The Adventures of Starmonia

Chapter Eight: Thank You

After the meal was over, the crowd sang a few hymns and chatted a while longer. Then it was time to go.

Cloudy and her friends offered to help clear the dishes and fold up the picnic tables to return them to Mrs. Turner’s restaurant. As they wiped the tables, Cloudy hummed snatches of the songs they had just sang.

Wylanda, overhearing, smiled contentedly. It was funny, she thought. If her mother had never made her go to this feast, she probably wouldn’t even be standing here right now. Truly the Lord works in mysterious ways, she thought.

After forty minutes or so, the picnic tables were all cleared away and the dishes had disappeared. Lily and the Palmer sisters cleaned the bits of food off the ground and stuck them into large trash bags, which they then hauled out to the side of the road.

Showerstorm smiled. “You guys are good helpers,” he commented.

“Thanks,” replied Lily, her brown eyes shining.

By the time the pasture was cleared, most of the people had already left. A few remained, such as Eloise and Nika’s family and Miriam’s mom, as well as the Stellarums. The knight was talking in a low voice to his mother, who nodded after everything he said. Cloudy looked at the paper she had made, remembering she had to give it to him.

She danced over to him and waited for the knight to stop speaking, then cleared her throat. “Magnus.”

“Hm?” The knight glanced down at her and smiled. “Oh, it’s you, Cloudy. What do you need?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to give you this.” She then added as an afterthought, “I made it.” Then she rushed off.

“What does it say, Magnus?” Scazzarda wondered.

The knight delicately unfolded the piece of paper and held it up to the light shining from the lamppost across the street. It read:

We met just today, Magnus Stellarum,

But I feel like I know you very well.

I wish I could understand you better,

But I can’t, so I just want to tell

You that you’re one of the kindest knights

That I’ve met, though we met so suddenly.

And that’s the way it ought to be.

-Cloudburst

The knight finished reading and his hand began to tremble, but with an effort he restrained his emotions. He folded the latter and lovingly held it. “It is just a poem,” he said quietly.

Scazzarda smiled kindly at him. “And from the looks of it, it’s a lovely poem.”

“Yes,” he admitted, looking over at Cloudy. Sensing somebody was staring at her, she turned to see the knight and grinned, her pearly white teeth reflecting in the lamppost’s light. “I’ll never forget her, Mother. She’s one of the kindest kids I have ever come across.”

“And she’s different, too,” Scazzarda murmured. The knight nodded, his eyes locked on Cloudy’s glistening black-and-white fur and her intelligent emerald-colored eyes.

“Let’s go home,” Scazzarda told her son.

* * * * *

Cloudy watched the Stellarums walk off toward Whispy Woods and frowned a little. Why were they going in there? Perhaps they lived there, but what an odd place to live!

“Hi, Cloudy.”

Cloudy whirled and saw Wylanda standing there, a smile on her face. “Oh, hello, Wylanda,” Cloudy said. “How are you?”

“Just fine, actually.” Wylanda’s brown eyes looked like stars in the dim light. “I came to thank you for showing me the truth.”

Cloudy backed up a little and shook her head in protest. “Oh, no. Don’t you thank me. It’s God who deserves the thanks. I was just His vessel.”

“Ohh. Of course.” Wylanda giggled. “I thanked Him too. He’s just wonderful to me.”

Cloudy agreed. Then a thought came to her mind. “Did you ever tell your parents about the knife?” she asked solemnly.

Wylanda nodded soberly. “They were grieved, but also happy because you came along and showed me the way to truth. They were very grateful that I accepted Christ as my Savior.”

Cloudy looked up to the starlit sky. To her, it looked as though God had drawn a black velvet curtain dotted with white spots across the sky. There were no clouds and the air was chilly but refreshing. “And do you now see how blessed you are?”

“Indeed,” Wylanda nodded. “And I hope one day to trace my original parents and tell them I forgive them for what they did to me.”

Cloudy smiled. What a drastic change the Lord has worked in Wylanda!

“Hey, wanna go to the mall together this Saturday?” Wylanda asked. “We can do some shopping.”

“Sure! I’ll be there!” Cloudy said. “And if you want, you can come to our house Tuesday night and have a sleepover.”

“Cool!” Wylanda then looked up to see Mrs. Coven waving at her. “Oh, we gotta go home.” Then she looked at Cloudy. “Say, I’ve been meaning to ask you. Where do you go to church?”

Cloudy frowned, confused. “Umm. . .I don’t go to church. This area of Spring Breeze has no church.”

“You don’t go to church!” Wylanda was silent a moment. “Well, we go to to a small Baptist church about thirty miles down from our house. We don’t live in your area, you know. We’re more in the north. But anyway, you’re invited to join us. We’ll pick you up this Sunday.”

“Okay, I’ll be waiting,” Cloudy said. “Now shoo!”

Wylanda waved to Cloudy as she climbed in the Coven’s automobile. “Take good care of my necklace!” she shouted out the window as the car roared away.

Cloudy stood alone on the dewy grass, the chill of night beginning to press down on her. She shivered and looked across the street just in time to see Miriam and her mother go into their house and slam the door. The Palmer sisters were climbing into their mom’s car. Once they were settled, Mr. Palmer puled out of the yard and drove down the road. Then silence.

Cloudy looked up to the sky once more and saw a tiny sliver of the crescent moon. The sheer beauty of its silvery light seemed to embrace every fiber of her being. And now she wondered where the Lord would take her next.

And that marks the end of this story. But don’t forget, dear readers, that the theme of this story is to always be grateful for what you have and not gripe, for what you own, the Lord has blessed you with. Take this moral and apply it to your own lives, and never forget to have a thankful heart no matter what.