Ranger was holding a large cast iron pipe he had found earlier in a the ditch he was playing in. The pipe had already been threaded in an apparent attempt to use the pipe to transport natural gas from the meter to some sort of heating device in a house. If the pipe hadn't been painted red it would not have seemed so out of the ordinary. (James Humig, Original) The wind had blown up gobs of dry dirt which had stuck to his sweat drenched hair. He had always loved to play in ditches, ever since he could remember. The best part about playing in ditches was that you didn't have to worry about cars driving by. He always hated having to get out of the road in the middle of a game of catch because a car was coming.

     He and his friends could have easily gone to a park to play, but they didn't want to be bothered by all the kids who gathered from every surrounding neighborhood. They wanted to play alone. For some reason, the pipe in his hand seemed like it would make a great digging tool, so he went to the wall of the ditch and started stabbing at the dirt. (James Humig, submitted July 11^th 2007) The dirt started crumbling away easily at first , but it quickly became more resistant to his prodding. "It's probably just some clay, " he thought, "Maybe I should get an old coffee can and take some home to Molly for her sculpting." He thought that would make his older sister happy. Ever since the accident, she couldn't get out of the house anymore, and it seemed like her artwork was the only thing that made her smile. Ranger's heart fluttered at the thought of doing something nice for her, and he began to dig more feverishly.

     He hunched down and pushed the mess of his hair aside so that he could see what was hindering his progress. To his surprise, he didn't see clay, he wasn't sure exactly what he saw. The ground here was the same gleaming red as the pipe, and it looked kind of like clay, but every time he would put the pipe in the hole to dig, the ground around it was wiggling and snapping back into place, like it was partly elastic or something, the pipe in his hand started to vibrate every time he touched it to the hole. Ranger became mesmerized by the strange substance, and slowly, without realizing he was doing it, Ranger put his hand out to touch it. (Mama, submitted July 15^th 2007)

     Ranger's best friend Ben was a tall, skinny kid and rather uncoordinated. He was constantly tripping over his own feet. His dad kept telling him that he would soon grow out of it but Ben found that hard to believe.

     Ben didn't like it when Ranger had adventure's without him. Ben had been looking for Ranger when he saw him climb down into the ditch. Ben figured he could sneak up on Ranger and give him a scare. He had crept up to the side of the ditch and had been watching as Ranger became hypnotized by the strange, red, wiggling clay.

     Ben loved the unexplained things in the world. He and Ranger would talk for hours and try to figure out why and how things got to where they were. This time he got a bad feeling that Ranger was about to do something that would not end well. He shouted Ranger's name but got no response. He picked up a clod of dirt and threw it, hitting Ranger's hand and knocking it away from the strange red clay. (Grammy, submitted July 26^th 2007)

     Ranger suddenly turned around, he saw Ben standing there laughing, he was very upset and yelled at Ben. Ben told him that it was just a joke, but Ranger angrily told Ben to get lost. So Ben did leave, and in quite a huff. He was very upset with Ranger. Ranger was also upset, but he quickly forgot all about it and turned back around to look at the red clay. His hand started to reach for the clay again. It got closer and closer, and finally his hand touched it. The most unthinkable thing happened. (Erin Donoho, submitted July 27^th 2007)

     Molly was in the garage of their small three bedroom house painting a picture of the tree in the front yard. The painting was very accurate from her angle except that the leaves were not green -- they were red. She began to feel a pain in her legs. This was both an exciting and extremely scary experience because she had not felt anything in her legs for at least a year. The pain was nearly unbearable, but she quickly placed her paintbrush between her teeth and bit down. As she crushed the handle of the paintbrush she felt it crack and she felt small splinters pierce her gums. The sharp pain of the splinters was comforting in a strange sort of way. The pain managed to get her mind off of the pain in her legs, and at least she knew why it hurt.

     Molly's mother Lisa came into the garage to move the laundry from the washer to the dryer and saw Molly biting on the paintbrush. Tears were streaming down both of Molly's cheeks in unison, and a small bead of blood was forming at corner of her mouth where the wood had apparently pulled her mouth open so far it had torn the tissue. Lisa rushed to Molly, knocking over the painting directly in front of Molly which crashed to the floor and one of the top corners broke off of it. She grasped Molly with her palms on Molly's ears and yelled in fear, "what is it baby? What's wrong?"

     Molly's legs, which had been completely limp for a year, began to spasm. Without meaning to, she kicked her mother in the shins. Lisa was at first very angry that her daughter had kicked her, but quickly realized that this was very unusual and took the pain of the kicks without a complaint, only a slight wince came to her face. Sliding her left hand slowly down Molly's cheek to her mouth, Lisa gently grabbed the paintbrush and tried to remove it from Molly's grasp. Molly's brown eyes were clearly out of focus, but Lisa could tell that Molly understood her intention as Molly's jaw muscles relaxed allowing Lisa to remove the paintbrush.

     The pain in Molly's legs was gone as soon as the brush exited her mouth, but the pain in her gums was still stinging. In a hopeful attempt, Molly looked at her mother, "is my big toe moving mama?" she asked. Her eyes were in focus now, and were clearly searching the softest features of her mother's face. Before Lisa could find the courage to move her eyes down to check, she found herself looking at the bottom hem of Molly's t-shirt. Molly was standing. (James Humig, submitted August 6^th 2007)

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