THE ENCHANTED RAINFOREST

If you need a good laugh, you’ve come to the right place. Here’s a story I wrote when I was in fifth grade. My best friend Kricket illustrated it.

Once upon a time, there lived a beautiful princess named Kimberly. She lived in a beautiful castle near the Amazon rainforest. Kimberly had blond hair and dark green eyes. She loved to play outdoors.

One beautiful afternoon, the princess was playing outdoors. She had her beautiful ball, which was bright green. The princess loved to bounce the ball on the sidewalk. Kimberly bounced the ball so high that the bright green ball went up and up until it disappeared.

Later, while the princess wept, the green ball began to fall from the sky. Down it fell, until it hit the leaves of a tree that was in the rainforest. This noise startled the princess. She got up and walked into the dark rainforest. Glancing about, the princess looked for the source of the startling noise. But all the beautiful princess could see was the dark green plants, moss growing on tree trunks, and no blue sky when she looked up. Kimberly walked farther into the forest.

Little did the princess know that deep in the shadows lurked an evil gorilla. The closer the gorilla got to the princess, the more still the forest became. Just as the gorilla was about to leap at the girl, Kimberly spotted her bright green ball. “My ball,” she exclaimed with glee, “my beautiful ball!” This startled the gorilla, but not for long. The gorilla lunged at the girl, grabbed her, and ran deep into the forest.

The gorilla ran and ran until he got to his home. A giant kapok tree loomed in front of the gorilla and Kimberly. It had giant green leaves, big enough for the princess to sit on. Near the kapok tree, there was a beautiful blue stream. Occasionally, a fish would jump out of the water. Near the shore was a large branch with a hole in the side.

Just then, out of the sky, came two black and white toucans.

“What have you got today, Evil?” asked the smallest bird. “

A princess, Fly,” Evil answered.

“Oh, you poor thing!” the other bird, Sky, exclaimed. Fly turned and glared at Sky. The princess had begun to cry.

“Don’t cry, princess,” called a voice from near the stream. The princess looked up and saw a bright green lizard crawling out of the branch by the river. “My name is Speedy,” the lizard announced.

“Come on, princess, let us show you your room,” Sky said.

Slowly, the princess followed Speedy up the tall tree. They climbed up the tree until they reached the biggest leaf on the tree. It was about thirteen feet high in the air and around the outside it was twenty feet.

Meanwhile, in the castle, the king and queen were beginning to worry about their daughter. In fact, they had begun to worry so much that the queen had her lady-in-waiting write a letter to all the other kingdoms in the world. It looked like this:

One sunny afternoon a knight named Sir Patrick received the letter. He decided to set off to find the princess. With his white horse and golden sword, the knight, who lived in England, set off on his trip.

The sun began to rise over the mountains as Speedy climbed the kapok tree to wake Kimberly. Speedy finally got to the giant leaf.

“Kimberly, I will help you run away,” Speedy whispered when he got Kimberly awake, “but we must leave now, before the gorilla awakes.” After the princess agreed, they quietly climbed down the tree.

When they got to the ground, a giant, green leaf floated to the forest floor. The two decided to use it as a boat. Quietly, they put the leaf in the river and got inside. Slowly, the leaf began to float down the river.

The trees became thinner as the leaf floated along. Just as the leaf and its passengers were about to float out of the forest, Evil jumped into the middle of the wide stream to block the leaf’s path.

Not far behind were the two toucans.

“Tell Evil to leave Kimberly and Speedy alone!” yelled Sky.

“No way! I’m not your slave!” Fly yelled back.

“At least, then, you leave them alone! You’re supposed to be my sister! At least…”

Sky was interrupted by Evil.

“Would you two be quiet!” angry Evil screamed in his hoarse voice. Evil picked up the leaf boat and carried it back to the giant kapok tree.

Meanwhile, Sir Patrick’s ship had landed on the continent of South America after two months of nothing but water.

“Thank you, kind people, for bringing me here. I really appreciate it,” Sir Patrick said.

The people nodded. Then they climbed back into the ship and sailed back toward England.

Sir Patrick mounted his horse and rode toward Brazil, where the king lived. On the way Patrick stopped at the Amazon River to let his tired horse get a drink; then Sir Patrick continued his journey.

Meanwhile, back in the forest, Evil had carried the leaf boat back to the kapok tree and had dropped it on the ground.

“Guard them. Make sure they don’t go anywhere,” Evil commanded Fly.

Evil disappeared into the forest.

About an hour later, Evil returned with a vine trailing along behind him. He grabbed the poor princess and began to tie her to the giant kapok tree. Around and around Evil wrapped the vine. Finally, Evil, with the help of Fly, tied the ends of the vine in a knot.

The two disappeared into the forest with Evil carrying both Sky and Speedy with him.

Sir Patrick had arrived at the castle about two days after his ship had landed at South America. He and his horse were tired and hungry, but when they reached the castle, they were given food and a place to rest.

The next day, the knight would go look for the princess. The next day, Sir Patrick set off on his journey to find the princess. As Sir Patrick looked around, he decided to look in the rainforest. He mounted his horse and rode toward the forest. The farther he rode, the darker the forest became.

Suddenly, from far away, Sir Patrick heard the sound of someone crying. He tried to follow the noise, but it seemed to be coming from all directions. After a few minutes, Sir Patrick decided to go straight ahead. The horse walked softly through the forest. The farther they walked, the louder the sound was.

Just then, the horse came out of the dense forest. A blue, bubbling stream was in front of them. To the right was a giant kapok tree. Around the bottom of the trunk of the tree was girl, a beautiful girl, tied to the tree with a vine.

Sir Patrick quickly dismounted his horse and ran to the tree. He untied the vine and set the princess free.

“Oh, thank you!” the princess cried.

They got on Sir Patrick’s horse and rode back to the castle.

They were married and became king and queen. They captured Evil and Fly and put them into the dungeon. Sky and Speedy became Kimberly’s and Patrick’s pets. They lived happily ever after.

The End.