“Do we have to go mom? I really don’t want to go to Hawaii,” I said to my mom. She was taking us to the cruise ship. We were in New York and the pier was full of people. And somewhere in that crowd was my worst enemy, Ali. She was going to Hawaii, too. She was even staying in the same hotel as us. It was going to be horrible. Our parents knew each other from high school. They were in the same classes. They didn’t know that Ali was mean to me.

She would always shout down from her room, “WE’RE OKAY! WE’RE GETTING ALONG AWESOMELY!” when really she was punching me and giving a black eye. Of course my parents noticed the black eye. But they always thought I was the one who deserved the black eye, because she was just defending herself, because I’m a boy so they thought I started it. I wish I wasn’t a boy. Once I even made that wish on a star.

I had packed some books, some clothing, everything I needed. It was going to be horrible. I’d always wanted to go to Hawaii, but now I wanted to go home and eat some chocolate chip cookies. I love chocolate chip cookies. We got on the cruise ship and it was just my luck that Ali’s family was right down the hall. I went to sleep, but it was very hard to. I read for some time, then I got sleepy. But I couldn’t get to sleep. I just kept thinking, Ali could come in and punch me anytime because my parents think she’s nice and I have my own room.

The next day, I went up to the top of the cruise ship. There they had a bunch of pools, ice cream, a buffet, and an arcade. I went to the water slide. I heard the captain’s voice calling over the loudspeaker, “Get on the lifeboats! We’re sinking!!!”

I grabbed some food and hopped onto a boat. (Of course I brought chocolate chip cookies.)

Ali was in the boat.

No one else was.

Help me!!!! I thought.

We called to our parents to toss us a rope, but they couldn’t hear us. None of them could hear us. The boats paddled in the opposite direction. We didn’t have any paddles. We had our hands. And soon they were specks on the horizon.

What felt like a million hours later, we’d finished all the food, even the chocolate chip cookies. We’d finished all the water. We were getting close to land. It wasn’t Hawaii, maybe it was one of those distant islands out there, but still, it was land. We paddled toward it. When we got close enough we jumped out and swam out towards the land. When we finally got there we flopped onto land and just lay there for a while. The island looked like a perfect beach — zero seagulls, zero dead fish, zero pollution, and uninhabited. The water was clear and the sand was speckled with pink. There were pieces of coral and beautiful shells scattered around. There was a big forest of beautiful greens, and we could hear thousands of parakeets and parrots squawking like crazy.

“I wonder why they’re all squawking like crazy,” I said.

Ali was walking towards the forest. Ali said, “Do you hear that rustle?”

I listened closely and said, “Yeah.”

I want my mommy! I thought.

We started running into the forest, which is one of the stupidest decisions I’ve ever made. Suddenly, a giant figure rose above the trees. It was probably ten stories high, maybe more, and it had teeth that were as big as the biggest daggers. It had eyes the size of dinner plates and I don’t want to explain the rest! It started chasing us. We ran through the forest as quickly as we could, but it was too fast for us. I tripped over something. It was a dagger. I stashed it in my pocket hoping the monster was just trying to play tag. It wasn’t. We were the first source of human meat that it had ever seen in thousands of years, and he wasn’t going to let us get away.

“Turn this way,” Ali screamed.

“No, this way!” I responded.

We kept arguing for thirty seconds.

Then I said, “How about we go the middle way?” BIG. MISTAKE.

We were running through the middle path and we tripped over a trip wire and got caught in a trap.

“If I could punch you, I would!” Ali said.

“Jeez Ali, why do you have to be so mean all the time?” I said.

“Why do you have to be such a dweeb all the time?” Ali retorted.

“Bully.”

“Dweeb”

“Bully.”

“Dweeb.”

“… Monster,” I said.

“HEY,” Ali said

“Noooo, really, a monster!” I yelled.

Ali screamed. We struggled and struggled to get out, but it didn’t work. The material was too strong. Then it went dark.

Ali was still screaming. So was I. Then I remembered.

The dagger! I thought.

“ALI, I’ve got a dagger. We can cut our way out.” I made a really big hole in the stomach, big enough for both of us to get out. It started shrinking rapidly.

“Okay Ali, c’mon,” I said.

Ali looked really pale, like a ghost. She fell down and fainted. I tried to drag her through the hole. She summoned enough strength to say, “Go on… without me.”

I said, “NO.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“YESSS.”

Then she was gone.

Wow Ali’s not such a bad person after all, I thought. I rushed back to the beach part of the the island and I saw a rescue boat. My parents were on it. So were Ali’s. I told them the whole story and to my surprise, they believed me. They said that everyone in Hawaii believed that this island was cursed, so everyone stayed away from it. They guessed because they saw me floating off in that direction, that I was stranded there. After they got to Hawaii, they got a rescue boat and sailed over here. Ali’s parents were very sad, and my parents promised me double dessert for a month for the way that Ali treated me. They mourned with Ali’s parents, though. I went to the funeral. It was very sad, but they didn’t have Ali’s body to bury, so someone made a body in a very similar way, like hers. I placed chocolate chip cookies on the grave afterwards.

THE END.