← Sleep Tight Stories - Bedtime Stories for Kids
Sleep Tight Stories - Bedtime Stories for Kids
Nicole And The Box In The Barn P.29 ✨
00:21:10
A bedtime story series set on Prince Edward Island
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Foreign. S and welcome to Sleep Tight Stories. Each week we share a few shoutouts and birthday wishes for listeners who help support the show. It's a small way we say thank you and it always makes us smile. Happy belated 5th birthday to Alexander from West Hartford, Connecticut. We are so proud of you. You are so full of energy and joy. We love watching you grow up. Love, Mom, Dad, Alanna and Lily. Happy Birthday to Hank in Round Rock, Texas who turned 9 years old on March 22nd. We are so proud of the creative, curious and caring boy you are becoming. Love, Mom, Dad, Sadie and Pickles. Wishing Azami a belated and stupendous seventh birthday. We want you to know that you are the light of our lives. You are a brilliant, imaginative, kind, smart, beautiful and hilarious soul. Thank you for picking all of us from the stars and you deserve all the love and wonder in the universe and any alternate universes out there. Love from dad, Mom, Ocean and Andrew. Happy 11th birthday Ariav. Love, Mama, Amara and Papa. Happy 7th birthday to our wonderful MacKenzie aka McDoodles from East St. Paul, Manitoba. You are strong, thoughtful and very smart. We love watching you grow and think you are becoming such a special and amazing young lady. Wishing you a wonderful birthday from Mommy, Daddy and Nat. Happy birthday to Theodore Smith. Your mom, dad and sisters Love you. Happy 8th birthday Lila Jo. We hope you had a great day and had so much fun celebrating in Lava Hot Springs. We love you to the moon and back. Love mom and dad. Happy 8th birthday to Juan Santiago Bitero from Victoria, BC. Mama, Papa and Fede. Hope you had an amazing day and that all your dreams become real. Keep being that special boy you have always been. And happy 5th birthday on April 3rd to Connor. You are learning and growing so much. We love you no matter what and no matter what means no matter what. Love, Mom, Dad, Hannah, Evelyn and the doggies. Happy birthday to you all and thank you for supporting the show. We're so grateful you're here with us. Whether you've been listening since the beginning or or just found us last week, you're part of something really special. Millions of families around the world making bedtime a little sweeter together. This year we have some lovely new stories planned. More adventures, more wonder, and maybe even a few surprises. We can't wait to share them with you. Now onto our story. Nicole is heading back to school after her weekend and she is not sure what is going to happen between her and Marcus. When Emma gets on the bus and mentions her grandmother again, Nicole is happy to say she'd like to meet her when science class rolls around. Nicole is not quite as eager to talk to Marcus about his grandmother. Nicole and the Box in The Barn Part 29 it was Monday morning. The bus arrived at Nicole's stop at 7:52, same as always, and squeaked on the first left turn down the main road the way it always did. Emma had named the squeak Gerald in the first week of school, and the name had stuck, at least between the two of them. Nicole was in her usual seat, backpack on her lap. There was nowhere else to put it on a full bus when Emma dropped into the spot beside her, unwinding a scarf that had seen better days. You hopped on early, nicole said. Emma's stop was a few minutes up the road, past the cluster of newer houses where someone had sold off the front of their field, which meant she was usually a few minutes behind. My dad dropped me at the end of the road. Emma made a face. My dad had an early meeting, so we left the house before the bus came. I stood at the stop for 11 minutes in the cold. That's dedication. That's having no choice. Nicole smiled and looked out the window. The fields were dark. October mornings on the island were like that, gray and slow to get going, the sun still low and pale. She didn't mind it. Back in Montreal, October mornings had meant noise right away, people rushing on the sidewalk, buses that came every few minutes packed with people. Here it was just red fields and bare trees and the occasional farmhouse set back from the road with one light on in the window, quiet in a way that had bothered her at first and didn't anymore. Did you see that video? Emma said. The one with the dog and the sprinkler? The golden retriever one? Yes. I've watched it four times. It's really funny, nicole said. My wi fi went down Sunday and I couldn't show my mom, and it was honestly the most frustrated I've been in weeks. Emma pulled at a loose thread on her scarf. They said someone would come and fix it, but nobody came, so we just had to sit there. What did you do? Emma looked at her. We played a board game. Was it fun? It was actually really fun, and I'm annoyed about that. Nicole laughed. Outside, the bus passed a field where the red soil was turned up or ploughed up. She hadn't mastered the right words yet. A crow sat at the edge watching the bus go by like it had nowhere better to be. In Montreal. She'd never really looked out the window on the way to school. There was nothing to see except other buildings and other buses and people waiting on the corners. Here she always looked. There was always something. A hawk on a fence post, a horse standing perfectly still in a far field, fog sitting low over the water in the distance. She was still thinking about that when Emma said, almost as an afterthought, my gran still wants to meet you, by the way. She keeps asking when I'm going to bring you round. She paused. She's pretty excited about it. I think she needs more visitors. Nicole looked out the window. Yeah, I'd like that. She'll probably talk your ear off about old island stuff. She's like that. Emma paused. But she knows a lot of stories about families that used to live around here. She mentioned the McDonald's again, actually said they were really well thought of back in the day. Hmm, nicole said. You okay? Yeah. Nicole turned back from the window. Just tired. Monday? Emma nodded and moved on to something else, something about a history assignment, and Nicole nodded along at what seemed seemed like the right moments. Outside, the red fields rolled past. The compass in her pocket was still just sitting there, not indicating much at all. For now. The rest of the morning passed the way Monday mornings do, slowly and all at once. Science was third period. Nicole slid into her seat, got her Chromebook open, and started pulling up the ecosystem document before Mr. Arseneault had even finished taking attendance. Marcus arrived approximately four seconds before the bell, dropped into his chair, and immediately opened his notebook to a page that already had a small drawing of what appeared to be a very confident looking father box in the corner. We should add a section on soil composition, nicole said by way of hello. Good morning to you too, marcus said. He looked at the document. Yeah, okay. Soil composition. That's good. They worked for a bit in the comfortable way they'd developed over the past few weeks, Nicole typing, Marcus occasionally contributing actual content between small additions to the fox, which now had a hat. Then, without looking up from his notebook, my gran called over the weekend. Yeah? She's been going through the box a bit. The one with the old stuff from when my great grandpa worked at your place. He turned his pencil over, considering the hat. There are more letters than she thought. And a photograph. Nicole kept her eyes on the Chromebook. What's the photograph of? The farm, she thinks, from way back. He paused. She got kind of emotional about it, so I didn't really ask too many questions. Nicole typed a sentence about soil drainage that she didn't entirely read back. She said, maybe you could come by sometime, marcus said. Nicole looked at him. He was adding a small bird to the fox drawing, completely unbothered. He wasn't being mysterious. He wasn't trying to start anything. He was just sharing something that mattered to his family with someone who happened to live in that place. Now that was all it was to him. I'd like that, she said, and she meant it. They were about halfway through lunch when Emma put down her sandwich and said, can I ask you something? Nicole looked up. Sure. Every time Marcus talks about his family and the farm and you get this look. Emma wasn't being mean about it, just stating a fact the way she did. Like you're trying really hard not to have a reaction. Nicole opened her mouth and then closed it again. You don't have to tell me, emma said. I'm just saying I noticed. Nicole looked at her lunch for a moment. My family's farm has a lot of history. Old stuff. I'm still figuring it all out. Emma's eyes went a little wider. Like mystery stuff. Kind of. Nicole almost smiled. Good weird. Not bad weird. That's actually really cool, emma said. You have to tell me sometime. Someday, nicole said. Emma considered this for approximately one second. I already think you're a little weird, she said. It's fine. Nicole laughed, the kind that came out before you decided to. They finished lunch, talking about other things, but something had settled between them quietly, without either of them making a big deal about it. She changed out of her school clothes when she got home and went straight to the garden. Not to go through the door, just to sit. The late October light was low and golden, the kind that made everything look a little warmer than it actually was. She could feel the cold through her jacket sleeves when she sat down on the grass by the pond. The flowers were sparse now, just the small, determined ones that hadn't decided to give up yet. But the apple tree still had a few yellow leaves hanging on, and the berry bushes were that deep red that was almost better than summer. She sat for a while without saying anything. The garden rustled once, softly, like it was just letting her know it was there. Marcus's gran has a photograph, she said eventually, of the farm from a long time ago. She pulled a blade of grass and turned it between her fingers, and Emma asked about the farm today. About why I go quiet when Marcus talks about it. She paused. I told her it was old history stuff. A small smile. She seemed okay with that. The pond was very still. A leaf came down from the apple tree and landed on the surface without making a sound. Nicole reached into her bag and pulled out the book. She opened it slowly, the way she always did now. Not expecting anything, just checking. Most pages the same as before. She turned toward the middle. There, a new illustration, small, tucked into the lower corner of a page she knew well. Two kids sitting on a porch step. One of them was clearly Nicole. The hair, the jacket, the way she was sitting with her elbows on her knees. The other was harder to make out. Not Angus. The setting was wrong. A modern porch, painted wood. A doormat, A plant in a pot beside the step. Someone's house. She didn't know whose. Nicole looked at it for a long time. Then she took out her phone and photographed it carefully. She closed the book and put it back in her bag. She didn't know what it meant yet, but it didn't feel like a warning. It felt more like something that was going to happen, something that was already on its way. Her. Her mom was at the kitchen table when Nicole came in. The attic journal was open in front of her, the older one, the one that wasn't Nicole's father's. She had a mug of tea that looked like it had gone cold a while ago. Nicole toed off her sneakers, hung up her jacket, and sat down across from her. I found something this afternoon, her mom said. I've been sitting with it for a bit. Before saying anything, she turned the journal around. It was a page near the back, dense with names and years in faded ink. Nicole had seen it before, they both had, but they'd skimmed it, distracted by other things. Alyssa. Names down the left side, years beside them, some with a single word of description, some with nothing at all. Her mom pointed to one entry about two thirds of the way down. Dunn D. 1942. Nicole nodded. They already knew that. Keep reading, her mom said. Nicole scanned down the rest of the list near the bottom, the ink changed pencil instead, fainter, like it had been added later by someone else or in a hurry. A few more names and then, almost at the very bottom of the page, one more entry. She read it. Then she read it again. Maclean, 1967. Nicole sat back slowly. 1967. Her father would have been about 12, about her age. Not her father as a guardian. Not her father as someone who had understood what the farm was or what it meant. Her father as a kid, a curious twelve year old who came to this place asking questions and ended up on a list of people who weren't supposed to be here. Just like Donald Dunn. He didn't know, nicole said. Her voice came out quieter than she expected. No, her mom said. I don't think he did. The kitchen was very still. Outside, the garden was dark, the apple tree just a shape against the evening sky. Nicole looked at the list for a long moment. Then she closed the journal gently, the way you close something that needed to be thought about before it was opened again. And that is the end of this part. Good night. Sleep tight.