Young Charlie Bucket sits at the dinner table with the rest of his family. He discusses with them about the books he has been reading recently. Not long after that, a triple-knock sounds the door. Charlie jumps out of his seat and dashes to open it, revealing the eccentricity candy maker, Willy Wonka himself.
"Good afternoon, Willy!" the brown eyed boy happily exclaims. Willy nods and smiles broadly at the boy's family.
"What have you been doing in here, my dear boy?" Willy asks. He briefly steps into the slanted house, and is welcome by a burst of warm air.
"Just talking about the books I have been reading." The boy smiles, but Willy just dismisses his purple-gloved hand in the air.
"Oh, Charlie, why must talk about books, when you can just create new candy ideas and enjoy life without them?"
"But Willy, sometimes books are the key to new things in life. You can read and get inspired by them!" The older man scorns at his apprentice, but Charlie flashes him a grin.
"Charlie, are you going to the bookstore?" Charlie's mother asks, as she wipes down the dishes clean with her apron. He nods to her, "Oh, and Willy, you can come too if you wish."
Willy opens up his mouth to object, but Charlie steals his hand and pulls him out the door, while saying, "Of course he's coming! Bye mum, dad, and the rest of the family!" the family echoed back to him with a good-bye, as Charlie and Willy steps onto the edible green grass.
"Why did you said that I was coming along, too?" Willy pouts at Charlie.
"You need to get out of the factory, Willy. Really, it's not good for you if you're locked up in here 24/7. Besides, you might like it."
"As long there's candy." Willy remarks, as the two grabbed their coats and out the door to the bookstore.
"Why can't we just take the glass elevator?" Willy whines, they're half way to the store.
"It's good exercise." Charlie points out.
"I have plenty good exercise in the factory!"
Charlie shakes his head.
"Willy, making candy isn't exercise. It's just exercising your mind. Oh, we're here!" they both stand outside of a little shop called, 'Books Are for Everyone'. Willy scowls, when they enter the small building.
For once, the chocolatier is taken aback. There are so many books. He takes a gander at every category; romance, mystery, action, comedy, and possibly more. As a section catches his eye, he leaves Charlie's side almost immediately. Willy glances at each book that is to his liking. After searching through all the picture books, he can't stop reading a few pages of a book called, "The Twelve Cats of Christmas" Sure he knows about the Christmas song, but cats? He's hooked. Charlie manages to find his friend squatting in a pile of children's books.
"Found anything interesting?" Charlie giggles from behind the adult's shoulder. In response, Willy drops the book in surprise.
"Oh, um, yeah." Willy blushes and grabs the fallen book.
"Great, let's go and pay for them." Charlie smiles at him. They head to the cashier. After that, Willy trails along with Charlie, somebody collides into him, making him drop his book as in result. The stranger's items crash to the ground, along with Willy's.
"Oh gosh, I am so sorry!" Willy exclaims to the stranger. He bends down and reach out for his book. But he can't see his fairly well. Nothing but a junkyard of books pool around their ankles.
"Here," the stranger kneels down to gather their remaining's. "I'm sorry for that." the stranger shovels their books away to find Willy's. He hands it back to him, "Once again, I am very sorry." Willy stands back up again, accepting it. Willy looks closely to the stranger. It appears to be a young teenage boy with charcoal black hair that reaches his chin. Most part of his bangs covered his face, as dark emerald eyes look back at him. For some odd reason, the boy reminds Willy, a girl, for he has extremely skinny jeans and a black top that has a symbol of a broken heart.
"It's, um, alright." Willy slowly replies, with a hint of blush? He shakes his head, to see Charlie standing by his side, looking at the stranger.
"We must be going, bye." Willy grabs Charlie's hand, rushing as far away as they can. Charlie peers over his shoulders to watch the boy standing in surprise.
Charlie and Willy marches into the factory, taking off their heavy down coats, and sits down on one of the green hills. "So, who do you think that boy was?" Charlie asks Willy while chewing a few blades of grass. But Willy, too, seem to be lost in thought, regarding the young boy.
"Charlie, did you receive a strange vibe from him?" he ponders, turning to fully face him. He waits for his reply.
"Maybe, but let's not jump to conclusions just yet. You know what they say; never judge a book by its cover."
Once the stranger stands alone in the cold, they flip over their book and notice a problem. "Oh dear, this isn't mine." They sigh, "But this is a joy to read." They glance up at the large chocolate factory that bellows black smoke into the evening skies.
'It's best to return this to its rightful owner,' the stranger tucks the mistaken book underneath their arms and treads up to the factory's gates.
They stand there for a moment in silence. When they were younger, they have often thought about the chocolate factory that closed for years. Everything has changed for the better for that special boy who won the contest.
Their eyes scan for an intercom and finds a button.
A scratchy line calls out, but is unclear for the moment. The teenage takes this opportunity to speak.
"Willy Wonka."
Before Charlie or either Willy stands up from their time of day-dreaming, an oompa loompa rushes up to its boss. Willy automatically kneels down to listen to what it needs to deliver.
"What? There's somebody at the gate?" Willy's face hardens. He stands up, Charlie at his side, and marches to the glass elevator. Much to Willy's arrogance, his surprised expression smacks right into the clear glass doors. Charlie has to stifle a laugh.
"Who's at the gate?" Charlie wonders. He presses a button for his mentor that leads to Willy's office. The elevator launches into the air. Once they arrive at the office, Willy gasps and stumbles out view from the window.
"Why is he here?!" Willy hides behind a mountain of papers.
"Maybe he needs something from you?" Charlie walks up to the window to get a better look at the guest at the gates. But Willy pulls him back.
"Maybe he's a spy!" Willy whispers urgently, and peers over the papers, just looking at the expression the boy was holding appears to be highly suspicious.
"I doubt it." Charlie shakes his head and sits down on a different stack of papers. He looks up at Willy to the screen and then back. "You need to talk to him, and ask him why he is there."
"No way."
"Then I'll do it." once again, Charlie stands back up and tries to get to the glass, but, again, Willy pulls him back near him.
"At least not by myself." Charlie smiles and walks to the window with Willy. Finally, Willy has the guts to speak to him. He presses a button that is connected to the intercom in the front yard.
"Who are you and what do you want?" Willy glares hard at the boy, hoping he really isn't a spy.
"Mr. Wonka, um, I believe that we accidentally swapped books when we collided into each other." The teenage boy's voice squeaks shyly.
"Liar."
"No, really, it is. The name of the book is 'The Twelve Dogs of Christmas,"
Willy pauses a bit and pulls out the book that the boy gave him earlier. He thumbs through the pages before shutting it entirely. The boy was right, this isn't his. But he doesn't care. Besides, he liked this one better.
"You can keep that one, goodbye." The boy opens up his mouth, but Willy pushes the button to turn off the intercom before he can even utter another word.
"Willy!" Charlie scolds him as Willy looks back at him with a weird look.
"What?" he says as if nothing really happened.
"You shouldn't have done that! That wasn't nice, and that book doesn't belong to you, it belongs to that guy!"
"I don't care," Willy turns on his heels and walks out of the door. Charlie reaches out for him, but forgets him. He turns back around and switches the intercom back on.
The stranger ponders deep into their thoughts. They have read about the 'Great Willy Wonka' but after seeing him flesh and blood, their opinions about the chocolatier seems to be wavering.
"Well, since there's no point on hanging onto something that I don't need, I can simply give it away who loves these types of books." He mutters under his breath.
Moments before they can even take a few feet from the gates, a voice rings out.
"H-hello? Are you still there?" the stranger swiftly turns their attention the younger boy's voice. He hesitantly presses the button again to respond.
"You're not going to cut me off, are you?" they quip.
"No, but I apologize for my friend's behavior. He can be difficult at times."
"I forgive him, I deal with those kinds of people every day." They reply with a heavy tone.
"Why don't you come inside, it's chilly out here when it's dark. Here, I'll open up the gates and I'll meet you at the entrance." The intercom comes to a close, and not long after that, the gates open, welcoming an unlikely guest inside.
"I'm going to regret this, am I?" the young teenager sighs to themselves, as they walk across the long and big courtyard. As promise, the younger boy stands at the front door with the door creak open. They both come inside, the younger boy gesturing the stranger inside.
Once inside the main room, they stand still, astonished. Everything at every single plant or object has exotic colors, colors that he never imagined. "Beautiful, isn't it?"
"Very." They stand there, a bit awkwardly; don't know what else to do. "Oh, well, here's the book that Mr. Wonka don't want." They nod before handing the disregarded book into the brown eyed boy's hands.
"I will, thank you." Charlie flashes them a smile, and they return it.