The Interlopers

The families of Georg Znaeym and Ulrich von Gradwitz were in a feud for three generations. The Gradwitz family had forest lands that were well stocked with game and were of wide extent. It was the most jealously gaurded of all its owner's territorial possessions. The two guys wished ill to one another since they were the heads of each family. Georg wanted that land and one night went onto Ulrich's property. Ulrich was gaurding it and heard something so he decided to go out and see who was there. He stepped around the trunk of a huge beech tree and saw his enemy. They stood in silence with rifles in their hands. There was a huge shriek from the storm and then the tree came down crashing over their heads. They were both struggling and arguing with each other. They wanted to have a fight to the death. They kept trying to escape but then they were too weak there was too much blood. After struggling for a while, Ulrich decided that they should no longer fight and be civilized. Georg was silent then finally agreed, especially since it was their families who had the feud, and not them personally. Then they heard a noise, someone or things were coming for them. Finally, when they could see who was coming, they were in shock because they weren't people at all, only wolves.

A Handful of Dates

This young boy used to walk around the village with his grandfather who he looked up to and who he liked to spend his time with. He thought that his grandfather was respectful and generous. Later on, he finds out that his neighbour, Masood, who looked very poor owned the land he used to play on, but now his grandfather owns most of the land. When they started the harvesting of dates, he thought about Masood and his grandfather. Soon after the dates were all harvested, and they were split up. Masood was left with none instead of the little bit he normally got. The boy started to realize that Masood was a good guy and he ended up with nothing, but the person who he looked up to the most was the bad guy in this scenario. His grandfather only cared about money while Masood loved the land, and the actual dates. The young boy was upset by the end of the story at the way he treated Masood and how he treated money like the most important thing in the world. His opinion on his grandfather changed in a bad way by the end of the story.

My Hungarian Sister

Catherine was reading the newspaper and saw a picture of Hungarian refugees. A young girl in the picture caught her eye. She saw this girl as someone with a great destiny living with her boy-heavy family. Underneath in the caption it said, "Please look after our young ones." Catherine decided that she was gunna call this small girl by the name Szaba. It was short for szabadsag, which meant freedom and that was written on their cards. At Catherine's school, they were establishing a fund for the refugees. She donated half of her allowance and packed food hampers that would have been sent to the refugee reception centre in London. The other half of her allowance was put into a jar that she marked "Szaba" with a picture of the little girl on it. She would soon have Szaba as her sister and she imagined how it would be. Catherine then asked her mom while knitting scarves for the refugees, but her mom said no because they had no room in their house. Catherine talked to her piano teacher, Mrs Berenyi and she decided to write to the Red Cross. She too was in this exact situation after the war in Switzerland, so she understood what those children were going to be put through. The Red Cross wrote back and could not identify the child Catherine spoke of. Then Catherine talked to her dad and he decided to write an article in the paper. After Christmas, three Hungarian girls were sent to Catherine's school. None of them looked like Szaba. She hung around the one girl named Marta, who was the closest to her age. Catherine showed Marta the photo of Szaba and then Marta started crying. She pointed to the picture and said Halott. Catherine never invited her over again, since she did not understand Marta. Then Catherine wrote a letter to a journalist about Szaba, and he said that he could not find her which meant Catherine would not be able to see her. Years later, she was introduced a colleague on another newspaper. This woman's family took in a Hungarian boy who wrote a book on his experiences. The woman gave it to her, but she never read it.

Chilly Girl

There was a girl who was usually cold. She ruined picnics by wanting to go home early once the sun went down and no one ever wanted to hold her hand. She was once invited to a condo-warming party by her boss and she decided to wear her favourite dress but it was made from thin cotton, but she grabbed a cardigan and then she was ready to go. Her roomate thought that she was insane because she was wearing stickings and heels with a summer dress and therefore she ended up putting sandals on. At the party, everyone was glad to see her, but the people she shook hands with recoiled because of her icey fingers. She was getting cold but it wasn't from the house that she was in, it was a man that appeared from behind her. They talked about the beautiful view until he saw that her fingertips were blue. He became worried and gave her his socks since she said that she was cold because of the cold floor. They flirted the whole time and he grabbed her arm and waist and whirled her into the living room. She whirled so fast that her face became flushed and she was sweating, she definitely was not cold anymore. The guy had to leave but let her keep the socks so that she would have to find him again to give them back. She asked everyone who that guy was but no one knew, even the hostess. She went home, and in the morning did laundry and folded the socks so that she could put them in her handbag. Summer went by too fast and now it was Christmas time. She tried knitted scarves and buying wool socks for herself. At a restaurant she went to, she went to put her stuff on a hook, and she pulled out the socks, cuz they became squished. She saw a warm spot in the restaurant not near a window, but when the same song came on that she danced to with that guy, she decided to sit in a cold spot in the restaurant. She sat down and waited to see what would happen next.

How Eunice Got Her Baby

Eunice got her baby from the estate of her older sister, Florence, who died in a tragic accident. even though there was not a will, Eunice was the first in line to take care of the baby. Some thought that Eunice would be a better mother than the natural mother, since Florence drank a lot and would drive at night with her lights off so that she could see the stars a lot better. Florence came home every night with her panties in her purse rolled up and it was no surprise to everyone how she got her baby, Pasquena, who everyone called Quennie. Florence had good qualities too but everything went bad only because of the guy she met, Darryl Bugden. He mad lots of charms and attributes to a girl but also the heart and spirit of a criminal. They met at the Minimart where Florence worked, but it wasn't a good meeting since he was about to rob the store and threatened Florence kind of in a joking and serious way. All she cared about was his smile though. He got the money and they flirted and ended up going out to dinner because he was then being nice and they both forgot about what happened at the store. Everyone always warned Florence but she didn't care. On Darryl and Florence's last trip out driving, there was crystal meth involved and that's part of how the accident occured. Darryl's Chevrolet and an old man's Winnebago hit straight head-on. Darryl and Florence ended up in the trunk with flames that broke out all around them. Earlier that day, Florence gave Queenie to Eunice and that is how Eunice got her baby.