One night at a bonfire held on the lake shore in my village, a bright light appeared in the sky. Then came a loud crack followed by a boom like the sound of thunder on a stormy evening. At first, we thought it was lightning but there were no clouds
in the sky, just stars as far as the eyes could see. Little did I know this one event would change my life forever. My name is Lily and this is my fantastical story. I live in a house that was built next to a deep body of water called the Blue Lake. It gets its
name from the hue of the surrounding mountains of blue granite rock. The lake itself has crystal clear water and is five miles long and one mile across at its widest point. The deepest spot, at the very center, is about 60 feet. In the summer, there are all
sorts of water activities going on, with boating, fishing and diving being the main sports. My friends and I like to visit the deepest point to search for all kinds of treasure. We often find lost items belonging to swimmers and kayakers; cell phones, cameras and
watches make up the bulk of our discoveries. Sometimes we even find precious jewelry like wedding rings, gold chains and necklaces, some of which can be very valuable. We do our best to return the missing objects to their rightful owners by
placing flyers around the village, in hotels and at tourist attractions. On occasion we manage to reunite a found article with its owner; but most times we fail to do so. We will always do all we can though. Items which are left unclaimed are tossed into a
box - the box of the “unwanted and forgotten”, as we fondly call it. In reality it is mostly broken electronic gadgets - cameras and phones which are beyond repair. Very little of what we find has any real monetary value. The most valuable finds are
gold and silver jewelry, some with precious stones, which we divide between ourselves and either sell or keep. The next day, after the flash in the sky, my friends and I went out on the lake. This day was no different from any other summer day.
We used paddle boards and kayaks to go back and forth on the water as we talked about a whole lot of nothing: teenager stuff. Then Lucas, one of the members of the group, spotted an object in the water directly beneath him and called our attention to it.
We all made our way over to see the curious object and it looked like a rock from the surface. It was about 15 feet down and rested on the sandy bottom. It was the only thing sitting in that area so it looked out of place. “Lily, you are the best diver, why don’t you go check it out?”,
Lucas asked. Before he could get another word out, I was already in the water and on my way down to investigate the strange looking rock. As I drew closer to the artifact, the water became warmer and warmer. “What a bizarre feeling,” I thought
to myself. When I got to within 5 feet of the dark object, it started to glow with a dull redish yellow hue and I became very afraid. I swam back to the surface as fast as I could. “It’s glowing!” I yelled as I broke the water surface and quickly scrambled into the
nearest kayak. It was Tami’s boat I entered. “What do you mean glowing?” Tami asked. “Glowing Tami… red… A redish glow!” I pronounced loudly. They saw the terror on my face and didn’t question me any further. We all swiftly peddled back to the
lake shore. Everyone clambered around me as soon as we landed. We gathered around one of the picnic tables and I started to explain what I saw…what I felt. “We must alert the authorities. Last night there was no lightning, that was the sound of a
meteorite zooming through the atmosphere and I think it landed in the lake!” Lucas exclaimed. “That rock is a meteorite?” Lily asked. “Yes!” Lucas replied. Not long after calling the police, there were divers in the water retrieving the space rock. We were
told that the rock was radioactive so we were given some medicine and treated for radiation poisoning as a precaution. To retrieve the rock, the divers secured bags around it and inflated them with compressed air. The airbags rose towards the
surface bringing the rock with them. An excavator was then used to lift the rock out of the water and into a truck equipped with an anti-radiation container. The rock was so hot that it made the excavator bucket scalding to the touch. During the recovery of
the meteor rock, journalists from local news agencies assembled around us and asked my friends and me for interviews. That night, all the interviews went out on the local television station and the next day the news went national. Within a week my face
was on TV screens across the country and then the world. It was the craziest experience of my life thus far. I was even invited to go on talk shows with my friends. After about 6 months, all the hoopla died down and we returned to our normal lives.
As for the rock, we never heard anything from the government agency that took it.
To Be Continued