Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 45319 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 181(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 45319 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 181(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
As I planned what branch to start on, I couldn’t help casting a glance over the top of the hedge to the other side. Many times I had thought about trying to find a way over so I could pick pears over there too, but several things stopped me.
First, I wasn’t sure if I could get a huge basket of pears over the top of the extremely prickly hedge which had spiky leaves and inch-long thorns on its branches without hurting myself. And second, I didn’t want to go anywhere near the haunted mansion.
No, I’m not talking about the ride at Disney World—“the haunted mansion” was what I called the old dilapidated house I could see on the other side of the hedge. It was an enormous, rundown structure—clearly it had been built for someone or something that wasn’t human. Possibly a Troll had once lived there, I thought. Or maybe a Giant? How big did they get, anyway?
I didn’t know and didn’t want to know. Giants, Trolls, and Ogres are on the list of undesirable Creatures with evil tendencies. Their anti-social natures make it impossible for them to live and mingle with other, more peaceful Creatures and human magic users and I for one wanted nothing to do with them.
So I had long ago decided to ignore that side of the hedge and just gather all the pears I could from the branches that hung over it. And today I had a lot to gather.
Ignoring the broken and boarded up windows of the haunted mansion which seemed to stare at me like blind eyes, I put down my basket in a good spot and started picking.
The pears were humming in the sunshine, their golden skins bursting with juicy goodness. They were so ready to be harvested they practically fell into my hand as I reached for them. Every time one dropped into my palm it let out a musical little “tra-la!” as its stem parted from the branch, which let me know that the fruit was indeed perfectly ripe and ready to pick.
I rapidly filled my basket to the brim taking all but one pear—the most beautiful one of all which I was saving for last. In the past, I would have had to leave some pears behind, but now thanks to the bespelled basket, I could carry them all easily back to my bakery.
Humming happily, I picked the very last pear on my side of the hedge and sank my teeth into its golden skin. True, I would be singing for a whole hour after I ate it, but it was totally worth it and besides, I would be working alone in the bakery so it wouldn’t matter.
The delicate pear flesh melted on my tongue unlike any other fruit I’d ever had and I took my time eating it. This was probably the only one I would allow myself to eat—all the others were going into the tarts—so I wanted to savor it.
It wasn’t until I was down to the core and licking the sticky juice off my fingers that I noticed some movement on the other side of the hedge.
The last bite of pear seemed to stick in my throat as I saw the door of the haunted mansion open and an enormous figure come out of it.
He was hairy all over with a long, greasy, dark orange pelt that covered most of his body. It hung down over the dirty brown shorts he was wearing which appeared to be his only clothing. His head was as big and lumpy as a prize-winning pumpkin and his yellow eyes seemed too small for his face.
I wanted to look away at that point but I couldn’t—I felt frozen to the spot and my mind kept cataloging the Creature’s lumpy, frightening features. Hairy pointed ears flapped in the breeze and his mouth was filled with long, sharp, curving fangs that seemed to interlock together like the teeth of a bear trap. Overlong arms hung down so low that his knuckles dragged the ground like an ape’s as he shambled towards the hedge.
If you’re wondering how I could tell for sure that he was male, well it was obvious. There was an enormous, long bulge along the inner thigh of one leg of his shorts. The head of a perfectly huge penis, the size and color of a bruised apple, was hanging out of the shorts, down near his knee. Disgusting.
My first thought was that this must be what Bigfoot looked like—only uglier and way smellier. Because the breeze was bringing whiffs of his personal odor through the hedge to me and even the sweet aroma of the Golden-Skinned Warbler pears couldn’t drown out the rotten stench.
My second thought was that I needed to get away—fast.
I didn’t think the hairy, smelly Creature—whatever he was—had seen me since I was watching him from behind the hedge. It occurred to me that he might be tall enough to step right over it and I didn’t want that. Slowly I picked up my enormous basket—which was still light as a feather, thanks to Sarah’s magic—and started walking quickly and quietly back down the path.