The Girl in the Woods

Lizzie’s clothes were laid out for her, so when she got up all she had to do was slip them on and come down to eat breakfast. But, first, she had to put on her glasses. Lizzie couldn’t see a thing unless she had her glasses on. She hated wearing glasses because some of the kids at school would make fun of her. Even though she made good grades, it was hard for her to make friends because of those stupid glasses.

“Why do they have to be so cruel and make fun of me just because I wear glasses” she thought.

Putting on her glasses and then her clothes, Lizzie went down stairs where she found breakfast sitting on the table.

Lizzie ate breakfast hurridly, her mother did not like it when she hurried like that. Scolding Lizzie a little, she continued taking big bites of her food and gulping down her milk. She then grabbed up her back-pack and rushed out the door to catch the school bus. It was another hot day in Georgia.

It was the last week before summer break began. Lizzie was eager for school to be over. Even though she loved her teacher, Ms. Marsden, she was looking forward to going to the mountains on a camping trip that her parents were planning. It would be the first time in several years that they would take a trip together since her mom lost her baby brother in child-birth. Lizzie often wondered what it would have been like to have had a baby brother. Would she have been a good sister? Would she help her mother take care of the baby? Would she be jealous? She had made up her mind that no matter what, she would have been a good sister. But, that was not to be, and her mom had been very sad for a long time. At times it seemed that her mom lost interest in her. Sometimes it seemed that she wasn’t even noticed, no matter how well she did in school. Her mother rarely asked her anything about school or anything else for that matter.

It was three in the afternoon and it was almost time for school to be let out on this Friday, the last week of the school year, and school was out for the summer. Lizzie was sitting at her desk reading a book when one of the girls, that made fun of her, walked by. She looked at Lizzie and stared at her in a way that made Lizzie feel uncomfortable. The girl tugged at her hair trying to upset Lizzie. She didn’t have time to worry about that right now. Lizzie had a lot of planning to do. She had to plan on what was she going to take on the trip. She wanted to be as much help as she possible could possibly be in packing and choosing what to take with her. Should she take her favorite stuffed aimal along so that she would have it to sleep with in the woods. Would she be afraid of all the noises that the animals would make in the night? Her mother had assured her that most of the noises in the woods were from crickets and frogs and that there wasn’t really anything to be afraid of.

But, Lizzie was also going to be turning ten years old the week of the camping trip. She couldn’t help but wonder if daddy had gotten her a present and was going to give it to her on the trip, or was the trip in itself the present. Lizzie also wandered if her dog JoJo would also come along on the trip. Jojo would