The Rice Farmer

"One day, a man walked down a bridge, and dropped a rice seed he got from an old wise man. He told him to drop it in water, and add a cup of dirt in the water each night. The man came back every night to drop a cup of dirt in the lake. Then, in a week, the lake was covered in rice plants. The man came everyday to collect rice. He sold it to all. As he got rich, he became greedy. He put many out of order. Many people lost their money and homes. So one night, the old wise man returned, snuck into the man's mansion, and killed him in his sleep!" Grandmother yelled, shutting the book, causing Peter and Mari to jump. "Why did he die?" Mari asked, as Grandmother began to tuck them in. "Because he forgot to pay back his debt." Peter looked up. "What debt?" he asked. "The knowledge he learned in planting rice," she said, putting up the story book. "Legend says that ever since he died, anyone who tries to plant rice in the lake, they shall suffer death as punishment. The more the rice, the cruler the deaths." Then, the grandmother turned out the light, and closed the door. Peter looked at the wall, and thought about the story. Rice. He closed his eyes, and fell asleep.

20 years later

Peter Collins had a job. Sucking up to people. Sounds annoying? Well, ever since the story, he found out that sucking up to people, usually rich people, got you a lot of things. So his job was getting jobs, and sucking up to the boss. And he found the best job. He lived in the urban area's of Louisiana, where Farmer Jerimiah Cross has been through 2 heart attacks since Friday, and he had an old family fortune. Ten Billion dollars. Sweet job. All he had to do was work in a stupid rice farm. Should be easy with the technology these days.

After taking a cab to the farm, he noticed something. There was no machinery. "Are you Paul?" a voice said from behind him. Of course he had to use a fake identity. Farmer J didn't look like a farmer. He had a brown worn-out jumpsuit, black boots, and a white hat. "Um, yes," he said, "I wasn't expecting you not to have any, well, machinery." he said, and shook Farmer J's hand. It was soft and warm. He pulled his arm back. "Well," Farmer J said, "You came in good time. It's harvesting season, and my doctor doesn't even want me standing up." He guided him inside the house. "Now," he said with his African accent, "You work for me, so before we start, I need you to pest the fields." He handed him a rusted whip. "Um," Peter said, glancing at the whip. "What do I do with this?" He said. Farmer J looked at him, dumbly. "You pest with it. In your file, it said you were a master at rice planting." Peter had to think of what to say. "Um, well, at my old farm, we didn't use whips to "pest". Farmer J straightened. "I see. Nobody plants rice like everyone used to." He pulls of his hat. "I'll just have to teach you." Farmer J pulled out a seperate whip, and headed out to the field.

The field itself was 20 acres. The entire rice farm was 25 acres. Pesting involved getting your metal whip and smacking any creature you spot with it. Peter was shocked that the only pest in the fields was bugs. No mice or snakes. Just weird looking bugs.

In around an hour, he was done. It was 9:00am. After unleashing a

wave of sweat, he returned to Farmer J. Farmer J was setting something up. Suddenly, something flashed in Peter's eye, in a flash of white. Probably just some rice. Farmer J had the next step to harvesting, which was getting the rice from the crops. It took a long time, in the heat of the August sun. It seemed like the sun was floating above him, watching his every move. Many times he felt like giving up, but then thought about the 10 billion at the end of the rainbow, and got back to work, stronger than ever. Then he started hallucinating. First, he saw the crops flying around him, like he stepped into a swarm of gnats. Then they started to bite him, suck his blood. The sun got hotter and hotter as he leapt in pain, shaking and shaking, they kept biting and biting. His veins lost their color. His skin burned. He fell to the ground, rolling. His body was burning, turning into ash. He glanced up. Farmer J stood in front of him, and smiled.

"Paul?" a voice called out. Peter opened his eyes. He was sitting on a bed. Farmer J was sitting on a chair near the bed. "Look's like today wasn't a good harvesting day." Peter looked outside. It was raining hard. Farmer J stood up. "You might as well stay for dinner."

he said, "We got all the rice picked. A few friends came to help finish. We can box after we eat." Peter got up. "No you stay down", Farmer J said, "You need some more rest. You can read or something as I get dinner ready." Farmer J walked down the stairs, and left for the kitchen. Peter heard a noise from the field. A pickup truck was leaving the farm. On it was 5 men dressed in white, loose clothes. Peter looked down at his wet clothes, and stinky self. He needed a shower. He was going to call out for Farmer J when he first noticed a book that said GUEST. He looked into it. "You can find clothes in the first closet." He looked around the room. Their was a small door. It was a closet. Inside it was the same white clothes he saw on the five men. He grabbed it, grabbed a towel from the closet, and went to the shower down the hall.

The bathroom was normal. The walls were Egyptian Blue, with sea green marble floor tiles. He walked into the shower and turned the knob. Water fell down, the warmness of the liquid touching his skin. When he was done, he turned the knob. The water stopped. He was about to walk out when something hit his head. He picked it out of his hair. It was a grain of rice. Suddenly, grains of rice poured down from the knob, and covered him. He ran to get away, but the rice crawled onto his skin, and covered his body. As much as he pushed them off, they just multiplied. He tried to scream, but they crawled into his mouth instead, and stuck his lips together. He tried to run, and move, but the rice stuck him together. He made one last move, and a collection of rice impaled his heart. He jerked back, noticing it was just a creepy day dream that felt weird. He turned of the water quickly, put on the clothes, which was weirdly his size, and ran to find Farmer J. When he ran down the beautiful staircase to find himself slapped in the face by the smell of the food. He turned into the dinning room to see a table full of crawfish etouffee, boudin, andouille, and a big kings cake. Turns out, the men in the white clothes had came to eat. Peter was shocked that Farmer J had cooked it all alone by himself. But that didn't stop him from shoving his mouth. But before he ate, he had to wash his hands. Afraid to do it upstairs, he did it in the kitchen. It was spotless. He washed his hands to see a bunch of bags of rice. He ran out quickly.

Turns out, the men were already seated as he came in. The man's names were Randy, Luis, Todd, Earle, and Teo. "So," Luis said, picking at his boudin, "Why are you here, Paul?" Peter choked in andouille. "Um, well, I saw his flyer in the mail, and thought I would come help," he was about to finish, but Teo slammed his hands on the table. "Are father isn't a charity case!" He yelled, and threw a handful of etouffee in his face. It felt as if his face had been slapped by lava, as the etouffee has just came out of the pot. As he hollered in pain, Teo just wiped it off his hand, as if it was ice cold. "Teo!" Farmer J had yelled, handing Peter a towel and some ice. "Why would you do that?" Farmer J said. Teo just looked down at his boudin. "Well," Todd said, looking down at the Kings Cake. "I'll take some cake for the road." Peter looked at his reflection on his bowl. His face was red. When he touched his face, it felt bumpy and torn. "Where are you going?" Farmer J asked. "Open Mike Contest," Todd said. "Us too," Earle and Luis said. "I'm going to the Night Club," Randy said. Teo didn't say anything. "Well," Farmer J said, "You all can stay with pops if you want." "Nah", they said. "We'll be here tomorrow, thought." Farmer J slunk down. "Well," Luis said, "Thanks for dinner." Everyone got up, and began to leave. They shook Peter's hand and hugged Farmer J. Teo looked at Peter deadly. If looks could even so pinch you, Peter would have been dead. Once they left, it was back to work.

Boxing the rice was hard. First they had to collect all the rice. Then they had to put it into containers. Then they put it in boxes. Eventually, they had boxed 1 acre of rice. Peter put it on the truck, and they would ship it the next day. "1 acre down,"Peter thought, "19 to go." Farmer J got of the truck. "Well," Farmer J said, "I guess this is a day." Peter began to walk, until he noticed something. Farmer J didn't seem that, old. He turned. Farmer J was gone. Peter walked to the road. A car pulled up. Inside was a swarm of rice bugs. He ran to the field. The swarm followed quickly behind, and bit hi every chance it got. He didn't dare to scream, and just ran to lose the swarm. The rice on the crops flew up as well. He ran as fast as his heart would take him. He ran and ran, but suddenly fell into a well. He opened his eyes. Rice was filling the well. As he searched for the well water, he noticed something. The rice was the water. He ran up the steps of the well, and jumped to find himself face to face with Farmer J. "What are you doing here?" he said in a robot like voice. "It's Rice, its- attacking!!" He cried, shaking in fear. Farmer J looked at him. Suddenly, his body fell, and it transformed into a swarm of rice. Peter ran for his life. He decided to go to his grandmother's house, which wasn't to far away from here. If anyone knew about creepy rice legends, it would be her.

He took a cab to Summer Heights, where his grandmother was. When he walked out, he ran quickly to her room. She lived in an apartment. He ran up the staircase. As he touched a step, it turned into a swarm of rice. He slammed into the door. His grandmother was sitting on a brown and green couch. "You have to help me!" He cried, falling to his knees. "Peter?" She said, as she took his hand. "You gotta help me!" he said. She looked into his eyes. Then, she gave him a book. He looked at the cover. The Rice Planter of Thailand. The story she read him when he was a kid. He looked up to her, but she was knitting. He closed the door. On the other side of the door was a rice storm waiting for him. He swore the rice had created a smile. He ran past the swarm, an jumped down the stairs.

The swarm doubled into a tornado. Everytime rice came near, it tried to gue to his skin. He pulled the storybook out of his pocket and flipped to a page. "The man came to a wise man in the woods" he threw the book. It was useless. The rice filled the halls, and he jumped out the door fast enough. He ran to catch a taxi, but the rice was coming to fast. He ran into a parking garage. As he limped pass the cars, he noticed that the rice was slowing down. Soon, the rice was cornering him, and got closer and closer. He dunked. The rice swarmed in.Farmer J lifted a cane, and hit it on the floor twice. The rice stopped. It dissolved quickly. The Farmer J rice figure looked at him. Peter grabbed his stomach. It felt as if it were burning. The Farmer J looked at him, and smiled. It vanished into night. Peter stood up. At his feet was a bag of rice. He dropped dead.

The next day, Farmer J had recovered from all his heart attacks, and had a expency of at least 20 more years to live. Likely more. He came outside to see new plants planted, and the rice grains all collected into boxes, ready to be shipped of. Farmer J chuckled. Paul must have done it by himself. He turned on the tv, saw his son's walk in the door, and they watched the news. That's when he saw that a man that he knew as Paul, named Peter-dead.