Friedrich Froebel: A Selection From His Writings

On the seventh day after my daughter goes missing, I kidnap an entire kindergarten. I lock away all 27 students and two teachers in a classroom. I tell the police that if they can't find my daughter, I will kill a kid every 30 minutes. The principal falls to her knees, wailing and begging, "It's not my fault that your daughter is missing. Why should other children pay for it?" I glance at my watch. "29 minutes left. Find her." I know she's in this kindergarten.

I donated 45 million to the city's best kindergarten, but my daughter failed the enrollment interview. She was a polymath. Furious, I demanded an explanation from admissions. She hurled an assessment file at my face. "Your daughter's brilliant, but you're the exact opposite! You're dead last among the parents!" She continued, "The others have tech domes! You're nothing but a regular Ivy League graduate! Your degree's worth about as much as toilet paper!" The other teachers laughed as well. "If we admit her daughter, it's going to look bad on the other kids. She can't take that responsibility." "Yeah, I can't believe she's demanding an explanation from Ms. Johnson. Her husband is the kindergarten's biggest stakeholder. He can make sure her daughter has nowhere to go." The admission teacher shoved me away. With disdain in her eyes, she said, "Out of my sight if you know what's good for you. My husband is picking me up in his Rolls-Royce. His car plate alone is worth more than your life! It's lucky 777! Only one in Georgeport!" Three sevens? That was my husband's car. I laughed mirthlessly and texted my husband. "I had no idea you had another wife behind me."

"I'll marry you when I grow up." The little Prince chimes as he steadies himself to walk on top of an old abandoned log. "You can't. A Prince should marry a Princess, and I'm not a Princess so you can't marry me."She says before resuming back to the coloring book in front of her. With a grunt he hops off the wood. "My mom said I can do whatever I want when im King. And I want to marry you. Simple as that."

I had just gotten home when a parent in my son’s class group chat erupted: [Ms. Zinn, what kind of place are you running? Do you let just any random stray off the street become a teacher?] [My daughter came home, grabbed two forks, and tried to jump off the balcony. She said it was Miss Never who told her to!] The homeroom teacher panicked and denied it at once, insisting there was no such person as Miss Never at the kindergarten. She even posted the official teaching schedule in the chat to prove it. On the security footage, there was not a single trace of this so-called Miss Never. However, later, my son whispered to me in secret, “Mom, Miss Never is an old lady with a cat’s face.” “She says only kids can see her.”

I understood babies. The baby in Room 403 cried out, "My butt itches! It is not a stomachache!" A newborn in the ER screamed, "Something is stuck under my belly button!" A preemie babbled softly, "I want my mommy..." None of that prepared me for that day. Dr. Margot Aldrich, the country's foremost authority in pediatrics, stood before a packed auditorium and examined a baby who had screamed himself purple. "We will keep observing." The mother fell to her knees. "Please, my baby is dying..." Margot let out a short laugh. "Am I the expert here, or are you?" The room went silent. In my ears, a tiny voice raged. "Are you grown-ups blind? Something is stuck under my belly button! It is not a stomachache! Somebody cut me open already!" I did not stop to think. I pushed through the crowd, dropped beside the crib, and looked Margot in the eye. "Dr. Aldrich, let me try."

The Eze (king) of the Afugiri community Eze Obinna was suffering from a curse from a wizard who visited his throne to invoke the curse on him. The wizard was paid by Arinze, a rival to the throne to lay the curse on the king (Eze) because it is only when the Eze is dead that he stands a chance to be enthroned. This beloved Eze Obinna of Afugiri can only be saved by a magic bean that can only be found in a forbidden forest. The curse on the Eze will take his life in 30 days if the magic beans are not retrieved from the forest and administered to him. The Eze was already dying; his body is swelling-up as he is losing consciousness daily. If nothing is done, he’ll be truly gone in 30 days. Before getting to this evil forest, you must pass through the river where Mermaids come out at the bank to hunt for humans, Bushbabies that walks at night with mats, The land of Silence if you make noise because of what you see, you’ll be killed, the land of ‘Don’t look up where the monster that flies above you won’t spare you once you look at it, the land of Lust where your utmost desire will be presented to you and if you fall for it, your soul will be whisked away, the coven of witches where witches will gladly suck blood bloodd if you don’t know how to overcome and so many other strange-lands that require a set of virtue to cross. Brave warriors must be summoned from the 11 clans of Afugiri, these warriors must not just be brave physically, and they must also be strong in character because battling the spirits and crossing those strange lands with strange beings requires virtues.