NOTE: So this was a really fun short story to write. I was thinking of all the silly antics my daughter pulls around the house on the weekend and thought I would try to write a story about what I imagine her thought process is when she is pulling one of her silly schemes. I hope you enjoy it.
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Alright, I am going to get that toy. This is the thought that hits the young child’s mind as they look up onto the counter at the shiny, white-cased tablet sitting precariously on the edge. The counter is high. From the child’s perspective its 100 feet tall. In actuality its about three and a half feet tall. But the child is determined to get their hands on it. First, the child checks the living room for any sign that mom or dad is onto their scheme. Nope. Mom looks up and smiles and then goes back to reading her book. Dad looks up for a moment and makes a silly face at the child, but then goes back to looking at his phone.
“Man, I really want that phone” the child thinks upon seeing it in dad’s hand. The child begins to walk forward but stops and goes back to the task at hand: getting the tablet. The child then quietly walks to the table and pulls a chair out. The noise draws the attention of dad, who looks up and watches the child. The child gives a cute little smile and climbs into the chair, making it seem like they are just going to sit at the table. But its all an act. As soon as dad looks away, the child is back at it and moves the chair a little more. Now that dad thinks the chair is just being moved for sitting, he is none the wiser. The big brown chair is made of heavy wood that, to the child, weighs about 300 pounds! in actuality its probably a 10lb chair, if that.
The child now has the chair positioned next to the countertop. The child pulls themselves up onto the chair, then up onto the countertop. Finally, the tablet is within reach. But look what is next to the tablet. Its a plastic container. The child knows that they just saw mommy pull cookies out of there a little bit ago. So the child now has a new goal. “I can have cookies and the tablet at the same time. The child quietly grabs the plastic box and lifts the lid. Sure enough, there are nearly 100 cookies in the box, ready to be eaten. In actuality, there are about eighteen cookies, but to a kid, eighteen cookies might as well be 100.
The child quietly puts the lid back on the plastic box and then moves on to their true prize: the tablet. But the child realizes that they can’t carry both the cookies they grabbed and the tablet. So the child decides to put the cookies on the chair first. Dropping the cookies one by one onto the chair, the child now has their stash right where they want them. The child then grabs the tablet and begins to climb down.
WOOOOOSH!
The child falls from the countertop. The fall isn’t very far, maybe twelve inches or so, from counter to chair. All the child’s stealth, all the child’s quietness wasted, as the child’s but falls onto the chair and crushes the three cookies beneath their body. The tablet also falls to the ground, rousing mom and dad from their distractions as they rush into the kitchen to find their child, laughing hysterically on the chair, the back of their pants covered in cookie crumbs, and the prized tablet laying face down on the floor.
With a laugh and a sigh, the dad starts picking up the mess on the chair as the mom grabs the toddler into her arms for a giggle, a kiss, and a quick check to make sure everything is alright. The child is fine and is giggling and laughing with mommy. As Dad finishes picking up the mess, he turns around to find the child and mom gone from the kitchen. He returns to the living room to find mom and child, curled up on the couch, eating cookies and watching Netflix on the tablet.
All according to the Child’s plans.