The Lost Child

I walked through the blossomed trees. Birds were chirping and singing out to each other. The path was littered with colourful flowers. Ella strode up to me. "You have to do it, May!" she said to me. "You have to do it." "I know!" I cried. I ran home with Ella by my side and we plonked ourselves onto my bed. I wiped the sweat off my forehead. "How are we going to do it?" Ella asked. "I think we'll have to start looking really soon," I replied. "Maybe a snack first though?" "Are you sure we'll be able to find him, May?" Ella asked. "Of course!" I insisted. I walked into the kitchen and mum was there, chopping up peaches. "Hi honey, would you like some peaches?" she asked. "Yes, please mum!" I said. "Also, chop some for Ella, would you? She's here too!" "Of course darling! I'll bring them into your room!" mum promised. She bought us the peaches, two each. "I can't believe I promised to find that boy, especially by the first day of Spring!" I cried. "Let's start looking now, Ella!" I said and we walked off into the blossomed trees. 2 hours later and there was still no trace of him. 'I guess I'll just have to say I couldn't find him," I said sadly. "No!" Ella cried. "We are not giving up!" So, we kept looking. 3 hours after that, mum called. "Where are you?" she said, sounding extremely worried. "I'm at Ella's place," I lied. "I'm having dinner with her. "OK," said my mum. "Can I have a sleepover?" I asked. "Sure!" mum replied. "OK! Bye mum! Love you!" I said into the phone. "Bye honey! Love you too!" mum gushed and then I hung up. "I can't believe I just lied to my mum," I thought out loud. and then I burst into tears. "It's OK May! Don't worry! When we find the boy and get famous, your mum will completely forget!" Ella soothed. I took deep breaths and calmed down. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a foot, running across the park. "It's him!" I shouted and the chase was on. We ran and ran and ran. We tore through thorny bushes. But he had completely disappeared into the green bush land. We collapsed onto the ground. "Where are we?" Ella asked. I looked at my phone. Oh great I thought. There's no WiFi here! That's when we realised it. We were completely and utterly LOST. I groaned. "Nothing is going to plan!" I yelled. Then, the boy came around the corner. "He's there!" I whispered. She got up but I pulled her back down. "Don't! He might see us!" I whispered. "I've already seen you!" he said. "Oh," I said. Then more cheerfully, I asked, "What's your name? I'm May!" "I'm Hugo," he said. Then he added, "Nice to meet you May and......" "Ella!" said Ella. "Nice to meet you girls!" Hugo said. "So, are you the missing boy?" I asked. "Yes," Hugo answered. "I am! But I didn't go missing on purpose." "Let's here the story then!" I sighed. "Alright!" Hugo said. "So, I was camping with my parents. They asked me to get some firewood because our fire was going out. I walked into the woods with my wheelbarrow and started picking up some sticks and logs! But a snake was in one of the logs and bit me. It hurt so much! The bite still hurts now," he lifted up the cuff of his pants to reveal a nasty-looking, probably infected, snake bite. "Do you know what type of snake it was?" I asked. "I think it was a carpet python," Hugo said. "Oh my gosh, thank you for not biting him venomous snakes! It wasn't a venomous snake!" I sighed in relief. "Well, let's go home now," I said. "OK," said Hugo. We walked towards the road, deciding to follow the road. Then, it started raining. Hard. We walked for hours, our feet sorer with each step. We finally came across a row of houses. We ran up to the houses and knocked on the first door. An old lady answered it. "Oh!" she said. "What are you poor children doing out in the pouring rain? Come inside, come inside," she took us inside, wrapped blankets around us and made us mugs of hot chocolate. 'Now," she said. "Why were you little children out in the rain?" "We were rescuing Hugo," I answered her. "You may have heard of him! He's the lost child." "From Brisbane?" she asked. "Yes, is Brisbane near here?" Ella asked. "Child, this is Ipswich!" she cried. "You are 44 kilometres away from Brisbane!" "Oh," said Ella. "I'm May," I said. "And this is Ella and Hugo." "Nice to meet you May, Ella and Hugo!" "Our pleasure," I said. "May we sleep here tonight?" "Of course, of course!" she said. "You can call me grandmother." "Grandmother, may we have some dinner? We have not had food for about 6 hours," Ella asked. "You may have some soup! There is 4 cans of soup in the cupboard! Make one for each of us," grandmother said. An hour later, they were tucked up in bed and Hugo was softly snoring. Ella and I were whispering though. "Do you think she's who she says she is?" Ella whispered to me. "Yes! She's such a kind grandmother!" I said. In the morning, we all had toast and eggs and bacon. "Will you drive us home, grandmother?" I asked. "I do not have a car, darlings, but I can give you money for the bus! There's a bus station just around the corner!" grandmother said. She packed us some lunch and some entertainment and pointed us in the direction of the bus station. "Here comes the bus!" I cried and pointed where the bus was driving slowly towards us. It finally reached us and pulled to a stop. "Hi!" I said to the bus driver. "Does this bus go to Brisbane?" "Yes! 3 dollars each please madam!" I worked it out in my head. 3 x 3 = 9! I handed the money over and we took our seats. We chatted about lots of different things on the way home and about halfway through, Hugo fell asleep in my lap. We finally got home and mum almost knocked me off my feet. "Honey!" she cried. "I was so worried!" "Me too!" I said. "I was so scared!" "Who's this?" asked mum, eyeing Hugo suspiciously. "Don't worry, mum! This is Hugo! He's the lost kid!" Mum gasped. "You found the lost kid??!!" she cried. "Yeah!" I said. "I kinda agreed with the mayor that I'd find him by yesterday!" "I'm so proud of you, May!" she cried, "Thanks mum," I said, blushing. "Ella helped too!" "Really?" asked Ella's mum. "Um, yeah mum," Ella said, blushing as well. "Oh my gosh, sweetie! I'm so proud of you!" Ella's mum cried. "May Peterson!" a voice boomed over me. "Mayor Evans!" I exclaimed. "Well done!" he boomed. "You have found the lost child and reunited him with his parents!" I glanced over at Hugo and he was trapped in a hug with what looked like his mum and dad. "You will be rewarded the 10,000 dollar reward for finding the lost boy!" Mum screamed and hugged me so tight I thought I would suffocate. I ran up to the stage and excepted the cheque. I ran back down to mum and I said to her, "Mum, I've had enough excitement today! Let's go home." We walked through the blossomed trees and the birds were chirping and singing to each other. We got to our house, and I was so happy to see everything in my house. It was great because I was home, where I belonged.