Lilly Fleming, 11, has been with Written Out Loud for two years now and has been one of the funniest, most gracious students I’ve had the pleasure to teach. She’s a fashion icon (see picture above), a diligent worker, and is always the first one to let go of an idea when someone presents a better one, or let a crewmate write a chapter she wanted to write. What more could you possibly ask of an up-and-coming novelist?
Lilly and her crew are working on a story centering around a high school in which iconic figures from across American history compete in an epic talent show for glory, fame, and a few sorely-needed points on their report cards. George Washingmachine, Thomas Caprisun, Alexander Hamsandwich, and the rest of DA BROSKIS must pull out all the stops to defeat their enemies at home and abroad–the latter taking the form of an all-British high school. That was the initial idea.
But there was something missing. We needed an element of uncertainty, someone who existed outside of the parameters of the story and brought an element of surprise.
Then, Lilly wrote this chapter.
***
“And now for our final performance, Melvin Moccasin!”
“Oh this is gonna be good!” said Lafayeti, “C’mon!”
Melvin's cheesy performance started with him walking on stage in a shimmery suit with fairy wings. A couple of notes were played on the recorder. George knew those notes from anywhere; he was singing Golden Child Country. Melvin’s spit was starting to puddle on the stage floor from spewing out flat tones.
“Ohhhhhh have you ever seen the color gold, do you know what it was made for? Our country, golden country, golden child, perfect as can be,” Melvin sang. George and Lafayeti were trying to hold in their humongous amounts of laughter. All of a sudden, Melvin ripped his suit off to reveal a super goth jumpsuit with fake furry spider legs coming out of it. He got on the floor and started hissing and crawling. The judges looked horrified and one woman’s glasses were covered with spit from Melvin. This performance was the equivalent of a dumpster that smelled bad in the rain. All of the sudden, a whole choir came down on a platform with spider legs and Melvin continued to hiss and crawl and flap his fairy wings. “OH GOLDEN COUNTRY!” Melvin shouted. “OH GOLDEN COUNTRY, HOOOOO!” The ladies sang in the background.
“GOLDEN COUNTRYYYYYYYYY CHILDDDDDD!” Melvin belted. For some reason, Melvin thought there was a whole crowd that loved him and tried to do a stage dive. He ended up falling right into one of the judges, cracking her glasses, and kissing her.
“You are so beautiful,” he said.
He climbed back on stage and the confetti blast from the ceiling stuck to his sweaty face.
“Thank you!” he shouted and waddled off stage. George and Laffayeti could hear the woman with the glasses saying “ Gosh, I'm going to have to triple cross his name out.”
***
Like she does every week, Lilly absolutely knocked this chapter out of the park. I can’t wait to see what she comes up with next.
