Here's another one of the stories I wrote here at arts camp. I wrote this about three weeks ago, and it's far from complete. I'm still editing and revising it, but here's the story so far. I present to you "Crossing the Bridge" by me.

Crossing the Bridge

Jessica clutched a large picture book with both arms as she made her way down the path, looking ahead at the rows and rows of gravestones. She smiled sadly as she recognized the two gravestones farthest away from her. The young girl began walking.

She remembered how she had once been afraid of this place. Something about it made her heart beat faster, whether it was the complete silence of the graveyard, or the fact that no animals ever visited here. Or maybe it was the feeling that the stones were watching her, emotionless eyes following her wherever she went.

But that fear was gone now, ever since her mother had taken her, not even in kindergarten yet at that time, here to visit her grandmother.

“Where did Granny go?” she remembered asking her mother.

“She’s resting, Jessie,” her mother had replied. “She’s with Grandpa now. You want to see her, don’t you?”

“Yes,” said Jessica. “But all I see are these rocks. Is Granny hiding behind one of them?”

“No, Jessie,” said her mother. “She’s gone. She’s up in the sky.”

“I thought you just said she was here,” Jessica said, confused. “How can she be two places at once?”

“You’ll understand when you’re older,” her mother had said, squatting down to hug her and stroke her blonde hair, the fingers combing the individual golden strands, the palm caressing her head.

Jessica thought she saw tears in her mother’s eyes, but didn’t understand why she was crying. Mommy didn’t have a boo-boo, did she?

Jessica now looked again at the graveyard. Now I am older, she thought. And I do understand.

Suddenly she tripped, the huge book flying out of her hands. She fell to the grass. The book landed in front of a gravestone.

Jessica’s face contorted as she willed herself not to cry. But her face broke into a smile as she saw the book leaning against the gravestone.

She took the book, reading the name inscribed into the gravestone: Gregory van Meter.

“Thank you for catching my book,” she said to the gravestone before getting up to continue on her way.

She clutched the book to her chest, remembering when her mother had read the story to her the first time.

Her mother had finished reading the last line, “—and they all lived happily ever after,” and closed the book.

There was a moment of satisfied silence. Finally, Jessica spoke.

“I really liked that part where the prince had to cross that rickety bridge to get to the tower with the princess inside,” she said. Her mother nodded, a smile on her face.

“Can we read it again?” asked Jessica, looking beseechingly at her mother.

“No, not now,” her mother laughed.

“Can you read it tonight?” pleaded Jessica. “And the night after that, and the night after that, and the night after that, and--”

“Every single night,” her mother interrupted, stroking Jessica’s hair.

Jessica now looked at that same book that held so many happy memories. She breathed in, imagining that she smelled the lavender scent that her mother carried, as she read to her.

Jessica was now at the far side of the graveyard. She stopped, reaching the gravestones that were planted side by side. She sat down cross-legged, spreading the book out in front of her.

“Hello, Mommy,” she said. “Hello, Daddy. Today we had DEAR time. Teacher says it means ‘Drop Everything and Read’. I really liked DEAR time, so I thought

you would too. I brought this book you used to read to me, Mommy. Remember? Every single night.”

She opened the book to the first page and began reading. “Once upon a time…”

She read the book, and it was as if she were two places at once: she was in the graveyard, reading to her parents, grandparents, and everyone else in the graveyard, and at the same time she was crossing that rickety bridge again towards the tower, a boiling river of lava beneath her. But she wasn’t afraid at all, because her parents were there at her side, holding her hands as they crossed the bridge together.

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I hope you enjoyed reading the story. Feel free to comment or critique my work!