by Karen Kalbacher

Created on: November 03, 2008   Last Updated: September 21, 2011

The Witch on the Corner

Emrick wasn't frightened of the house on the corner. That wasn't to say the moldy old house with its weird mustard yellow flower garden and front lawn full of rotting neighborhood toys didn't make him nervous. Edging past it every day on the way to and from school did make life interesting after all. School certainly wasn't making life fun and exciting. Emrick found it boring to sit still for hours on end. Most of the time he doodled in the margins of his old spiral notebook. He found he liked drawing the moldy house and junk on the lawn best of all. But he couldn't quite get the fence right. It bothered him every time he walked past. If only he could get a closer look then he could get it right on paper.

The house was on the corner. None of the other houses were near it. In fact the row homes looked like they were huddled together for warmth or in fear of the corner house. Emrick stared and stared, putting his hands on the outer gate and looking hungrily at the inner fence. One good close look and he would finally be able to draw the house properly. All he had to do was get closer. Emrick felt weird tingles zip up his back and into his brain. He felt like people were whispering in his ear, telling him it was too scary, too different inside the gate and he best go home now. Emrick let go of the gate and started to back away but the fence. He wanted to draw the fence.

"One quick look can't hurt," Emrick whispered. With two hands he grabbed the gate and shoved. There was no screech, no haunted house squeaky hinges. The gate smoothly opened into the front yard. Brown, dead old grass stretched from the outer fence to the muddy yellow flowers ringing the walk. Emrick saw old Frisbees faded from red to dull pink and baseballs split at the seams growing dandelions. He didn't stop but kept going up the walk to the fence. He could see it had a leaf pattern on it but he wasn't close enough yet to see what kind of leaves. The flowers got thicker. Emrick was dizzy and the flowers seemed to have tiny little faces. Emrick leaned close to a big bunch. The flowers moved. Emrick backed up. The flowers seemed to have eyes and teeny tiny mouths. The mouths opened showing rows of bright buttercup teeth. They screamed!

Emrick backed away from one row of flowers only to hear another bunch start screaming. He was trapped! They were all up and down the walk. The only place he could go was in to the house. Emrick ran up the steps past the inner fence. Terrified,

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