Buried Alive
Scratch! Scratch! “Uuuuggghhhh!” I groaned as I woke up
to that sound. Scratch! Scratch! What is that? I thought to
myself. As I turned my head I made out a blurry 1:30am on my
clock. Scratch! Scratch! As I stepped out of bed, which seemed
pretty easy, but it’s not a walk in the park at 1:30am. I glare
over at the hermit crab tank with a small dark figure in it that
was moving its claw slowly up and down. “Oh, it’s that stupid
hermit crab!” I mumbled to myself. I trudge over to the tank
and lift the lid up. The hermit crab, as usual, went into its
hollow shell as soon as it saw me. I very earnestly picked up
the hermit crab and put him on the other side of the tank.
“Stay there!” I demanded, and I actually thought he understood
me. This seems like I’m not smart, but after all I was only seven
years old.
That morning I woke up again at 7:30am and again
trudged to the tank and glared through the glass. Where is
Johnny? I thought anxiously. Johnny is one of my hermit crabs.
My sister and I each have 2 hermit crabs. My crabs were
named Johnny and Mickey, and Elena’s (my sister) were named
Fly and Sparkle. Kind of unusual names, but she was only six. I
dug through the sand, but I couldn’t find him. I also noticed
that Sparkle was nowhere to be found either. All of a sudden, I
started feeling really suspicious about what may have
happened. What if they got out of the cage? What if Dexter, my
dog, ate them? What if they were stuck in the trashcan? These
questions were running around my head, like stars around a
cartoon character’s head when it gets hit.
There was one place left to look in the tank, under the
small log. I slowly and carefully lifted the log up…and there
they lay. Out of their shell, pink and not able to move an inch.
A lump formed in my throat. I loved those hermit crabs
because they were my first pet. I sprinted into my parent’s
room. “Mom! Dad!” and I burst into tears. “Johnny and Sparkle
are dead!” “What?!” my parents asked in shock. “I’ll go look,"
my dad suggested. I realized he definitely did not believe me.
But when he saw them, his eyes widened with surprise. “Oh
my gosh!” he bellowed. “They are dead!” My family did not
have much knowledge at all about hermit crabs, as you will
find out…
“What’s going on?” questioned Elena as she trudged
through the hallway. Only slits of her eyes were opened.
Sparkle and Johnny are dead, I whispered sadly. Faster than
my parents could say anything, she cried a river. “I guess we’ll
bury them later today in the backyard,” my dad consoled.
“Now who wants pancakes?”
“I do! I do! I do!” Elena and I yelled on cue. “Ssshhhh”, my
dad said sternly. “No pancakes for whoever wakes up Sara!” I
guess right now is the best time to say Sara is my sister who is
13 months old, and who apparently needs twelve hours of
sleep. “Alright, let’s go downstairs,” my dad announced. Later
that afternoon we had our sad funeral for Johnny and Sparkle.
It was a very dramatic event. Tears streamed down my
and Elena’s faces. You could tell that our feelings were
genuine. My dad started digging a hole and we carried the tank
out to the back yard. We picked up the limp, lifeless pink
bodies and carefully placed them in the hole. “They’re in
hermit crab heaven now,” my dad pronounced in an attempt to
cheer us up. But it did not help. “Johnny and Sparkle are
gone,” I whimpered to myself. My sister and I each said some
words about the great crabs. I said, “Johnny was a good crab.
He was the only survivor from Sea Isle City (the others were
extras added along the way) and Johnny was special to me”.
“Elena, do you want to say some words?” my dad asked.
“I loved Sparkle because she was so pretty,” Elena sadly
announced. Once the speeches were over, my dad and I
carefully covered the hermit crabs that were as dead as a rock
with soil. I slowly walked inside and my heart was broken.
“Cheer up Ethan”, my dad suggested. “It’s not that bad. At
least they’re in a good place.”
“I guess,” I replied, even though I didn’t really mean it. No
hermit crab would replace Johnny, I thought. I felt like the
world was over. I tried to be optimistic about what my dad had
said, that Johnny is God’s pet now God’s pet now. But still he
was my only crab that survived from Sea Isle City. I was a
seesaw kept on going back and forth with my feelings and
opinions. I guess I’ll try to be optimistic and act like it’s not
that bad.
I placed Johnny and Sparkle’s shell on the dirt where they
were buried so I would always remember them. It’s not every
day your first pet dies randomly. I acted happy the rest of the
day. I didn’t show my genuine feelings.
That night my mom was reading a book about how to
take care of a hermit crab more considerately. I guess she
didn’t want Elena and me to feel this sad for a long time. She
wanted to take better care of Mickey and Fly so they won’t die
for a long time. As I walked into her room, I guess she read
something surprising because as soon as I walked into her
room she screeched, “@$#$&!! Ethan the hermit crabs are still
alive!!”
“Why are you so surprised?” I asked her “Of course Mikey
and Fly are alive,”
“No, I mean Johnny and Sparkle!”
“WHATT!! We buried them alive?!”
“I’m absolutely sure; it says that in the fall, your hermit
crab might come out of its shell, lose a coat of skin, and turn
pink and weak. But your hermit crab is okay, it is just molting
during the time of year for it,” my mom explained.
“So, you’re saying we buried them alive?!” I questioned hoping
for no because then we have the guilt for killing them.
“Yes! Let’s go dig them up!”
My mom informed my dad and Elena as we raced outside
in a split second, sprinting to the gravesite. My dad had a
shovel in his hand and I had the tank, carefully carrying it
outside. My dad dug like lightning and the little pink hermit
crabs crawled out of the hole like they just woke up! “Johnny!”
I screamed with tears of joy streaming down my face. I felt
triumphant.
“Sparkle!” screamed Elena. “You’re still very pretty!!”
“I guess it’s all back to normal again,” my mom said.
So the moral of this story is if you’re going to have a pet,
you need to be educated about it or it won’t have a good
chance of survival. If not, you might bury it alive!