The two boys took their supplies out into the backyard. They set them on the side of the sandbox, which was constructed using four wooden walls a foot high built around sand poured over a black tarp.
“This is a nice sandbox you’ve got here. Did you help build it?” asked Mark.
“Yeah,” replied Jacob, “my mom helped me. I,” he walked around to the back of the sandbox, “thought of this so it doesn’t get ruined when I’m not here,” he pulled up a black tarp that was folded up beside the sandbox. “At night I put this on too so no monsters can come in here to play. They’d ruin everything.”
“That’s a good idea,” said Mark. “Once we make this catapult I don’t think any monsters will be tough enough to mess with your sandbox ever again.” He scratched the back of this head, “probably still best to use the tarp in case of rain, even a catapult can’t help with that.”
Jacob laughed and dropped the tarp back to the ground.
They sat together playing with the supplies on the side of the sandbox. Mark began making a base, taking from the dozen Popsicle sticks at their disposal and sticking them together with the clay.
“Now what?” asked Jacob, looking at the completed base.
“We’re almost done,” replied Mark. He stuck two sticks at the front of the base, securing them with rubber bands, then stuck another horizontally at the top using the clay. “Come here, Jacob. I need your help with this.” He watched as Jacob attached another stick to the catapult, this time vertically atop the horizontal one. “Now stick the cup to that one using some clay.”
“Is it done?” asked Jacob.
“Looks done, but we’ve got some sticks left. Let’s make it extra strong at the base.”
“What’re we going to launch at the monsters?”
“Hmm, we’ll need some good ammunition. How about some little rocks? Come on, let’s look for some.”
“I know where we can get some!” shouted Jacob, a burst of excitement in his voice. “Oh, but mom doesn’t like when I take them.”
“What’re you thinking?”
“There’s little rocks in the front yard in mom’s garden. I used to take them and pretend they were magical gems and placed them around my castles, but she got mad at me and made me put them back.”
“I’ll go ask her,” said Mark, pushing his hands into his thighs and grunting as he got back to his feet.
He walked up to the house and disappeared inside. Jacob looked on from the sandbox as he practiced pulling the catapult back and launching puffs of sand into the air.
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