My Summer With Willy

A brown-haired girl near the front of the class took the folder handed to her by the teacher and looked at the cover. "How I Spent My Summer by Penelope Hudson" was hand-lettered in the title box. The teacher continued to circulate around the room until all the folders had been handed back to their respective authors.

"Okay class, thank you for taking the time to tell me about how your summer recess went" Mrs. Sarbone started. "From what I read, it looks like you all enjoyed yourselves very much. Now I want you to read your papers again to yourself; you haven't seen them in several weeks and you might find that it looks a little different to you now. You might even find mistakes that I missed when I was grading them. Go ahead and read them for the rest of the period. You'll all find that I've made some type of comment or suggestion on your work."

Penelope opened the cover and began to read.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

I had to spend the summer with my Aunt Francine and Uncle Jonah. My father died while he was a soldier a few years ago, and my mother decided to go stay with her mother this year while I was out of school for the summer. Her place is very small, so I'm staying with other family so my mum can have a nice time. My Aunt and Uncle aren't really good with children, so I thought it would be a good idea to find some on my own.

While I was walking, I saw someone that was close to my age. He had bushy hair, and on the top of his head was a really nice tall hat. He was sitting alone by a pile of metal. When I got closer I saw that the pile was really a fountain, with water pouring through holes from the top and splashing and dripping their way around different pieces until it reached the bottom that was a big tub. While I watched, the boy picked up a small bucket and put some of the water back into the top. He then sat back down and watched the fountain again. He looked sad so I went over and talked to him. He said his name was Willy, but he didn't say too much so I did most of the talking. I told him my name was Penelope, but he could call me Penny. I talked for a long time about school.

It was getting late in the day, and I told him I had to go. I pulled out my little silver flute that my father gave me and played him a little tune. He smiled and thanked me. I told him I would come back tomorrow if it was okay, and he said "That would be grand."

The next day I went and he wasn't there, so I poured some water into the top of the fountain and waited. After I poured it again later he came from down the street; I could see the top of his hat over the hill before the rest of him appeared. He sat down and I talked some more; he told me that he lived nearby and that he was a business man. I laughed, but then said I was sorry afterward because he didn't look like any business man I ever saw. He smiled again and told me that he was a new one, and didn't have a fancy suit to look like the others. I told him you should look like what you feel on the inside, not what others looked like.

After that we talked almost every day. He asked me if I wanted to meet his partners, and he introduced me to some other boys named Sir Truus and Bob Wilkinson. Sir didn't say very much to me, but Bob was nice and he liked to talk. It turned out we were all just a couple years apart in age, so we got along swell.

They were in the hauling business, and explained that they had three wagons to help take things away for people, or to move them from one place to another. They promised to show me the wagons, and the next day they brought them to the fountain. Each had "Movers' Deluxe" painted on the sides. They showed off how the wagons were built and then the other boys said goodbye and left to move something while Willy stayed. He said he wasn't ready to go back to work and needed to think some more, so that was what he did while he looked at the fountain that Sir had made from old parts. I asked him if he would like me to skip a day so he could think alone and he said no, he had something important he wanted to tell me the next day. So I made up a little song on my flute and called it the "Movers' Deluxe March" and I played it for him before I left.

The next day when I showed up, Willy was waiting and as I sat he hummed the whole song I had made up the day before. He learned the song just by hearing it! He said he could see the song, but he needed to explain.

Then he told me something that at first I thought he was making up. He said that he saw the world in colors and tastes that weren't there but should be; everything had a color or mix of colors or a flavor if he concentrated on it hard enough. The song I made up was mostly orange with a little red and a green streak, he told me, and seeing the colors in his imagination helped him remember it. Then he told me all about his growing up, and all the grays around him, and the colors he wanted people to see and feel. I told him he sounded like a painter, and he smiled and said he tried painting but "was pure rubbish at it".

His smile went away and he told me his father had died not too long before I met him. His father was proud of him for the jobs he was working and the money he was saving and helping the family, but he told Willy that he wasn't supposed to be hauling other people's things all his life. He needed to make things and find ways to make other people happy too. He told him these things just before he died, and Willy was trying to think really hard and smart about what to do with the rest of his life.

I told him about my dad, and then I said that Willy was a really nice young man to work so hard to help his family. I also told him his dad was smart in what he said, and that he could really do something special one day if he tried. But it was like learning to play a musical instrument I said, you just don't do it all at once. You have to learn bit by bit and make mistakes too without giving up if things don't go right at first, and he could always save money to do bigger things later.

We spent days talking about ideas, people, and what the world should be like. We both got along really well, and could talk about anything. I would pull out my flute and play a tune and Willy would tell me what colors it made. He also started being less sad and went out on more jobs with Sir and Bob.

Soon it was time for me to go back home to my mum before school started again. I told Willy and he wasn't really happy, but he knew I had to go and help my mum too. Maybe he was a year younger than me, but in some ways he seemed older.

He asked if I would ever come back again. I told him I didn't know for sure, but my heart said yes so I chose to believe that. I pulled out my flute and he thought I was going to play one last song, but I told him no. Instead, I gave it to him and told him to practice with it whenever he could, and maybe someday if he discovered the right tune I would be back. I left him with a hug and told him that the world was already a serious enough place, but he should do his best to change that, even if it made him different. I came back home in time for school to start again, but my summer with Willy was the best summer I ever had.

Penelope came to the end of her paper; she didn't notice any additional mistakes, but it sent her mind back to her adventure during the summer. She read the note written by Mrs. Sarbone:

Miss Hudson, you wrote very well about your great summer. Just remember
that no matter how good it was, you'll meet other boys when you
get older that you'll like even better, trust me.
I'm giving you a well-deserved A.

Penelope closed the folder. It's possible I may like other boys more when I get older, she thought, but there won't be any like Willy Wonka.

The End

A/N: This story fits into the gap between my "How Many Shades" and "Chocolate, Now That's" stories. But it doesn't FILL the gap, it just makes it smaller. I guess I'll just have to write that next story in my head sometime. After all, one does not simply jump from the business of hauling to making fruit cakes overnight...

And of course I've got one set up to come after "What Goes Up" now as well. So much writing, so little time...