-Kevin Valente, Grade 8

 
The sounds and noises of the early morning routine broke the silence of the foggy night. The metal gates of the shops made loud noises as the owners opened them for business. There was a gentle swishing of water as the gondolas and boats smoothly surfed across it to make their deliveries. The smell of freshly baked bread filled the air.

Giovanni, a student at the Academia dell' Arte, slowly paced his way to the square where he bought his newspaper every morning. As he walked along the street, Giovanni saw the same bakery and souvenir shops he had seen for the past two years. Solemnly, Giovanni directed himself towards his favorite coffee shop. He walked automatically, not thinking about where he was going--his thoughts were rather distracted by recent strange occurences.

He quickened his step as he passed under the Campanile, feeling an eerie chill that was not due to the cold air of the early spring morning. Giovanni entered the coffee shop, barely noticing all the beautiful paintings or regular customers due to the uneasy feeling in his gut.

The shop had a small, cube-like shape with a quaint counter where the coffee was served. The cash register was old and rusty and was placed to the far right side of the counter. The shop had five round tables in total (two outside and three in). They where fairly small also, but then again the only things you could buy at this shop were coffee and a newspaper. As Giovanni waited for his cappuccino, he picked up a paper from a stand. He hesitated for a moment, closing his eyes. Then he slowly opened it, wincing as if there might be a monster ready to pounce out of the newspaper and tear him limb from limb.

On the front page there was a picture of a shadow enveloping a school. Giovanni immediately knew that it was another article about the strange cases of students like him at the Academia dell' Arte who had disappeared mysteriously. The director of the school was quoted as saying that "if these strange things keep happening, the school will be forced to close down."

As Giovanni read on, his heart skipped a beat at the thought of his future if the school shut down. He had spent a great deal of time studying there, and it would be a shame if he had to stop. A tear came to his eye as he thought of this, and he knew he had to do something. Giovanni took the newspaper and threw it in the trash. He suddenly remembered that before his friend Marcus disappeared he had gone to sketch the Statue Delle Ombre. So he began to walk in that direction.

It was an enormous square with several statues positioned in a large circle. As he entered the piazza, the stench of pigeon droppings filled the air. The statues there were deteriorating from the acid in the pigeon droppings. The statues gave Giovanni a strange uneasy feeling, as if someone was watching him. Giovanni then slowly edged towards the Statue Delle Ombre at the head of the circle.

The statue was close to eight feet tall; it wore a long cloak, with a hood concealing its face. It had two black wings and it held a sword, sharp-side-down touching the floor. It would have seemed like any other statue, but the only problem was that usually all statues had faces and this one did not.

The sun was showing overhead and the shadow of the statue was big and powerful, leaning to the side. As Giovanni walked around the statue, his foot touched it, and he felt a shock as if a jolt of electricity went through him. He jumped back out of fear. Then Giovanni, curious of what just happened, put his foot back in the shadow and felt that same tingling sensation that went through his body. But as Giovanni looked down he was shocked to see that his foot was gone.

He could not see his foot, and he could not feel his foot as if it had completely disappeared. Then realizing the danger, he tried to take it back out of the shadow but he felt a strong resistance as if someone had grabbed his foot. So with all the strength he could muster, Giovanni gave a strong tug on his leg and fell over out of the shadow. He caught his breath, and then he stood back up and began to run towards his school.

He instinctively knew there was a connection between that statue and the missing students. When he got to the school, he opened the doors and zoomed to the homework board in Professor Mc Riley's room. Just as he had suspected, there on the homework board it said: "sketch the Statue Delle Ombre."

Giovanni ran to the cafeteria to find his friend Paulo. As usual he was sitting by himself in the center of the cafeteria eating some cheeseburgers. Giovanni ran over and explained the situation to Paulo. After hearing this, Paulo immediately jumped up from the table and ran off with Giovanni to the Statue Delle Ombre.

When they reached the piazza, the statue's shadow was directly in front of it, bigger than you could imagine. As they stood there in the silence of the afternoon, they began to hear faint voices as if someone was screaming in the distance. And then they realized that the sounds were coming from the statue's shadow. When they strained to hear, they could make out the voices of students coming from the shadow. It was as if the shadow concealed a hidden box which you could not escape from.

Then, as they listened closer, they could make out what the people inside the statue were saying, and it sounded as if they were asking them to get them out. Giovanni was thinking a million thoughts, not believing this could be happening. And as if the people in the shadow had heard him, they told him that it was really happening and it was extremely scary, so they needed help to get out of there.

The voices communicated to Giovanni to get a rope and throw it in the shadow so they could climb back out. Giovanni accepted this, and told Paulo he'd be right back. Paulo waited in front of the statue as he was too shocked to do anything.

Giovanni went to his house and looked in the basement, but he couldn't find a rope, so he took a long extension cord and ran back to the statue. Then he took one end of the extension cord and tied it to a light post and threw the rest of it into the shadow. Then all of the voices slowly began to increase in volume and unbelievingly people began to climb out of the shadow as if they had been hiding behind a black curtain the whole time. Slowly one of the students came over, panting heavily, and told Giovanni that the statues would keep enveloping people unless they were restored because they were all deteriorating and angry about being neglected. The statues resented being sketched in that condition and wanted art students to help them and not just use them. Giovanni was

relieved because he knew the Academia would sponsor a program to restore the statues and everything would be O.K.

After he had helped people back to their homes and grateful families, Giovanni went home himself. He went to bed feeling better about the future and knowing that he could sleep well.