The Purple Beanie

After School

    Why was he suddenly acting like this?

    Conner reached his house and walked up the stairs to his room. No one was here yet, since his mom was at work at the hospital. He just wished that his dad was here to make everything seem like it was okay.

    Conner tossed his backpack down on the floor and collapsed onto his bed. After closing his eyes to rest them, he got up and opened his sketchbook. He started drawing the back of a girl's head. She had straight hair in a ponytail with a beanie on top and was wearing a jacket with a simple t-shirt. Conner sighed. There was no telling who that was.

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It was the evening when Bree's phone made a little "ding" noise. Bree curiously picked it up. She wasn't used to having messages sent to her, since she didn't have many real friends. She saw that the message had been sent on Instagram, so she went onto her account. The message was from Danielle.

    Hey, Bree! It's Danielle. What's up? Danielle had sent.

    Oh, hey, Danielle! Not much, just doing homework. How bout u? Bree messaged back.

    DanielleRowr: Same. Let me guess, ur doing the hw for English, right? The short story writing?

    BreeFox: Yeah, haha

    DanielleRowr: Well, have a nice evening! See u tom!

    BreeFox: Likewise! :)

♩ How can we rewrite the stars

How can you say you'll be mine

Everything keeps us apart

And I'm not the one you were meant to find ♩

    Bree listened to 'Rewrite the Stars' by Zac Efron and Zendaya from The Greatest Showman. Suddenly, she thought of a somehow-familiar face with strawberry blond hair, freckles, and ocean blue eyes. It was Conner Bailey.

    Bree internally slapped herself. WHY was she thinking about CONNER BAILEY of all people?! She didn't like him. She didn't even know him.

So why had his image appeared in her head?

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    Conner was officially excited about English homework. He had been given an assignment from Ms. York to write a creative short story about anything he wanted, and he wanted to get right to it. First of all, he had so much to write about because of his earlier fairy tale inspiration from his father. His father, John Bailey, had passed away in a car accident just before his and Alex's eleventh birthday, and he was no longer by his side to encourage him through the hard times and tell him meaningful fairy tales to make him understand life. But Conner knew that it was his turn to help himself.

    His father had told him stories about 'The Curvy Tree' and 'The Walking Fish'. Conner decided to write a 'collection' of stories for his homework, because there wasn't any rule that kept him from doing so. He was going to combine the two stories.

    After scribbling away at a lined sheet of paper, trying to remember every detail about the two stories, he looked at it and decided to grab more paper to write a good copy and refine his sentences before turning it in. Conner was shocked at his own effort for homework of all things. He was definitely changing. And somehow, he knew the reason why.