When Time Stopped (Inara C.Y., Grade 5

an entire night. Where am I? I thought to myself. And how is this possible? The last thing I remember before blacking out was entering the empty room at the end of the hall. But wait! It wasn’t empty. There was a plaque with words engraved on it. I’m not sure how, but I remembered the exact words on the plaque. Your soul lies not with your body. I was pondering the meaning of these words when there was a knock on the door. It slowly creaked open, revealing a soldier in an American World War II uniform who looked strangely like … my grandfather! He took one look at me and said, “Bring this to your father, and he’ll know what to do. Good luck soldier.” And for the second time that day, everything went black.

When Time Stopped By Inara C.Y., Grade 5

Juniper Amberjack Wixx is a normal 14 year-old. Or so she thought. We’ll get into that later. But right now, she’s eating breakfast. Lucky Charms, no milk. Her favorite weekend breakfast. ”MOOOM!!!” ”YEAAAAAH?!” her mother replied as she walked into the dining room. ”I'm going to ride my bike to the library.” “Kk,” she said mockingly, because Juniper always said “Kk” instead of okay. Juniper opened the garage door. Her black and neon orange mountain bike was sitting right smack in the middle of the garage. She walked the bike out onto the smooth cement sidewalk. She clipped on her matching helmet and started to pedal down the street. Then she realized. Shoot. I didn’t close the garage. She slammed her brakes and circled around. She hopped off the bike and put down the kickstand. As she did, a shadowy figure ran out the driveway. She hoped it was just her dad leaving for work. She walked up to the keypad and pressed the down button. Okay. NOW to the library. She pedaled down the street once more. Okay, she thought. Down Malibu, right on Griffith, left on Fairfax, and then right on Wall Street. There in the center of Wall Street, sat the four story quartz building. The interior was the most modern library you’ll ever see in your entire life. There was glass everywhere, and there were so many books that you could fill a skyscraper. Juniper’s favorite books were Wonder, the Harry Potter series, and any Shakespeare book, especially Romeo and Juliet. But today, she wanted to try something new, and that something was a book that she spotted on the very top shelf, out of fifty-five levels. It was a fifteen minute climb on a ladder. She didn’t want to do this, and luckily, neither did most people. So, there was an elevator. In the library. The book she found was called The Time Stopper. She traced her fingers over the cover. In the middle there was a large Andamooka matrix opal (Juni was very good at telling rock types). Juniper felt a small jiggle from the rock. Then she realized it was a button, andddd, being the adventurous girl she was, she pressed it. Of course. The next second, she could feel the world just come to a 100% complete stop. Every human and service animal in the library stopped in their tracks. She looked out the window, and saw the pigeons of New York freeze in the air. But they didn't drop to the ground like the movies when time stopped. She looked at the cover of the book again and sighed. “Wow. That title is super literal,” she said aloud to no one.