2024 NATIONAL MEDAL
for Museum and Library Service Finalist

Adults

Get Up

I was sleeping. It was my first day of summer vacation. I had just completed my junior year of high school. My summer plan was to get a job and save for a car. At 7:30, I suddenly woke to the noise of a vacuum cleaner in my bedroom. It was my mother who announced if you want a job start looking early in the morning. Guess what! I got up.

Gravel

"Mary kicked the gravel as she walked, forming clouds of dust up to her knees. She imagined her feet were on fire and each step was only a few seconds away from setting the ground ablaze.

She didn’t hear the sirens screaming behind her. The cop cars whizzed by in a panic, swirling up the dirt around her like a dust devil. They squealed as they turned at the next street. Her street."

The Moth

The Moth by Phyllis Francese (a Short Story Contest entry) 

 

 

A moth is trapped between the screen and glass of my patio door. It crawled in through some small hole. It flits about, landing on the glass and then the screen, not remembering how it got in. It flies from screen to glass, glass to screen casting its shadow on the drapes. Perhaps it will find its way out. Perhaps not.

Distracted, I find the moth is gone.