Meddling Mike
Around 8 a.m. on a beautiful October morning begins on the edge of town in Rayville, Louisiana.
A jovial fourth grader, Meddling Mike, hops out the passenger side of his Grandpa’s blue 1998 GMC Sierra short bed with a side step truck. He pushes his Coke-bottle glasses up on his nose and swings his camera strap around his neck. He walks with a lotta pep in his step to get his daily assignment.
As he enters the building and says hello, everyone quickly starts moving drinks, computers, files, food, plants and anything breakable away from him. He quietly enters an office and we see the back of a middle-aged man in a brand new white shirt stacking his donuts and pouring his morning orange juice.
Very loudly, Mike shouts, “HEEEELLLOOOO Mr. Riser!!!”
This scares the bananas out of Mr. Riser and he spills his orange juice and donuts everywhere.
Mr. Riser rolls his eyes as if he already knows who it is and doesn’t want to turn around, but he does.
As the orange juice drips from his hair and glasses, he says, “Oh lucky me. Mike, your assignment today is to get photos of the Halloween Festival at Lobrano Field in Mangham. And please don’t break or destroy anything this time.”
Mike gave a really big smile and said, “okie dokie.”
We arrive at the Halloween Festival and there are people everywhere. There are different kinds of fun games, costume contests, lots of rides and delicious food stands. There is a 20-foot-tall pyramid of pumpkins, a 15-foot tall scarecrow and a gigantic ice sculpture of a pumpkin.
The main attraction was in the far right corner of the field.
We see Donald the Purple Dragon. He is about 30 feet tall and weighs about two tons. He was doing tricks with his trainer, Mr. Elmore, for the spectators. Upon noticing Mike, Mr. Elmore began to look very nervous. For every trick Donald got right, his trainer would give him a really huge popcorn ball. He would burp bubbles after every popcorn ball. Donald was really enjoying himself.
Mike noticed all of the signs that said: take only one photo and NO FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY!! Well Mike said to himself, “I wonder what would happen if I did use the flash?” So he took the picture, and it gave an extremely bright flash!
Donald was immediately startled. He stood up, let out a loud scream and began to flap his wings. The wind was so strong that it knocked down the pyramid of pumpkins, destroyed the tall scarecrow and the fire he was breathing in the air melted the gigantic ice sculpture.
Finally, Mr. Elmore calmed Donald down. Donald began to smile and he flew away to his home for the rest of the evening. The show was over. The once beautiful festival was a complete mess.
Mike took a look around and said, “Wow, this is gonna make a great story!”
Roger J. Timber is a native of Rayville and graduate of Rayville High School. He is an actor known for Warped!, S.W.A.T. and Insecure in addition to more than 30 Hollywood productions and a children’s book author.