An Excerpt from a Writing Project

From The Somewhat Perilous Plot of the Patriotic Mosquitoes

There wasn't really a lot for the kids to do for a while. Hide and seek might have been the best option, even if the kids are at least twenty years old. Other games, like football, flying disk war, and other games were possibilities as well. But there were some people who wanted to play hide and seek.

Or reverse hide and seek. Where only one person hides, and everyone else seeks. A game that has been played before and proven to be quite fun, the kids thought that would be a better idea than plain old hide and seek. Why not change things up a bit? What's wrong with being different for a little while? Being conventional could wait for another time.

When they had all counted to thirty, they heard Levi running. But they weren't quite sure where he was headed off to. All they heard were his fast footsteps that probably led to a small house with a porch.

"Well, it looks like he's gonna go for it," Caleb said after they all counted when Levi ran to his hiding spot.
"Where do you think he is?" Bradley felt compelled to ask.
"It would be interesting to find out."
"Probably not in an easy place."
"Oh, absolutely not," Caleb remarked.
"I don't think he's that....you know...." Bradley tried remembering a certain word.
"Um....what word are you thinking of?"
"I can't think of it."
"He's bold."
"Well, yes. He's very bold and stubborn."

There were quite a few buildings around the area. They just figured that the small house with the porch was where he might be. The roof was a gable shape, with clapboard siding. The porch looked nice enough. But there was absolutely no way Levi could have hidden here. The only door leading into the house was locked. And all of the windows were locked as well. There was absolutely no basement.

The kids didn't really know where to look next. The small house with a porch was out of the question. They moved on to the next small house, but without a porch. The house looked a little similar to the previous house, but the siding was made of some weird off color of lavender vinyl. It was a cool house nonetheless, but it didn't seem to be a possibility either. However, with this house, there was a basement. But Levi could not be hiding in the basement. He is way too smart to pull that off. Because of this, the hide and seek game could take a while. That was for sure.

Fifteen minutes later, and the kids still could not find Levi. They knew he had to be around here somewhere. That was the rule of the game, to not go farther than the end of this so-called park. If it is even a park. More or less a bunch of small houses just thrown on some vacant land that dates back to 1982. Maybe the year is a bit off, but one would get the idea. But Levi was here somewhere, but he was most likely going to shock everyone with his hiding place. There were at least ten houses around this area, and Bradley, Claire, Brody, Caleb, Jack, Andrew, and David had only looked at two of them. Twenty percent completed. Eighty percent more to go.

On to the third house. A small house with a porch, this place had a hip roof that looked like it had just been renovated. The porch also looked renovated, with a soda machine just outside the front door. The pop machine did not look renovated, however. It most likely dated back to the 1950's or 1960's, so basically when soda machines were so popular.

There were so many cool things about this house, including the kelly green shutters, the scarlet red roof, and the royal blue door. It was locked, as everyone had figured. And there was absolutely no basement. So Levi could still not have possibly gone into the basement. But, did anyone really know if Levi was hiding here?

No one could find him.

A few minutes, however. That changed. The seven kids were wandering around aimlessly in the area when they heard some feet jump off something. Whoever made this sound did not jump hard. It sounded like he or she might have taken some time to get closer to the ground before making a jump. The seven kids turned around to see who might have made that noise to their dismay.

It was Levi. He was bent over with his hands on his knees, with his head facing the ground. Very similar as to when someone finishes their morning run. Only it wasn’t morning. And he wasn’t running.

Levi’s chest was heaving once he was able to get back on the ground. He didn’t want to just jump off the roof because it was high enough that he could hurt himself if he had done that. He sat up against a large boulder, which happened to appear out of nowhere, according to the eight twenty-some-year-olds.

​"Levi! Where did you hide?" Jack questioned his best friend.
"I climbed up on a roof after running up that hill," Levi replied.
"You okay, man? Wanna relax a bit?"
"I might need to. I was so shocked that you didn't see me."
"You hid yourself well," Jack said.
"I was nervous, man," Levi remarked. "I was watching you guys keep passing where I was, and I was trying to keep my breathing to a minimum."
"Oh wow."
"My body wanted me to breathe hard, but I didn't want to breathe hard. So I tried to hold my breath as long as I could, but it didn't work as well as I wanted it to. And my heart was pounding so hard while I was trying to hold my breath. I was that nervous."
"Does your chest hurt?"
"My chest is a little sore, but I need to actually breathe."
“You gonna pull through?”
“Absolutely.”