Riley and Addy in: Special Powers

When my kids were younger they would have parent reader days at school. Instead of brining a book we wrote one together and then I had it illustrated. The result was some smiling kids as a read a story about them to their classmates. The tale is modeled after the story of David & Goliath. Here it is.

Riley and Addy are best friends who are also brother and sister. They play together, watch movies together, and always watch out for each other.

Riley and Addy really like to go to the playground with their dad. Their favorite playground is “Alligator Playground” because it has a slide that looks like an alligator. It’s also their favorite because there are always a lot of other children to play with there.

One day in the summer, they asked their dad if they could go to Alligator Playgroun, and dad said, “yes!” Dad always said yes when addy asked with her please face.

When they arrived, Riley and Addy noticed lots of kids were already playing. They were very excited to meet them. Some of the games they like playing most are Tag, or spaceship, or Cops & Robbers. Even though they liked those games a lot, their favorite thing was playing on the alligator slide. They ran over to the slide, but when they got there they found something troubling…

A boy was standing at the top of the slide yelling, “This is my slide and no one else can go down it. HA HA HA!”

This boy’s name was Phillip. Phillip was a really big kid, so no one dared to challenge him. No one dared to try and change his mind. Riley and Addy knew lots of kids liked that slide but no one was brave enough to ask talk to Phillip.

Addy really wanted to go down the Alligator Slide. With a little bit of courage, Addy walked right up to the bottom of the slide and asked, “Excuse me, why are you not sharing the slide?”

Phillip, angry, quickly looked at her and replied, “Because I am the king of the slide and I make the rules!”

Addy couldn’t understand why he was being so mean, but tried to think of a way that she could get Phillip to share. She asked politely, “Could you please share the slide? I know my brother and I would really like to go down it. It’s our favorite thing to do.”

A stubborn Phillip quickly responded, “NO, NO, NO!”

Addy looked up at Phillip just then she had an idea. Her eyes grew wide with discovery. Riley stood behind her shaking his head. He’d seen that look before and knew she was up to something.

Addy stared confidently at Phillip, crossed her arms, and said, “Ok, then. I’ll just have to use my special powers!”

Phillip laughed. “You are the smallest one here! What special powers could you have that would scare me?”

“Ok, then.” replied Addy. She stuck out both her hands, gritted her teeth, lowered her eyebrows, and made her special-powers-sound, “PSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

Phillip laughed. Addy’s strange sound amused him. But as he tilted his head backwards, he noticed there was a something on his forehead. Something not good on his forehead. A BEE!!!

“AAHHAHAHAHAAHAH!!!” Phillip screamed.

Phillip was terrified of bees because they sting, and bee stings can really hurt. He quickly ran away from the slide wondering how on earth Addy was able to make a bee appear on his forehead. He ran far, far away screaming, “MOMMY, MOMMY!”

Riley and all the other children ran to Addy and asked, “How did you do that? Do you have special bee-making powers?”

Addy smiled as she turned to the children and said, “No, I don’t have any special powers. At least none that I know of. Instead I simply looked up at Phillip and noticed that a bee had landed on his forehead. He was so mean and worried about his slide that he didn’t even notice!”

None of the other children had noticed the bee because they were all too scared to even look up at Phillip. Addy explained that she too was scared, but remembered her dad telling her both about courage and how to be brave. Even though she was afraid, she looked at Phillip and tried to think of ways to convince him to share. First by asking nicely, and then when she saw the bee she decided to use her special powers.

Special powers aren’t always like flying or heat vision or ice breath. Sometimes they are things like courage or patience or kindness. These are special powers we all have.

Even though Addy was the smallest kid on the playground, that day she had the most courage.

All the children learned something from little Addy that day. When we get scared, we should be brave and look for ways to use our special powers!

On the way home, Riley told Addy how proud of her he was. Addy told Riley that he was very kind to say so. Riley smiled and said “Well I guess I have super powers too then!”