This is a bit of what I've been doing for Nano...but I'm going to use it for something else if the rest of my NaNo is as crappy as I suspect it is.

Jane

The little neighbor kid, Tobias, comes and plops himself down next to me on the driveway.

“Hey, Jane.”

I ruffle his mud-flecked hair.

“Hiya, Toby.”

He cups his hand over his eyes and looks out down the cul-de-sac, watching a black cat scurry across the street and disappear into a bush in front of the Matthews’ house.

“I’m bored. Got any chalk?” he asks.

“Yeah, hang on.”

I get to my feet, wipe the gravel and dirt off my butt, then turn around and walk up the slope to the garage, which is still open from when my dad left for work this morning.

The big Crayola tin of sidewalk chalk sits on the bottom shelf of the cabinet housing screw drivers, spare lawnmower parts, Barbie heads, and a truckload of other assorted things that my family deems necessary but not immediately needed.

I put my hand under the bottom of the tin and carry it, maitre’d style, back to Toby.

He smiles, and I note he’s missing a few more teeth than what he had from last time I saw him.

Toby carefully chooses the right color and attacks the driveway with it.

“Close your eyes!” He squeals, when he sees me watching him.

I do as instructed, listening to the chalk stick clatter across the concrete. “Okay, Jane, you can

look.”

I open my eyes and stand back, resting my arms on the top of his head, squinting and trying to look pensive.

“Tobias, I think I shall give this 4 out of 5 stars. It is a very, very accurate rendering of the human form and lots of attention is drawn to the amazingly drawn face,” I say, taking note of the drawing of a stick person, an arrow drawn from the side that’s labeled ‘Jane’. I have gigantic eyes and a crooked smile that makes me look like I’m stoned, though I do have to give the kid credit, for my waist is amazingly tiny in proportion to the rest of my body. Wow, eight years old and he already knows how to flatter a woman. My faith in the public school system has been restored. “However, your perspective leaves the viewer a lot to be desired.”

He answers with a simple, “Cool.”

“You know what? I think I can draw a better picture. One of you,”

“You think?”

“Amazingly so, yes, I do think.”

“You’re on!”

It’s my turn to dig into the chalk bucket. I pick out a brown color.

“You’ve got to close your eyes, though, first!”

He squeezes them shut. I get on my hands and knees and draw two circles, a tiny one for the head and a gigantic one for the body. Then come the arms, tiny stick things with extremely bony fingers coming out from the end.

I make a line separate the big circle in half, making the top half a shirt. The shirt is really tight

fitting and unflattering, with the phrase “Fart-Head” splashed across the chest.

Next, I move on to his head. I make him have a gigantic, three-foot tall afro coming out of the top of his skull and a nice, French-like mustache that sticks out at least a foot. He’s cross-eyed and he’s got a beard that sticks out to the side, curves down and hangs to his feet, curling a little at the end.

I sketch an arrow pointing to the drawing and title it simply, “Toby, Aged 8”.

“Okay, you can open your eyes now!”

He grins and jumps to his feet, squinting.

After a few minutes of careful review, he nods slowly and says, “Jane, you’re a butt head.”

I turn toward him and he sticks his tongue out.

“You want to bet?”

“Yes, I want to bet!”

He grins and snatches the chalk out of my hands and kneels next to the drawing of me, quickly scribbling

in a long, curly beard that wraps around my legs like a dress. “There!”

“Is that the best you can do, Tobias?”

He scowls and draws (what I suppose to be) gas bubbles coming out from behind my pencil-thin back.

“Jane… tooted…” he says slowly, adding arrows pointing to my stick-butt.

I smile proudly and bow.

“You’re learning, kid.”

He grins.

“But we’ve got to have pets, right, Jane?”

“Yes, we do! Why didn’t I think of that before?”

He pulls a couple more chalk sticks of different colors out of the bucket and hands a few to me.

“You can draw a skunk and I’ll do a roadkill.”

“You can’t have a pet roadkill. Roadkill’s a state of being, not-”

“I say I can!”

Oh well. I can already tell that science is not going to be his strong suit, but I can at least say I tried.

My skunk turns out to be rather bloated, but at you can still tell that it’s supposed to be an animal and not a sock, which is a good thing.

His pet roadkill turns out to be a flat, spiky thing with x’s for eyes.

“Oh, it’s lovely, Toby,”

“I know.”

We stand up and take a step back, my arm around his shoulders, admiring our artwork. “Oh!” he cries. “We forgot to label ‘em!”

“Oh, we did, didn’t we?” I say. “Quick! We’ve got to add them in before anyone else sees that we’ve goofed!”

I write by the bloated sock, “Toby’s skunk” and he scribbles in “Jane’s roadkill”.

“Now, it’s perfect,” he says.

There’s the soft whirring of bike tires coming from behind us. Toby and I turn around and, lo and behold, it be David, a’cyclin’ in on his vintage Schwinn.

“Hey kid!” Toby screeches at David, waving. “Come see what we drew!”

Oh, he may not become a scientist, but he sure has a way with people. He should be a politician, or the dude behind the cash register at McDonald’s.

David stops, gets off, and leaves his bike lying on its side in the road.

“Hey, Spencer,” he says, grinning.

“Likewise, Ingalls,”

Toby pokes him and points to our drawings. “You have to look!”

“Oh, yes, Ingalls, aren’t they wonderful?”

David stands back and folds his arms, considering.

“Jane’s…pet…roadkill…” he reads slowly, deciphering the third grade scrawl as he goes along. “Spencer, is there something we need to talk about?”

He looks up, grinning.

“Maybe.”

Oh, God, stop it, don’t make me laugh.

You can’t win against the teriffic smile-power of Ingalls, though. I have to giggle, if only a little.

“Want to help us?” asks Toby, looking over David to try and figure out who he is.

“Sure, kid.” Ingalls kneels down and picks out a few sticks of chalk and slowly draws begins to sketch.

“So, what brings you to these parts?” I ask, plopping down next to him.

“My mom’s out and there’s absolutely nothing on T.V.”

“Ah! Alert the authorities!” I wail. “David’s on the loose!”

He frowns and pokes me. “My God, Davy, you know you shouldn’t be out. You could be mugged! You could be shot! For Jesus’s sake, you could be raped!”

Poke.

“It’s not like she’s going to be back any minute, Spencer. I’m not that stupid.”

“Yes, you must admit that you are.”

Toby is quietly drawing himself a gallery of assorted roadkill, totally focused, not paying attention to anything we’re saying.

(And then it just stops. Sorry, but I'm out of ideas )