Writing Resources from Fifteen Minutes of Fiction

The Young Orange

One sunny morning, in a distant land, known as Florida, a family of oranges hung merrily from their tree.

It was a joyous day, the latest orange, Gladys, had fully been transformed from a meaningless flower, to a ripe, beautifully thick, bright skinned fruit.

The family was overjoyed, as brothers and sisters, aunts, and uncles celebrated.

Greeted willingly by everyone, the whole family in the entire tree wanted to meet Gladys. She was just happy to be with them, and was just having the best day of her life, as everyone knows, the first day of an orange, is always the best one.

Unfortunately, this was not as sunny as the day could get. Unfortunately, it was the worst day of their lives, and Gladys didn’t even know it yet.

It was harvesting day, and soon the noise of incoming tractors was heard.

The screams off all the trees before them terrified them from deep within, and Gladys shook from deep within her seeds.

It had seemed that a cloud had floated over them, bringing darkness to this beautiful day.

The tractors came, and the sound of families being severed from their places gave them a helpless feeling.

The smell of cut rinds met them, as the inhaled the very scent of other families being cut from history, forever.

Soon the third tree was being massacred, and even sooner the tree next to them. Only ten seconds passed as every tree of oranges met their ends, but it seemed like an eternity.

Eventually, the sharp, razor blades that darted horribly back and forth like a long line of scissors came at them, and they knew that it was too late to say goodbye.

Uncle Fritz was the first to go, his screams overpowered them, no matter how much he tried to hold it in, it was still the most traumatizing thing that any of them had experienced.

Next was grandpa Steven, He had survived the last attack, but not this one; he was too small the last time.

As the machine slowly crept bye, an aunt fell, but missed the pile of bodies that collected in the back, instead, poor aunt Sarah fell to the grass below.

The other oranges screamed for her to move, but soon, a massive, black tire rolled across her slowly like a steam roller.

Spewing the seeds from deep within her, the orange flesh squirted across what accumulated below, and that was certainly nothing that ANY of the little orange children would forget.

As each of the members of the tree watched their own fall to the grasp of the long blades, they panicked, and had no idea of what to do!

Gladys, being the new one, was not entirely sure of how to react, as she watched her parents and sisters become severed from were they sat.

Before she realized it, the monstrous tractor had passed, and all Gladys could hear was the screams of all the remaining family around her, there were only about five of them left.

Her sisters, Fran and Mary, her cousin, Jeremy, and her aunt and uncle, James and Carrol, who clung to each other’s sides with absolute horror.

What they did not plan on however, was the group of horrible beings who came after the tractor, and picked the remaining of them.

Hearing the trees around them silence, Gladys decided that nothing could be worse.

That was however, not the case.

As each of the beings with long arms reached at them, the horrible screams of her aunt and uncle leave her, she was not left with her cousin and sisters much longer afterwords.

Gladys watched as her remaining sisters and cousin were tucked into a pouch below her, but somehow, she was missed.

The youngest, and least experienced in the bunch, and SHE of all oranges, had to be the one left on the tree. She had been forgotten. She no longer had any orange family around her to comfort and encourage her.

The deafening silence from the trees behind her horrified her, but not nearly as much as the sounds of the screaming trees of families after her, who were experiencing the same things she was.

It was truly, not a day to live. Or better yet, not a day to die. Not for everyone except her anyways.

Why was She the last one? She only hoped and prayed, that she didn’t have to be the last one left the next time it would happen

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