It was a dark and stormy night, at least it was outside. Inside, there was a warm family, and a fire burning.
"Open another present, Megan", called a little girl.
"I am, I am", Megan said.
" Here is one from your Aunt Elise", her mom said.
" Oh, no, not more clothes from Tibet", Megan said. She carefully unwrapped the plain paper, and saw it was...
" A 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle. Cool", Megan said.
" That was the last one", her dad said.
" Wow, I am so tired", Megan said.
" Melanie's asleep," her mom said, looking at the younger girl.
"Good night" Megan said, "I'm going up to bed".
"Good night," her parents said.
The next day, Megan woke up and it had snowed!
"Snow in Calofornia," Megan said to herself, "that's unusual".
She got up and went to breakfast. She ate her pancakes and opened the puzzle. Looking at the picture on the box, it was a puzzle of a winter scene in Colorado. It was beautiful. There was snow everywhere, and snow rabbits were frozen in time, hopping through the tall trees. It was the most beautiful puzzle Megan had ever seen. She dumped the puzzle out on the large card table and sorted out the edge pieces.
"Wow, there are so many pieces", she wondered outloud.
She started to put the puzzle edge together. A few hours later, she got hungry and stopped, fitting in the last edge piece. Looking at the clock, Megan saw that it was late.
"Twelve o'clock", Megan exclaimed, " I've wasted almost the whole day".
She got on her snow gear and went outside. She yelled to her dad that she was going to Nicole's house for a while.
"Okay," her dad yelled back, "I'll call for you to come home".
Megan tracked through the streets full of snow and finally reached Nicole's house after about twenty minutes. Nicole opened the door and Megan rushed inside. She took off her snow gear and put it in the bathroom. Then, she collapsed onto the soft, velvety smooth sofa.
"Long walk", Nicole asked her, smiling.
"You bet", Megan replied.
The two girls made hot chocolate and went up to Nicole's room.
" Want to play Jumanji", she asked Megan.
"Sure", Megan said," Have you seen the movie yet? It is so cool".
"Yeah, I've rented it", Nicole said.
"Cool," Megan said, " let's watch it instead".
Nicole turned on the movie, and brought out some cheddar popcorn in a bowl. Megan found a warm blanket, and they watched the whole movie before the phone rang. Nicole answered it
"Hello"...."yeah"...."okay,I'll tell her".
"let me guess", Megan said," that was my dad".
"yup"
"and he wants me home, right"
"you got it", Nicole said.
"see ya tommorow", Megan said.
She got her stuff together and went home.
"Dad, I'm back", she yelled coming through the door.
She went to work on the puzzle, but something was different. On the box, the trees were dead, and instead of the lively rabbits, all that was there were bones where the rabbits once were.
"Weird", Megan thought.
Nevertheless, she continued to work on the puzzle until dinner time.
The next day, Megan woke up and went downstairs for a hot breakfast. After she ate her pancakes, she went back to the puzzle. This time, it had really changed. There were NO trees, no rabbits, not even bones, just a cold, dark, empty space, with a cave in the middle. Megan was scared, but something controlled her, the eyes in the cave, green and chilled, stared into her deep blue eyes and beckoned her to continue the puzzle. Slowly, and zombie like, Megan continued. Up and down, up and down, up and down. Slowly, she fit the LAST piece into the puzzle. `CLICK' it fit in. Megan started to walk away, but something pulled her back. She could feel the green eyes staring at her as she slowly turned around. The puzzle was pulling her in!
"Nooooooo", Megan screamed, as the puzzle consumed her.
Ten Years Later
A boy about the age of ten or twelve was rummaging through a box in the attic marked "Megan's Things". He pulled out a jigsaw puzzle, 1000 pieces. Delightedly, he took the puzzle downstairs, unaware that deep blue eyes were watching him, waiting for freedom.