Grum!

by Robyn Hill



  Grum!

  Robyn Hill

  Copyright-2012 by Robyn Hill

  Chapter 1.

  At first I wasn't happy with the idea of spending my summer vacation at my Aunt Victoria's house. My dad, and his research partner, would be traveling to Africa to study plants for medicinal purposes. It wasn't that I didn't like my aunt, it's just that I was going into 6th grade and spending the entire summer away from my home, and my friends, was not my idea of a radical summer. It would be the first summer away, and the first summer since my mom had died.

  When we arrived at my aunt's house, I realized it was not as bad as I had expected. The house was huge for one thing, and old. It was not old in a bad way, more in an interesting, spooky kind of way. The bricks were covered with stringy moss, and vines reached around the entire house like protective, bony hands. A lovely garden of different colored roses grew to the side, and behind was a wooded area with ponds, frogs, and many curious swamp creatures.

  I waved to the car as my dad and his partner drove off.

  "It will be over before you know it, Carol," Dad's partner said while pushing his wire glasses further upon his nose.

  "I love you and entertain yourself with books, Sweetheart, lots of books, especially math!" Dad yelled out as he waved back, and then the Volkswagen pulled out of the driveway.

  "Really, Carol, time will go by quickly", my aunt said and she picked up my suit case and walked into the house.

  "Don't fret and make the best out of the situation. When life gives you lemons, why I say make lemonade!" she sang out happily.

  I remembered my parents and teachers always saying that, but I didn't really like lemonade either.

  We walked up a spiral iron staircase and down a dimly lit wooden hall to the room that would be mine for the next couple of months. My aunt opened a tired creaking door. I was pleasantly surprised to find a cozy room with a large brass bed. There were many filled bookshelves and a white fluffy cat. The cat was curled in a ball atop of the thickest down comforter I had ever seen. He had a black spot the shape of a diamond on his head. He looked up at me, stretched his fat paws, then retreated into his curl and fell back to sleep.

  "That would be Marlin, my cat, and it seems he has already decided to bunk with you while you are here," my aunt said. "Make yourself comfortable and come down and join me for a glass of lemonade when you are finished."

  Great...I thought to myself, more with the lemonade, and I reached forward to unpack my things.

  I had my suitcase, filled with summer clothing, and one large geometry book to unpack. Since my mother had passed away, my grades had slipped and I had received a D in math because I didn't understand geometry. Dad wanted me to study a geometry text book before school started so I would be ready for 6th grade math. I rubbed the top of the book and remembered how my mother would help me with my homework during the evenings. Those were the days when I had straight A's. I grabbed a pillow and began to cry. I can't do anything on my own anymore. It just didn't seem fair that cancer had taken my mother and here I was alone in a huge house with a relative I barely knew. I felt a light tickling on my nose and opened my eyes. There stood Marlin, looking at me with crossed green eyes, gently kissing my cheek with his rough tongue. It was strangely soothing. Marlin made himself cozy underneath my neck as I dozed off into a comfortable sleep.

  After I awoke, I emptied my suitcase into a weathered, oak dresser in my room, and then headed downstairs to join my aunt while Marlin followed me. My aunt was out on the patio sitting on a rolled out pad in a funny yoga position. Her legs were sticking straight up in the air like two Popsicle sticks. She was an odd sort of lady with curly red hair, thick black framed glasses, and clothes that looked like they had been in her wardrobe since the 1970's. I walked out onto the patio and breathed in the scent of flowers warming in the sun.

  "So, now that you are settled, I will tell you about our plans while you are here." My aunt said as she looked up from her mat.

  "Oh, don't go to any trouble," I said, "I am sure I will find plenty to do with the books to read and the woods to investigate."

  "Well, yes, there is that," my aunt said as she stretched her leg over top of her head, "but you will also need to come with me to work. I don't want to leave you here by yourself, dear."

  I looked over at my aunt, "I guess I didn't even ask Dad, what it is that you do?"

  My aunt hesitated, "I am a scientist, and am working on a new invention!"

  I thought that sounded very interesting, "What sort of invention are you working on?" I asked her.

  "Well, I am uncertain of that right now... but when I am certain of what it is, it will be an amazing invention!"

  My aunt sounded like she was trying to convince herself of this, more than me.

  "I do have a partner, his name is Doc. but it is strictly business with us, so don't get any silly ideas!" she laughed a little too hard as she said this,

  "Oh my goodness... the idea of Doc and me!" again, she sounded like she was trying to convince herself of this, more than me.

  "You will be happy to know that Doc has a granddaughter about your age, 12 I believe. Her name is Jordan. Doc made a special trip to get her so she will be here for the summer too. He will be bringing her to work as well, so you two can entertain yourselves."

  This was very good news to me since I had noticed there weren't any immediate neighbors. The idea of having someone to hangout with sounded great.

  "So when will we be going to your work?" I asked,

  "Well, I was hoping to go tomorrow, that is, if you feel settled enough?"

  "Tomorrow sounds wonderful!" I told my aunt.

  I drank the rest of my lemonade and skipped back upstairs, and the lemonade...well, it wasn't half bad.

  Chapter 2

  When we arrived the next morning, the work shop was not at all what I had imagined. It was a huge brick factory that had several windows boarded up with nails and wood. There were worn out pictures painted on the walls.

  "Aunt Vick, why are there pictures of bubblegum painted on the outside of this building?" I asked barely making out a painted image.

  "Funny thing," she said looking up at the crumbled paint, "This used to be a gum factory, and I mean, this place sold every flavor imaginable... Tooty fruity, Banana milkshake, Peanut butter, you name it."

  I thought that sounded delicious, "That sounds wonderful, why did it shut down?" I asked.

  She looked around at the walls,"Well, that really is the strange part. You see, the man who owned it just up and disappeared one day! Here he was making so much money and then just up and disappears!"

  I thought for a moment, "Does anyone have any ideas how or why?"

  "No, not really because nothing was missing. His car was still parked here and everything was the same as if he had just vanished into thin air!”

  She shook her head, “Too bad really, because from what I understand, he was just about to introduce some new fantastic bubblegum, but of course he never did, with disappearing and all. So, with all the lab equipment left behind here, Doc. and I decided it was a perfect purchase to work on our inventions. Anyway, come on inside and I can introduce you to Doc. and Jordan."

  The inside of the factory was huge and cluttered. There were contraptions and machines everywhere and rooms that had large metal doors. At the entrance stood an older, balding, man who held the hand of a skinny girl with ragged hair. She was dressed in a blue checkered dress and two ponytails were sticking out of her head.

  "Oh, you must be Jordan, Luv, Doc has told me so much about you! This is my niece, Carol." Aunt Vick pushed me towards Jordan to introduce myself.

  "Hi, nice to meet you." I said offering my hand. Jordan shyly put
her hand out to greet me.

  Doc introduced himself and said, "Well now, you two should have plenty to do around here, just make sure you are careful and don't get into any trouble."

  He picked up a cardboard box and started unpacking it onto a machine. "And make sure to check in with Vicki and me every so often."

  My aunt blushed and batted her eyes at Doc. "Yes, check in with us every so often Sweet plumbs."

  I gave my aunt a strange look, "Sweet plumbs?" I thought to myself.

  I shuffled my feet a bit and looked up at Jordan,

  "Well, what do you want to do?" I asked her.

  A slow grin spread across her face, "What do you think about exploring?"

  I was sure relieved to hear her say this, at first I thought she was going to be a drag, but she began skipping forward and all I could do was follow after her.

  We decided to check out the top of the factory first. When we climbed up the stairs I asked her,

  " Hey, did you hear what happened to the owner of this place?"

  Jordan said her Grandpa had told her how the man had disappeared.

  "Don't you find that strange? I mean I guess the guy was making millions off his gum so why would he just disappear like that?" I asked.

  Jordan thought about it, "I don't know, maybe he made enough money, and wanted to travel somewhere magnificent and decided to sneak off somewhere."

  "I suppose." I said.

  We walked past several metal doors and decided to open a few to see what was inside. Each door seemed to have more of the same equipment, lab tubes, and boxes of colorful gum wrappers.

  "Hey, we should open some boxes and see if we can find the ingredients to make our own gum!" Jordan suggested,

  "I don't know if we should snoop around, we might get in trouble." I replied. Jordan looked at me strangely, "Your aunt and my grandpa own the place, we can do whatever we want!"

  Jordan was turning out to be much braver than I first thought. "What the heck," I said, "Where should we start?"

  We walked over to a large metal door that had a rusted lock on its hinges and began pulling on it.

  "I bet there are all sorts of ingredients in here!" Jordan began tugging harder on the lock.

  I tried at the lock as well, "Yes, well, the lock appears to be quite stuck so we may need to find something to pry it open."

  Jordan reached over and pulled a large hammer off of a shelf and began pounding on the lock. After about 5 tough slams, the lock crumbled to the ground and we were able to pull open the metal door.

  Once inside, we discovered we were in a storage room of some sort, filled with all sorts of colorful boxes of gum. A fluorescent light flickered and lit up the inside so we could see. Aunt Vick was right, there were so many flavors! We found gum with flavors from Ice-cream sundae, to Blueberry Pie!

  "Well, since we sort of own the place, I guess it wouldn't hurt to try some of the gum" I said.

  We tore open a "variety" box and stuffed different flavors in our mouths.

  "Thif stuff iv amazing" Jordan mumbled with a mouth full of bubblegum.

  "I know, I think I am chewing on a piece of Peanut Butter and Jelly bubble gum!" I said.

 

  We continued to try the different flavors and laughed as we competed to see who could blow the largest bubble. After a few moments of laughter, Jordan looked over at a strange isolated box right in the middle of a metal table. The box was taped shut and there was a note on top of it.

  "Grum! Do not open!"

  The note also said, "Not ready for sale"

  Jordan turned the box over in her hands, "What kind of name is Grum? she asked,

  "Well,” she said before I had a chance to answer, "since we are probably heirs to this place, let's go ahead and check it out!"

  We tore off the dried yellow tape and carefully leaned forward to peek inside. Inside there was but one pack of bubble gum with one piece missing.

  "Should we try it?" I asked.

  "Of course we should try it!" Jordan squealed as she began to tear open a piece.

  I hesitated, and said "But it's called Grum, not gum, and the note says not to open and that it is not ready to sell yet." I tried to reason.

  "Look," she said, "We won't know if we don't try, besides it's not like the note said poison or anything."

  She handed the pack to me and took out one piece of the Grum. She slowly unraveled a blue foiled wrapper, to reveal a purple piece of gum.

  "Maybe it's just grape gum" she said, "No big deal."

  I took the piece of gum from Jordan and tore it in half.

  "You're probably right," I said handing her half a piece, "What harm can it do?"

  Chapter 3

  Jordan and I stood staring at each other as we chewed the piece of gum.

  "Strange, it really doesn't have a particular flavor.” I said as I watched Jordan chew her share of the gum.

  "Yeah," she said with her mouth full.

  "It is sweet and everything but I can't tell what flavor it is either. Jeesh, no wonder the owner put 'not ready for sale' this gum probably wouldn't sell to anyone!"

  We began to get bored and started heading back towards the metal door to continue exploring. At that moment, I noticed something rather strange about Jordan. Her pig tails seemed to be shrinking into her head!

  "Um...Jordan, are you feeling ok?"

  She turned to look at me, "Yes, I am," she looked down at my feet in confusion, "but why are your shoes so large for your feet suddenly?" she asked.

  I looked down with horror as I saw my feet shrinking before my very eyes. "What is going on?"

  I looked back at Jordan. Her pigtails had completely disappeared along with the lower half of her body!

  "Oh my gosh, Jordan, something is happening to us. I knew we shouldn't have eaten that Grum, we are probably dying or something!"

  Jordan was about to say something back, but she disappeared.

  Moments later, I could feel myself sinking lower and lower into a dark place, and then I felt myself beginning to faint.

  When I started to wake up, everything was fuzzy. I could make out Jordan next to me. It looked like she was asleep.

  "Jordan, Jordan, wake up! I think that weird gum we chewed made us both pass out!"

  Jordan mumbled something, began to stir, and slowly sat up. "I told you we shouldn't eat that gum" she said to me.

  "What?" I said, "I was the one who told you that..."

  We both looked around. We hadn't just fainted. We weren't even in the factory anymore. Hot sunshine glared down from above. I could feel sand underneath me and two wooden shacks stood a few feet away. We were outside in a strange place that grew out of desert tundra.

  Out of the corner of my eye I saw a dark shadow of a person approaching us. As they moved closer, I noticed it was an old lady with long gray hair. She wore an old ragged baseball hat on top of her head and had on a sequined prom dress. She leaned in to grab us both by the wrists. Her bony hand clawed at us and her nails dug into our skin.

  "Get up you ninnies, this is no time to sleep! You get back to work right now or you will suffer the consequences."

  I looked up at the woman and tried to explain our situation,

  "But, Ma-am, I think you have us confused with someone else. We are supposed to check in with our relatives right now, but we seem to be lost."

  "Oh, is that right ninny girl? I see, I feed you and give you a place to sleep but here you sit and make up stories! Play time is over, pick up your shovels and get back to work!"

  Two strange, dirty, boys stood next to her as if to beckon us to do exactly as she asked. We picked up the shovels, and Jordan quietly asked the woman,

  "What is it we are digging for?"

  The old lady looked at Jordan as if she were mad, "What are digging for? Why, you know exactly what it is you ninny! You are digging the tunnel
to China!"

  I tried to reason with the woman. "Ma-am, there is no way to dig to China. It is just an old wives' tale. Nobody can actually reach China by digging."

  She looked over at me with anger in her eyes,

  "Is that right you little urchin? That is ridiculous, You just get busy and quit blabbin and we shall be the very first to arrive in China by tunnel! Now begin digging immediately or you will be sleeping with the slugs tonight!" We did as she told us, picked up the shovels and began digging.

  After what seemed to be hours of digging, I looked over at one of the scruffy boys who was standing guard.

  "Excuse me, but where exactly are we?"

  The boy looked over at me and wiped his runny nose with his filthy sleeve.

  "You aint spose to be talkin Ninny girl, you know you is in Crud-ville. You quit yer yappin or I'll get Gertie back here and she'll put you in with the slugs."

  I continued to dig into the endless dirt hole. I looked over at Jordan whose blue checkered dress was now covered in mud stains

  "Psst, Jordan, what do you suppose they are talking about when they speak of these slugs?"

  Suddenly the old lady, Gertie, appeared over top of the hole and said,

  "Oh, the ninny girls want to visit my dear pet slugs, do they! Well come along then and let's go pay them a visit!"

  With that, she and the two boys grabbed us and led us to an old wooden shack with black bars on the windows. Gertie opened the door and sang out sweetly,

  "My lovelies, we have guests with us who are dying to meet you! They will be spending the night with you so you can all get to know each other better!"

  Jordan and I looked beyond the door. Inside the room were piles of giant slugs moving slowly and thickly while beaming up at Gertie. Gertie looked the slugs adoringly and then at us with sharp beady eyes. She slammed the door.

  "Now, back to work, it isn't bed time yet."

  The hours seemed to drag as Jordan and I continued to dig and dig. Slowly the stars began to come out by the hundreds. The two scruffy boys took our shovels and grabbed us by the arms.