vacation

there were two girls and there were three boys. there was bright sun, cool air, blue sky and greeeeeeen. they walked (practically skipped!) down the dusty trail with smiles erupting from their young faces and endless ideas bursting from their young minds.

the sound of rushing water intrigued them and the company clamored through the flora to find it. at nearly the start of their jaunt to the beach the “duo a trio” came upon a creek with big mossy rocks to climb on. and waterfalls, so many little waterfalls!

the shes and the hes were delighted at the scene. they oooohed and they ahhhhed; they climbed its fuzzy green rocks. they were enamored.

the boys grew anxious and the girls reluctantly lagged behind them until one turned to the other and cried “i don’t want to leave! i want to put my head in the water!”

two chimed “me too!”

so they stopped and the hes kept going unaware that the shes had no intention of “catching up” until one (or two, or all) of the hes came back to fetch them. the girls admired the clear brook and the dense foliage as they climbed back up the rocks to the highest point they could reach. the trees and bushes created shadowy shelters and back near the biggest waterfall was the best one of all, a little cave created by the erosion of soil at the roots of a giant tree. the girls chattered on about never leaving, “we could just live here in this cave!” she dreamed.

they plopped down and took off their shoes and socks. one steadied herself on the algaed rocks; she dipped a toe into a falls and gasped at the cold. she drew in a sharp quick breath and thrust her head under the water with such enthusiasm that she misjudged the distance from water to rock.

the blow knocked her out and her limp body slid down the slimy rocks and into the creek.

“oh my!” cried the other and she flung her arms into the air.

in her panic and haste to save her friend two slipped as well and met the same fate.

the water jumped down the rocks and over the moss; birds chirped and the wind rustled the trees. the young ladies, bodies splayed out on wet rocks, faces down in the shallow stream, hardly detracted from the quiet woodland scene.

while the shes were daydreaming and slipping and drowning the hes had continued down towards the beach. along the winding rocky coast ran a train track. on either side of the track there was a cliff, to the right it went straight up to the scenic highway above, to the left straight down to the pebbly beach below.

three turned to one, “should we go find the girls?”

“maybe,” he replied, “i did expect them right behind us.”

two chimed in with a difference of opinion, “they’ll catch up! those silly girls are probably wading or picking flowers or something. i want to see what’s further up the beach, let’s follow the tracks.”

the other boys shrugged and tagged on with him along the rickety track. they balanced on the rails and teased each other while they wavered and wobbled and waned. as they traipsed down the tracks they began to rapidly approach a sharp turn in the path. around that bend they could see nothing of the remainder of the track as it was entirely obscured by the cliff to the right. two and three laughingly dared each other closer and closer to the turn.

one started to get nervous; he hopped down from the rail and walked on the wooden planks in the middle of the track. he noticed his untied shoelace and as he sat down on the rail to tie them he felt it start to vibrate.

he shot up from the rail and saw that his friends were quite possibly too close to the bend to escape the approaching train. they’d given up on their balancing acts, without the knowledge of the vibrating rails they may not even know that it was coming.

one yelled to the other boys as he endeavored the treacherous downhill to the beach, but it was too late, the blast of a train whistle swallowed his cry and as it appeared around the bend the two young gentlemen on the tracks met their doom in a union pacific engine.

the other, tripping on his untied shoelace, tumbled down the rocks into the cold blue pacific where he suffered a fate not unlike that of his former female companions whose discarded socks floated away with him out to sea.