Charlie’s Room: The Invitation

When Isaac was getting ready for work, he found a small piece of paper in one of his shoes. It said: You’re invited to a Dinosaur Party in Charlie’s Room after dinner. Bring this ticket to get in.

At the bottom of the ticket, there was a squiggly drawing of a Tyrannosaurus Rex. It looked very festive. Isaac was thrilled to be invited to a party and left for work with a smile.

Work seemed to go especially slow in the way that it always does when there’s somewhere else he’d rather be. Isaac kept losing track and had to reread emails and important documents several times. However, he did his best and somehow made it through the day.

Outside, it was freezing cold. Isaac had parked a block away, which wasn’t too far. He pulled his gloves out of his pocket, and a piece of paper fluttered to the ground. It was the ticket to the dinosaur party.

Just as Isaac leaned over to pick it up, a nearly-invisible wind sprite dashed by in a gust of wind. It picked up the ticket and ran away grinning madly, its feet barely touching the ground. Isaac chased after it, and the wind sprite began to leap higher and higher. It grasped the edges of the ticket and used it a parachute to glide on the air currents.

Isaac ran faster and faster. He lunged forward and almost managed to catch the sprite. It dropped through the bars of a storm drain and fluttered to the bottom, out of reach. The wind sprite hugged the ticket to its chest and laughed a hissy, sighing sort of laugh.

The sprite obviously wanted to keep the ticket, but Isaac needed that ticket to get into the party. He patted his pockets to see if there was anything he could offer in trade. He found an old shopping list with the entries all crossed out.

Storing his gloves in his pocket, he began to fold the list. He quickly formed a decent paper airplane. He balanced it in his hand, then gave it a trial toss. It flew out of his hand and landed a good distance away.

The wind sprite watched the airplane with wide eyes. Isaac left to retrieve it. He tossed it so that it flew past the storm drain a few more times. The air was still and waiting.

The sprite held the ticket a little more loosely as its eyes tracked the flight of the paper airplane above the grate. Finally it flew up out of the grate with a puff of wind that knocked the plane out of the air. It crashed to the ground nearby.

The wind sprite dropped the ticket and darted over to the plane. Holding it out in front, the sprite ran with the wind. The planed lifted up higher, and the wind sprite jumped on and flew away in a wild wave of wind.

Isaac ran towards the ticket, certain that it would be carried away too. But he couldn’t see it fluttering away. In fact, he couldn’t see it at all. He looked all around, in a wide circle, and then returned to the spot where he’d last seen it.

Had that rock always been there? It blended into the sidewalk so well that he hadn’t noticed it before. Looking closer, he could see the edge of the ticket poking out from under the rock. He tried to pick up the rock and move it to the side, but it wouldn’t budge.

Somehow, he knew the rock wanted to keep the ticket, but Isaac needed that ticket to get into the party. He checked his pockets again, shuffling around his gloves with cold hands. He pulled out a penny. This might work.

“Look,” Isaac said. “This was once a rock. Now it is shiny and decorated. Look what it can do.” Carefully, Isaac spun the penny. It managed a few turns on the side walk before flopping over. “This is a real treasure.”

Isaac set it next to the rock. “I’ll just leave it here and look over there for a minute.”

When Isaac looked back down, the penny had disappeared under the rock. The ticket was sitting on the sidewalk, looking only slightly crumpled. He picked it up quickly.

He held onto the ticket tightly and walked quickly to the car, not even stopping to put on his gloves. He shut it into the glove box, started the car, and turned on the heat even before putting on his seatbelt. It took a while for the car to warm up and a little longer for his hands to feel warm.

When he got home, he opened the glove box and was relieved that the ticket was still there. He kept it next to his plate at dinner, where he could keep an eye on it. Luckily, it didn’t go anywhere.

Isaac still had his ticket when it was time for the dinosaur party. He was an old shopping list and a penny poorer, but he didn’t really mind. The party was worth that and more. They had a lot of fun playing dinosaur games and acting out their favorite part of the dinosaur movies and drawing happy dinosaur pictures. It was the best dinosaur party Isaac had ever attended.