UNINVITED GUESTS

	Hi!  My name is Chelsea Garla.  I’m 12 years old.  This is my story.  I have two sisters, Allysa’s 17, and Jaime’s (pronounced Jay-me) 9.  I used to live in San Francisco, but a small mishap made that home go away.  I know this sounds weird, but I’ve been seeing weird things lately.  So like last week when my best friend Josh and I went to the pool, I saw a mermaid in the bathroom stall next to me.  How do I know it was a mermaid?  Well, when I came out, the mermaid was washing her hands.  Weird!  I tried to tell Josh about it, but he just thought I was crazy.  Typical.  Oh yeah!  On the last day of school, I saw the teachers in the teachers lounge, but they didn’t look like teachers.  They looked like aliens!  I think I’m having mental break downs!  So, if you really want to hear the weirdest story of all, just keep reading.

	So, on June 17 of this year, I was going in my basement to look for my water skis.  There is a rounded door if you turn left after you come down the stairs.  When I went down, the door wasn’t there.  I got kinda scared so I called up to my older sister, Allysa.  Well, Allysa is not the kind of person who will do what you want, when you want it.  So Allysa started asking why, so I was saying ‘cause I need you to help me find something, and Allysa still asked why, so I yelled up to mom to get Allysa down here.  So mom told Allysa to help me find what I needed.  When Allysa came down, she asked ‘the question’.  Now, you’re probably wondering what ‘the question’ is.  Fine.  The question is this: “Where is the door?”  Well, like I could answer that one!  So I told her that’s what I needed her to help me find.  So we were searching for the door for like, 20 minutes, and then I found something.  “The door,” I said to Allysa, “The door.  Allysa!  The door, it’s here, but it’s a lot smaller!”  Well, Allysa obviously didn’t believe me, but she came.  She
looked down, and there it was.  The door in it’s place, but like, 10 times smaller!  Allysa thought this was crazy and that she didn’t believe it, so she ran upstairs and ignored me for the rest of the day.

	Well, the next day, I went over to Josh’s house to tell him about the door, 
but when I knocked on the door, Kathleen, Josh’s mom answered.  “Oh, hi Chelsea.  Josh just went out to his basketball game.  You want me to give you a ride?  He brought Trish with him also.”  Well that made me mad!  Trish was the popular girl at our middle school, and she hated me!  So I hated her back.  “Nah,” I said, “I’ll just skip it.”  So I walked home the rest of the way, with my shoulders drooping.  When I walked in to the mud-room, my mom asked how Josh was doing, but I roughly said that Josh wasn’t here.  “Well, where is he then?” mom asked.  So I answered, “At his basketball game with TRISH!  Mom, he invited Trish, but he never even mentioned the game to me, let alone invite me!”  So I ran to my room crying.

	Maybe, an hour later, hour and a half, someone rang the doorbell.  Jaime answered it.  She yelled that Josh was at the door.  I yelled back that I didn’t care.  Jaime does nothing I say, so she let Josh in and Josh came into my room.  “I’m so sorry if I upset you, but Trish came up to me at the pool last week and invited herself to my basketball game, and I’m also sorry that I never told you about the game, but I knew that you’d want to come, and I know you hate Trish so I thought it would be best if I didn’t tell you,” said Josh, “and I hope that you forgive me.”  Wow! Impressive.  I had to forgive him ‘cause that look on his face was so sad and depressed.  “I forgive you,” I said, “I really, truly forgive you.”  Right about now is one of those times when you don’t know what to say, but you say something anyways.  “Okay.  Josh, I know that I was a bit harsh, but I just wish you had told me something.” I said.  There are times when I want to kill Josh, and other times, I want to hug him forever ‘cause he did something truly amazing.  Well, I guess Kathleen told Josh a whole different story ‘cause he went on 
and on about something I knew nothing about.  Well, I told Josh that he was off by a lot and I told him about the door in the basement.

	When I finished telling Josh about the door, he was gaping, wide-eyed wondering ‘is Chelsea crazy or what!’  Well, I thought for sure that I was crazy ‘cause when we went downstairs, there was the door, just like it usually is.  Well, now I completely felt crazy, and Josh probably thinks I’m going insane.  This door business is getting insane, crazy, and I am officially discombobulated!  What am I gonna do now?  Sit around all summer and be called freak?  No!  I’m gonna get to the bottom of this and figure it out!

	So, Josh left like, 5 hours ago and I’m feeling kinda down.  I mean, the door was smaller than Jamie’s ice skates a while ago, and now, there it is, just as big as it usually is.  Allysa just finished calling like, THE WHOLE SCHOOL!  What was she telling them?  Telling them about the door!

	Next month, Allysa told me that Josh was hanging out with Trish and her friends (mostly guys).  That made me want to kill him!  So I went over to his house, but Josh was outside with Trish, and I don’t even want to say what he was doing.  It wasn’t anything bad, but I was just so mad, I just don’t feel like saying it.

	Over the next few weeks, I’ve been exploring the basement regularly for anything unusual.  Well, yesterday, I found something.  There were these three tiny men and one tiny woman about 5” tall.  I screamed and Jaime came down.  “What?  What happened?  Tell me Chelsea, tell me!” asked Jaime.  I said, “Look at the door, look 5 feet away from that.  What do you see?”  Well, that made Jaime scream, so Allysa came down.  “What’s going on guys, why you screaming?” asked Allysa.  So I repeated what I said to Jaime, and Allysa screamed, and in 20 minutes, the whole family was down in the basement.  “Higof letert goo ferl agool!” said one of the little men.  “WHAT!” screamed mom, “TALKING MEN!”

	“Migidy nagidame igadis Bojo.” said the little man.  “Say that in english.” I said, because no one would be able to understand that gibberish.  “Ohhhhhhhh,” said the man, “my name is Bojo, ruler of Bojo-Mial.  This is my son, Mak, my brother Behy-Fac and my wife, Mial.  And you are?”  Well, I couldn’t ignore him so I said, “Chelsea, then Allysa, then mom or Ricci, then Jaime, then dad or Derick, but dad’s not here.  There’s lot’s of us!”  That made mom mad!  “Why exactly did you tell them our names?  These could be bad things.” she said.  That made me zip my lips.

	 The next week, the tiny men came back, but this time there were hundreds of them, and they were all carrying mini weapons.  “What are you doing?” I asked.  Bojo replied, “Invading human worlds so we can take over, now move or else we will dispose of you!”  Mom was right!  These men were evil!  “No, I won’t move.  You’ll have to find another way out!” I said.  “Go to Mars or somewhere.  There was said to be life on Mars.”  Bojo started laughing.  “You think you can over-power me and hundreds of Bojo-Mialins?  Go home kid.  Leave us alone!”  I ran upstairs, called dad and told her to come home at once.  “Dad! Dad, pick up, those men, mom was right.  They are evil.  They say they’re trying to invade our world!”  It turns out, dad was on the phone the whole time.  He started laughing.  “Oh, Chelsea, I knew that a while ago.  I had an idea about tiny men invading the human world and I made it come true!  My wish finally came TRUE!  Now get off the phone now!”  Now, in my head, I’m thinking, ‘What the heck is going on?’, but outside, I think I’m getting it!  Dad made a wish on a shooting star and it was that the basement door would shrink down whenever the tiny men who lived inside the door wanted to come out, or were already out.  He wished that the men and the woman would be evil and try to invade the human world.

	When I told mom my prediction, and she knew exactly what I was talking about.  “Your father made a wish last night while he thought I was 
asleep.  I remember it very clearly.  ‘I wish upon a shooting star, that the basement door will fall down far.  The men inside will strike at noon, and make it come so very soon.’  Yes, that’s what he said.  He wished upon a shooting star, but I never actually believed that those wishes came true.  Very silly of me to let this one slide by me.” she said.

	Three weeks before school would start again, Josh came by my house, and he stopped in front of it.  He came up to the porch, knocked on the door, Jaime answered it, and told Josh that I hated him.  Well, Josh didn’t care.  He pushed Jaime aside, ran up the stairs and into my room.  I tried to be as quiet as I could in my closet.  Josh’s footsteps came closer and closer and soon, he opened the closet door.  “Chelsea? Are you in there?” he asked.  Now I realized that he was sorry.  I came out and said, “Here I am.”  I ran out of the closet and jumped on my bed.  I started talking and soon, I couldn’t stop.  I talked about how much I missed him, about the door, about Bojo and his plans to invade the human world.  “Woah, woah, slow down, Chelsea, I can’t figure this all out at once.  Say it again, slower.” said Josh.  So I repeated the story again.  “Wow!” said Josh, “That sounds like a fairy tale.”

	So for the next half hour or so, Josh and I went to the basement, there was the shrunken door.  Josh was a little scared.  His heart was pounding.  He was sure he had seen the doorknob turn.  Then, the door opened the slightest bit.  Out came Mial.  “Go away, far away, somewhere where Bojo will never find you!” she said.  Well, Josh found Mial pathetic.  “Get a load of that,” he said, “telling us what to do.  We’re at least 12 times her size!”  Mial screamed, “How dare you insult thy mind!  I have a much bigger mind than you both put together!”  Josh wanted to test Mial, so he asked, “What is 3+12?”  This stumped Mial.  “Not that way, the other way.” Mial said.  Oh, so she meant division?  “Well, than what’s 12+3, then?” I asked.  “No, no, I’m not a mathmatition, I’ve meant that my mind knows what it’s been talking about.  Bojo and I had a forced marriage, not love.  He has forced me to hang my parents, push my family through that very door, telling them never to come back again!  The only person I love is Mak.  He’s the only one who truly understands me.  Please, run away for your sake, and never come back again.  Bojo is just inside, biding his time for the perfect moment.” said Mial.  I answered back, “OK Mial, we’ll run, far away, just for you.”  Josh was surprised.  “Really Chelsea, you believe her?” he said.  “Of course!  I’d trust Mial with my life.” I said.  We both ran upstairs.

	“Mom!  Allysa!  Jaime!  Run, Mial said Bojo’s coming, with the whole gang!  She said run away, far away!  Let’s go, before they get us first!” I screamed.  “WHAT!” screamed mom, “WHAT IS GOING ON CHELSEA?” Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, every month or so, mom forgets to drink her coffee, and, sorry to say, this happened to be the day.  “Mom.  Bojo’s coming with the rest of the gang.  We’re in for it unless we run!” I said.  Sorry mom, but you chose the wrong day to forget your coffee.

	I heard footsteps, slowly coming up the stairs.  I screamed to everyone that this was our last chance.  It turns out, mom was in her room, making tons of slingshots as our weapons against what we called ‘the 5 inch tribe.’  “Load up those weapons, find a good rock, shoot!” said mom, coming down from upstairs.  Hooray for mom!  She made four slingshots and had collected 32 rocks.  I ran and gave mom the biggest hug I’d given everyone, but I didn’t entirely mean it. (except for Josh, maybe, ‘cause in third grade, I gave him a big one.)  Well, Bojo and about 30 other 5 inchers came out from the basement doorway.  Well, thanks to mom, I was prepared and ready.  Bojo and seven other little things came towards me and Josh.  Six went towards Jaime, eight went toward Allysa and nine went towards mom.  We started shooting, hitting and picking up any rocks we found.

	Twenty minutes later, only one little man was left, besides Bojo, who was hiding behind a chair.  Ten minutes later, 25 more little men came up the stairs.  We fought, but 10 out of the 25 climbed out the window.  “Allysa, Jaime, run outside and catch the ten that escaped!” I screamed.  They both ran outside.  Mom, Josh and I kept knocking the others out.  At about 4:30, all the little men were dead. (knocked out, if you prefer.)  Except Bojo.  Bojo had run outside just as we were cleaning up the messy area.  This was all dad’s fault.  If he hadn’t wished on that star, we wouldn’t have had to kill these men, but before any of this, there wouldn’t have been any little men at all!  So in our dreams, we’re all thanking dad for having Jaime come to my room every night, saying Bojo’s looking through her window at her.  Thanks dad, I say to myself.

	A week before school started, mom announced that we were moving.  I kind of saw this one coming, but, I wanted to know bad where we were moving.  “I have officially decided that we are moving to Lansing, Michigan,” she said, “I hope that this choice is okay with you.”  “What!  Michigan!  We’re moving, to Michigan?” I said, scared.  “Yes,” said mom, “Yes, we’re moving to Michigan.”  Then I thought about who I would leave behind.  Josh, Melanie, even Trish.  Wow!  Wait!  “DAD!!!  MOM WE HAVE TO FIND DAD!!!” I screamed.  “I’ve already settled that with him.” mom said calmly, “Your father and I have decided it best to leave him here, where he cannot do any harm to us.”  But dad is dad, you can’t just leave dad alone in a place where fantasy isn’t reality.  “Mom, I don’t care if dad messes up my family!  I want him back!” I cried.  Mom just looked at me, pityingly.  I hate that face and she knows it.  “Stop, mom, really.” I said.

	So, six days before San Francisco school started, we drove up to Lansing.  There were no tall buildings, no taxi’s anywhere.  There were tons of two and three story buildings, gardens, and cars!  Cars are not everywhere back home.  This place was a terrible dream, and I did not want to stay.  “Pinch me, pinch me, pinch me.” I would say every ten minutes.  So Jaime pinched me, just like I asked.  “Oww!  Jaime, why did you pinch me?” I asked.  She answered, “‘Cause you said to.  You said, ‘Pinch me pinch me, pinch me’.”  Ooops, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.  So, for like, 23 hours, I was in a stupid little car, sleeping, or being bored.  Sounds like fun, right?  NO!  Boring!  That’s all it was, boring!

	So on Thursday, we arrived at the house mom called ours, and she told us to go inside.  Keys, mother keys.  She handed Allysa the keys.  Of course, Allysa gets the keys.  She opened up the door, let us in, and I quickly changed my mind.  This house was amazing!  Beautiful, nothing more interesting.  “Allysa, this house is beautiful!” I said.  I ran up the stairs, and saw a closed door with a piece of paper with the name Chelsea on it.  I opened the door, and I saw the most amazing room ever!  Lavender walls, light blue bedspreads, pink pillows, orange mirror, beautiful stuff!  When mom came in, I ran up to her and gave her the biggest hug I ever gave anyone, and this time I meant it.  I told Jaime and Allysa to come up, they did, and Jaime’s room had yellow walls, light blue pillows, orange bedspreads, and drawings she had made throughout her life.  Allysa’s walls were red with black squares, black bedspreads, white mirrors, red pillows, not very colorful, but completely goth.  Typical.

	For the next two days, we hired movers and set up the house.  On the Tuesday old school started, I got up at 6:00, got all ready, then mom came down and 6:30 wondering why I was ready for school.  “Honey, school doesn’t start till, well, school starts in three weeks.  In Michigan, school starts later!” mom said.  Well, that would have been good to know.

	I now know, moving isn’t the worst thing that can happen.  Even if you move away from friends, family, or people you love.  Lansing is a great place.  Hey!  It’s in Michigan!  Think good thoughts is what Gramma Lois would say.

	Today I went outside to explore the neighborhood.  I saw this girl who looked about my age.  So I ran up to her.  “Hey!  I’m Chelsea.  I just moved in to that old purple Victorian.  What’s your name?” I said, all in one breath.  She answered back, “Hi!  My name is Vicki.  I live across the street, there, in the blue Victorian.  I’m in 7th grade at Beckler Middle School.”  Awesome!  I’m going to Beckler Middle School, too, so I told her.  We decided to hang out in the afternoon, after lunch.

	We went to the pool, to the ice cream shop down the block.  She showed me all these landmarks near our houses.  I realized we only live ten blocks from the capital building!  I’ve never lived so close to anything important.  Ever!  It felt special to know that you live close to such a place.  I wonder what Josh would think of my new life?

	Well, that’s it for my story.  This all happened over my summer break.  I’d never even stop to think about little 5” men, coming to invade the earth, but I know better now.  What do you think about my summer?  Would you want your summer to be an adventure like mine? I was hoping for the summer of my dreams, but they got the better of me.  Catcha later!



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