A Plant’s Life
Lambullena was a young lamb’s ear plant. She lived in Lamber Falls Garden, the beautiful water land with glamorous water falls and water ways. She had never known her parents, and her right wing leaf was shriveled up and dying. Though her life seemed horrible, she was always like a big ball of joy. When plants asked why she would say, “When life is bad, look for the good in it.”
An example of this was a bright sunny spring morning when Lambullena was walking behind White Ear Falls, the widest but shortest waterfall. Buckear, a bully known throughout Lamber Falls, stuck his fat, leafy head through White Ear Falls, shortly followed by his even fatter leaf body.
“Hey Lambullena! What HAPPENED to your wing leaf?” he sneered.
“I never thought about it. Thanks for the idea!” Lambullena responded. She walked to her alone place, a shallow stream.
“Why IS my wing shriveled up?” Lambullena asked herself scrunching up her soft face.
“My leaves are using the water from the soil, carbon dioxide from the air, and energy from the sunlight to make food for me. My stem is supporting my leaves and it’s letting me bend to the light. And my trichome, the little hair-like fuzz all over my body, protect me from wind, heat, frost, insects and herbivores.
“WAIT!” She felt for her left wing leaf. Tons of trichome. She felt for her right, drooping wing leaf. NOT a SPECK of trichome.
“So THAT’S why. No trichome! Well, who cares. No plant can fly anyway!” she giggled.
Suddenly, Lambullena heard a crashing in the brush. Two men and three women pushed their way through the brush. One of the women carried a cage. Lambullena heard the squeals of more plants inside the small prison.
“Thar’s a beauty!” One man boomed with an Australian accent.
“Why, thank you! I do think of myself as pretty!” Lambullena answered. One of the men bent over to snatch her up, but all three women jumped in front of him.
“NO!” One women cried.
“Be careful with the plant!” She sighed.
“I’ll dig it up.” The girl grabbed a shovel and Lambullena was in a pot with soil and was placed in the cage. As Lambullena looked around, she noticed a plant in the corner of the cage. He was different from the other plants. Sad and lonely. Lambullena hopped over to him, pot and all.
“Hi! I’m Lambullena.”
The plant, Lambullena could now tell was a wild grass, jumped.
“Ohh! I’m sorry. Did I scare you?” Lambullena cried.
“No,” the grass murmured.
“What’s your name?” Lambullena curiously asked.
“Grassten.” Grassten smiled. (pronounced Grass-tin)
“I’m in a conversation with a plant, and he hasn’t mentioned my wing leaf ONCE!” Lambullena thought.
“Hey, what happened to your wing leaf?” Grassten asked.
“Sigh.”
Unexpectedly, the cage dropped.
“BE CAREFUL!” The plants heard. All the plants hopped to the back wall of the cage. All except Lambullena, who was looking curiously at the cage door. Suddenly, a hand reached through the door and grabbed her, pulling her out.
Everything went black.
“Lambullena! Err, Lambullena! Wake up!” Lambullena opened her eyes.
“Grassten?” Lambullena laughed.
“Where are we? Well wherever we are it’s SOOOO PRETTY! Look at the glass walls and roof! Is this a greenhouse? It must be the GLASS garden! It’s WONDERFUL! Look! Lots of soil in our pots, water and dissolved mineral nutrients for our roots to take in, our pots are nice and big for our roots to grow downward so we can reach more water AND there’s lots of sunlight for our leaves! It’s SOOOO pretty! WAIT! Is that --”
“Wo, Wo, Wo, Wo, Wo! Slow DOWN!” Grassten laughed.
“Well, it’s still PRRRRETTY!” Lambullena said cheerfully.Grassten’s face turned scared.
“Let’s get out. Have you heard of the plants that come here? They NEVER. COME. BACK!!!”
“Probably because they liked it so much!” Lambullena grinned. Suddenly something fell and hit Grassten.
“DUUUU!” Grassten fell and Lambullena could almost see grass stars spinning above his head. Lambullena looked up and gasped. THOUSANDS of helicopter leaves rained down.
“Plants CAN fly!” Lambullena thought. Grassten sat up looking dazed.
“URCK!” Grassten was on his back AGAIN. ANOTHER helicopter had knocked him out.
“...Grassten? I know how to get out.” Lambullena stuttered. Grassten shot up.
“HOW!?! WHAT!?! WHEN!?! Now?” he yelled. Lambullena smiled.
“Easy, jump on a helicopter! On the count of three! ONE! TWO! THREE!!!”
Lambullena went soaring out of her pot, off the table that they WERE on and landed on a helicopter. A second later, Grassten landed on THE SAME HELICOPTER. His hand landed on hers and Lambullena realized she and Grassten were friends.
“MANTEFLABERSHABER!” The mad helicopter screamed.
“GO FOR THE HUMANS!!!” Grassten screamed back at it.
“MARFF? The helicopter perked up.
“MARFANADAAAAA!!!”
They quietly snuck up on the two men. Lambullena knew the three girls would let them out so no reason to attack them. An inch away from the first boy, Lambullena stuck out her hand leaf and tickled him under the chin. He burst out laughing. He was laughing so hard he fell to the floor GASPING for breath. The second boy (Lambullena could now tell was a tall fifth grader) wasted no time opening the door and letting them out, then shrinking into the corner.
“MAANATOORAAA!” The helicopter cried in joy.
Then Lambullena stood up and sighed, her long fuzzy leaf skirt billowed in the breeze. Suddenly, Lambullena turned to Grassten.
“Where will you go?” She whispered. Her leaves looked pink and orange in the setting sun.
“SNOOORE!”
“Grassten!”
“SNORT!”
“WAKE UP!”
“Sorry.”
“Where will you go?” Lambullena asked.
“To the Golden Garden of course! But I won’t go without you,” he smiled.
“I was hoping you would say that.” Lambullena answered.
Meet The Author
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