Katharine Burris
Mr. Jockers
ILA Period 5
1/19/17
The Nerf War
I felt a bullet graze past my ear at the beginning of the game. Luckily, it didn’t hit me. I felt relieved that I hadn’t got hit, and also excited to keep playing the game and hopefully eliminate someone on the other team. I was still alive in the game. I ran to the staircase and shot at the other team.
Two hours earlier, the trees were covered with snow, and there was still more to come. The roads were icy and slick. We had nowhere to go. It was the Coldest. Day. Ever. My brother James and I invited the O’Brien’s and Rasmussen’s over because they lived in our neighborhood. But, now we were all bored and anxious to do something fun.
“We should play a board game or something,” I suggested to the group.
“No! That’s so dumb,” my brother instantly blurted out. He was a year older than me, so everything I said he would always have something to say against it.
“Let’s come up with a game to play,” Claire said.
“Yeah-” Micah was interrupted by the lights suddenly turning off. We all questioned what happened.
“MOM!” I shouted up to where she was.
The basement was pitch dark, and the once bright and loud TV was now shut off, leaving us in silence .
“The power went out. Come up here and we can get some lanterns,” my mom said back calmly.
I hoped that the power wasn’t out for too long. I hated power outages because there was never anything to do during them.
We headed upstairs, walking carefully through the basement.
Once we reached upstairs, the light from the cold, winter day poured into my house. We all sat down and ate lunch, chicken tenders of course, because they are our favorite. And after, we drank hot chocolate. We all contemplated what we could possibly do, and finally someone had an idea.
“I have a great idea!” my brother, James, shouted clearly excited as to what he had thought of.
“We should go downstairs in the dark and have a war with the Nerf guns!” he explained.
“Ok!” we all agreed, thinking it could be something fun to do.
We all piled down into the basement, trying to get in front to get the best Nerf gun and the most bullets. It was boys vs girls. James, Sean, and Soren vs Claire, Micah, and I.
The boys team went behind the treadmill in the corner, while the girls went behind the soft brown couch directly in front of the flat screen TV. The staircase was behind the TV and in between both bases, making it the perfect spot to shoot the other team. The familiar scent of vanilla filled the room and the laundry machine was roaring. My mother was upstairs working on her computer. I had a handful of bright blue Nerf bullets that were hard to hide from the other team. The girl’s team was currently unhappy and arguing with the boy’s team because they had an advantage of the ping-pong table next to their base, where they could easily hide under.
“Okay, what should the rules be?” Soren, Micah’s brother asked.
“We don’t need any rules, we all know who’s going to win,” James said, confidently.
“How about, if you get shot once, then you’re out?” I suggested to the group.
“Okay that’s the only rule,” Sean decided.
We all agreed on the rules and went back to our bases, preparing for the start of the game.
I dashed over to the light switch, eager to start the game.
The lights turned off.
And the game had begun.
“Ok, I’ll go to the stairs first to hide,” Claire whispered to Micah and I.
She ducked down and sprinted over to the stairs.
“I think I just saw someone… they might have gone to the staircase,” we heard my brother question, clearly confused.
Micah and I turned to each other and laughed about his confusion.
Bullets were flying around the room and bouncing and banging off objects. Right in front of my face, a bullet had whizzed by luckily not reaching me.
“I’ll go to the staircase next,” I informed Claire and Micah.
I sprinted over to the stairs and I thought about where would be the best place to shoot the boys, without getting shot myself. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, I felt something hit my arm. I turned to the ground and saw the bright blue bullet laying there. I couldn’t believe I had just been shot so soon in the game. I really wanted to keep playing, but I would have to lie.
“I shot you, you’re out!” my brother exclaimed in excitement.
“NO… you didn’t. You barely missed me,” I told him.
He didn’t respond right away because he was thinking about whether or not he should believe me. I had to make my story more believable.
“Do you really think I would lie?” (Of course I was lying, but I wasn’t going to tell him that).
“I don’t know, let’s just keep playing,” James replied, and forgot about the situation. I was happy that my lie had worked and I could keep playing.
I walked back to my base and sat down on the ground behind the couch laughing.
“Did you actually get shot?’ Micah whispered to me as quietly as possible, making sure the boys didn’t hear.
“Yes,” I told her. We both started laughing at what I had done.
But, I soon began to feel guilty about lying to them.
We kept playing for what felt like minutes, but was actually hours. After everyone had gone home, after the fun and memorable day we had, I realized that during snow days we would always go to my house and play the Nerf War. This had been the best day of the winter, even though we had a seven day power outage. The six of us would remember this day and eventually I would tell my brother about all the times I had lied.
