Run Away to the Stars

Run Away to the Stars Amima Iziddine

Junior couldn't wait for the sun to set so he could watch the stars through his telescope. It was his favorite thing to do each day. Sometimes, he was so excited about outer space, he forgot to do his homework. "You can't neglect your studies," his father told him. "But I don't care about math," Junior said. "What is the point of all those numbers?" "You may not understand now," his mother replied, "but math can really take you places."

Junior's other favorite thing was his socks! He liked to wear different pairs at different times of day. When he wasn't looking at the stars, he was organizing his sock collection. "You shouldn't spend all your time inside tidying socks," his grandma said. "You should go outside and play!"

Junior tried to pay attention to his homework, but he was soon distracted again by his love for the stars. "We will have to take away your astronomy books and telescope until you can improve your grades," his father said.

Junior hurried to his room and hid his socks before his grandma could take them away too. "I wish I could run away and live somewhere that I could spend my time however I want."

More than anything, Junior wished he could travel to outer space. If he could build a rocket ship, it would take him away to he stars!

Junior collected things from around his house to use. He stayed up all night working on his rocket ship. At last, it was complete!

But he didn't know how he would power the rocket. He remembered that a rocket has to blast off at 60,000 kilometers per second to escape Earth's gravity. Junior tried using all the batteries in their house to get up to speed, but nothing happened. Then he tried filling the rocket with all the fuel from their family's storage tank. But it only sputtered.

He spent all of the next day staring out the window, trying to think of a solution. At last he had an answer, thanks to the trees in his own backyard. A catapult!

His hundreds of socks would work perfectly to help fling his rocket into space. That night, Junior finished his catapult, then stepped inside and prepared for takeoff. Would it work? Three . . . two . . . one . . .

Blast off! Junior's rocket raced through the clouds and into space. He shot past the moon and headed for the stars.

It wasn't long before Junior could see a milky white spiral of stars. It was our galaxy, the Milky Way! Soon he passed Andromeda, the next galaxy after the Milky Way. Junior couldn't believe he was finally among the stars.

But suddenly, his rocket started to slow down. It was no longer traveling up, up, and away. Junior began racing down towards Earth. He closed his eyes, afraid of crashing into the ground.

When he opened his eyes, he found himself on the floor next to his bed. It was all a dream! Junior realized that it would take a lot more than watching the stars to get to outer space. He would have to learn how to power and fly a rocket ship!

Maybe doing his math homework would take him somewhere after all . . .

The End