They extinguish the fire, but it’s too late. The only thing left standing was the two kid’s rooms. Devastation was in the air that day.

The firemen are gone, and the observers leave. The family was slowly starting to move on, and the kids are just getting to the place they once called home, which is now a hollow shell of devastation. The family all walks through the destruction, gazing through walls, picking up old burnt family photos of happy times, thinking if the people in the picture knew about this, they wouldn’t be smiling. The family looks through the old storage room, seeing nothing untouched. But in the corner, covered in rubble, was the old chest, which contained all of the grandfather’s old belongings, who died of cancer a year before, was bright in the dark house. Like hope, in a world full of tragedy.

Echo

The roaring of bullets travel through the air like a rocket. Rocket launchers, be stealthy, listen closely now.

Now, the time has come to defeat the enemy. Enemy lines are in front of us now, one more step.

One more step…

We carry our arsenal, all loaded and ready. Ready, we walk a step, weapons ready to meet the target.

Targets everywhere, snipers, we streak havoc to get victory. Victory is awaiting, awaiting on the other side.

Other side…

Train Tragedy

I didn’t know exactly where the train was going. After paying my fare, I simply stood on the platform waiting for it to whisk me away to somewhere, anywhere from here. And that’s when it happened. The rumbling urges deep within, and the burning sensation coming through the darkness of my soul and filled my mind. No, not here, not now. I got to get off the train, away from the people. It gets closer, that monster slowly finding its way out of the dark abyss of the mind. Why does it come to haunt me now? In front of all of these innocent people who did nothing wrong? I can’t do it, not again. Screams fill the car, as a waitress falls to the ground. Here we go again.

Hurricane sandy

The sun was shining, the birds were chirping a little song, and the leaves were an elegant green. The squirrels were playing with their friends, the clouds were a sparkling white silk, and picnics were covering the whole park. It was a joyous day. Then, everything turned for the worst. The clouds turned to coal, the leaves turned a deathly gray, and the sun turned to stone. The squirrels and birds fleeted the scene, and people threw down what they were doing, screamed, and bolted, leaving their stuff. A giant dark shadow rose through the mist and the children gawked at the line of darkness that quickly maneuvered to the streets. You could hear sirens screaming through the town, as hurricane Sandy hurled towards them.

Sanity Rock

There was once a little girl in a city called Sparta. She was fourteen years old, and she was tall, with blond hair and blue eyes. She carried around a stone. It was different from the ones that she saw by her city walls. This one was smooth, while the others were rough. They all used to be smooth, but as the Spartan soldiers began invading other cities, the stones became more and more ragged. She cherished this stone. She saw more in it than just a rock. One day, as the soldiers came back inside the walls, she noticed they didn’t look the same. They left with scared but determined eyes, but the eyes they came back with were ones of savages. They all bolted, screaming and chanting towards the palace of the king. You could hear a shriek, then silence followed by cheering, as her stone turned rough.

Part 2

This section of the anthology is more of the fun writings. It has some mystery mixed into it, and some fun parts of my everyday life. This section includes “Interrogation”, “Spring Break”, “Paintball War”, “Castaway”, and “Game Rage”. Almost all of the works are freestyle, so most of them are from deep in my mind. The ones that are not freestyle are from my everyday life.

Interrogation

A concrete room surrounds me, and a single bright light cloaks the table between me and the officer. “Why did you do it?” I am handcuffed to the table. They think that I can’t get out of them. I can, and the officer knows that. He is one of me. I was just ignorant enough to get caught. Poor guy, I know he wants to let me go. What I did was just an essential part of survival. “Are you going to answer?” Luckily, no one was able to hear the conversation but us, even though they are looking through sound proof glass. “You know what I did, but you are obligated to hold me here,” I replied. He let out a long, deep sigh and said, “I know, but they don’t understand what happened.” He gestured to the people through the window. “look,” he hesitated, “ I have a way to get you out of here, but we will have to do it right now.” He whispered into my ear what the plan was. Time for action.

Spring Break

The things I needed to take a break from school were just my older brother and our imagination. Our imagination built a catapult and a dam, getting us into some slight trouble. We got in trouble for almost hitting Aunt Misty’s house with a rock, and for damming up the creek the cows drink out of. Another item we needed was a baseball bat. We put giant craters in our old rooms, and since the house burned, we didn’t get in trouble. At one point of that moment, Austin and I were on separate sides of a wall, and we both hit at the same time, and Austin almost got hit with a baseball bat on the head. It was nice to have a week of just relaxing.

Paintball War

I couldn’t ask for a better day. Here I was, hoping Austin would find me in the deep forest, so I could pelt him with paintballs. What better way could you spend an afternoon? I sat there, still, waiting to sense his presence. A crunch of a leaf, and another. I got my gun ready. I see something move, so I lift my gun, cock it, and fire, hitting him in the forehead.

Castaway

To me, being a castaway is something to celebrate. You have freedom, no rules, and it is a chance to be creative. Luckily, I have a partner in this freedom. Her name is Lilly. I am in charge of the hunting, fire, and building.. She gathers fruits, gets drinking water, and she is a gardener. She helps with the hunting a bit, but I do most of it. The huts are made out of the metal from the destroyed boat. We were sitting around a fire one night, when we heard a loud crash, which sounded like it was just a few yards away. We left it alone for that night, and went into our huts. That morning, we went and searched for the source of the noise. We found a boat just off the shore. A girl crawled out of the boat, tired and dazed. She looked at us and said, “where am I?” Lilly replied, “you are on the island of the castaways.”

Game Rage

Guns firing and people are shouting a language I can’t speak. The opposing side is an army from Germany. Mine is from Russia, battling it out on a well-demolished city. Millions dead already, and only five left on each side. I take out two of his members with a rocket launcher, and he takes out one of my members. He kills the rest of my team, leaving me. I take out the last three men of his team, leaving him, defenseless. We battle it out, one shooting in sync with the other, missing most of the time. Finally, one bullet meets the target. He falls with a thud. Austin throws down the remote controller and storms off.

Part 3

This section contains works that contain my personal opinions, my school life, and my hobby goals. The section contains “Coffee Burst”, “Growing Up”, “Changing the Outcome”, and “Jury Duty”. This part of the anthology is showing how I think about the world and how I think it should work. This would come from the surface of my mind. Other than “Coffee Burst”, the writings in this section are not funny, but more political.

Coffee burst

Lilly and I were sitting at lunch, when out of the blew, a sudden burst of energy came through her. I asked her if she was ok, but all I could get out of her was laughing. Then, that’s when I saw the coffee can in her hand. On our way out of lunch, she had a lot of people staring at her. She was laughing hysterically. When we reached the English room, Mrs. Sullivan gave her a weird look. She skipped to her seat, and plopped down in her seat fast, almost tipping it over. That was a long class.

Solo and Ensemble

A time in my life where I had to work hard and focus was when I was in seventh grade band. Solo and Ensemble came around, and it was a week away. I had gotten three pieces of music that Monday, and I was expected to learn all of them by Friday. I had to practice two hours or more each day, and then Friday came. I was waiting by the judging rooms, the minutes felt like hours, seconds like minutes. They call my name. I go in, and play almost perfectly. I repeated this two more times, all different judging rooms. We loaded the bus, and Mr. Bowlin told us what we got. I got a one, one, and a two. I got really excited. Hard work really does pay off.

Growing up

Saxon was just a normal ten year old boy. The only problem was, he wanted to be an adult. He wanted to rush the growing process because he thought that it would be fun. Eleven years later, Saxon had gotton a job, a family, and bills. He realized that being an adult wasn’t much fun. Exept for the little things.

Changing the

outcome

I think that if one person would try to change the outcome of a situation, I think they would lose. The reason I think that is because most people are stubborn. Most will stick with their own opinion because they think that if they choose another, it would be wrong. So most of the people are stubborn. Every once and a while, you may get a person who is willing to collaborate and listen. These people are the ones that sometimes see like a detective. But some are just ignorant, or believe anything they hear and think it is true.

Jury Duty

I think that people in court should be given the benefit of the doubt. They shouldn’t be accused of doing something they may not have done. To me, unless you actually saw them doing it, you shouldn’t accuse someone because of a rumor. The desire to punish is something that almost everybody struggles with at one point in time, including me. I don’t try to punish people if I didn’t see them do it. If your friend tells you a very personal secret that they would get in trouble for, would you go tell people? You would be a lot better off by serving justice for something you actually saw, not heard.