Having rolled his fingers to position them, Mr. Wonka put the flat of his hand against the wall, high up—no where near the tiny door—and paused, just that second that let you know he knew he knew exactly what he was doing, and then he pushed, and the wall opened—yes, the wall, not the door!—because the wall was the door, and what we saw when the door opened was… was… too much and too amazing to describe! My jaw went weak and my eyes went wide! It was my wildest dreams! Come to life!

It all happened so fast I can't tell you what it started with; I think it started with color. Where the hall had been grey as dust, like our town, this room was color! Color, color, color! Technicolor! Panavision! The colors spilled into our eyes before we had taken even one step, and after that it was noise, a great, big, roaring sound, and before you knew it, the scents floated over you, faint in the hall, but strong here: sugar, and peppermint, and lemon, and lavender, and above all, chocolate, and then we could all see what the roaring noise was: a great fall of chocolate, as tall as a skyscraper, thundering at the other end of the giant room, whose floor was as hilly as any pasture or glade might be, and covered with grass and flowers, and trees of the most fantastic shapes and kinds!

I might have the advantage over the others, but Mr. Wonka had the advantage over all of us: he knew what was in this room, and while we all would have stood there like gobsmacked zombies, his striding briskly down the hilltop we stood on dragged us with him. Oh, yes! This man had the advantage over us, big-time. It made me wary. This was no ordinary factory, and he was no ordinary man. We followed after him, not knowing where to look first, our heads on swivels, like owls. I stumbled a little on the uneven ground, looking at everything except where I was going. I wasn't the only one. Mr. Wonka must have known we'd be that way. He halted, and was saying something about keeping our heads, and staying calm.

No one said a word. Augustus dropped his chocolate bar. I used the halt to take in more of the room, and once my senses allowed me to think, I realized this was an Incredible. Wonderful. Gorgeous. Useless room. Seriously, candy-making doesn't need a room like this! There was no candy-making reason for any of this; no reason at all. Mr. Wonka had done this for fun! And what fun he'd had!

"It's beautiful!"

I said the last two words out loud. I had to. It couldn't go unsaid; unrecognized. No one else was saying anything, and it needed saying. The room was more than beautiful, or fun. It was daring. Mr. Wonka is a daring person.

"What?"

He turned. Saw it was me. Turned away.

"Oh, yeah. It's very beautiful."

His voice had a defensive edge to it. I couldn't decide why. It was like he thought we might think the room wasn't beautiful; that it was a waste of time. The others still said nothing, but he ignored that and led us around parts of the room, telling us about it. We went across an arched bridge that crossed the thick, dark river—a river he told us "was hot melted chocolate of the finest quality"—and then back across a bigger arched bridge, near the waterfall. He told us the waterfall was the most important thing, because it was how he mixed his chocolate. He told us his factory is the only factory in the world that mixes its chocolate this way, and I believe him. So did Grandpa Joe, who told me this was new to him. In his day, before the spies, Mr. Wonka had used mixing barrels. I believed that, too. He has mixing barrels as decoration carved in the stone over his gates.

We went on a little more and he stopped to point to pipes in the room. Some were in the chocolate river, near the fall, and didn't move, but some did move, on rails along the ceiling. Mr. Wonka told us the pipes were how he moved the chocolate to other parts of the factory.

By this time, we'd seen a lot, but now came the best part, because he asked us to try a blade of grass along the path. "Please, do," he said. "It's so delectable, and so darn good looking!"

"You can eat the grass?" I asked.

"Of course you can."

His tone was as pleasant as could be. He took a step or two nearer to me, and his eyes were soft. It were as if we'd been friends for life.

"Everything in this room is eatable, even I am eatable," he said, including the others, "but that would be cannibalism, my dear children, and is in fact frowned upon in most societies."

Mr. Wonka sounded as if the jury were still out as to whether or not he would frown on cannibalism, but now he was quite near me, almost touching me, and telling us all to scoot, and enjoy ourselves, by enjoying the room, on our own.

I stood there, rooted to the spot. Wander around? On our own? Could we do that? Would we get into trouble? My grandparents say kids can always get into trouble, if they try, and since they say it, my Mum and Dad don't have to, and I know it's true. Kids at school are always doing things that get them into trouble, but it's usually when no one's watching them. It's also usually the same kids, over and over. You'd think they'd learn, but they don't seem to. These kids here have their parents to watch them. I guess that's why Mr. Wonka let us bring them. Grandpa Joe doesn't have to watch me. I don't get into trouble. Even if I wanted to—which I don't—I don't have the energy for it.

But Mr. Wonka was serious. The room was ours to explore, and my heart beating faster was a measure of my excitement. But I still stared, not believing, but with a feeling creeping up on me, like the one I'd got when I found the Golden Ticket, a feeling like, I don't know, having gone from solitary cabbage soup to countless confectionaries in a single morning, I'd call... exuberance. That's a word my teachers tell us not to be in class—exuberant—but it seemed like that's what this was, bubbling up in me from where joy lives. The truth was, I didn't know which way I should go first, and more truth, Mr. Wonka might be the most interesting thing in the room, because he could tell me about it.

Mr. Wonka was tired of waiting for me to take the hint, but not in a mean way; in a nice way. I could tell he knew how hard it was to believe in good fortune when you've had nothing but bad, and you can't enjoy what you don't believe, so he didn't blame me for taking a minute or two to get used to it. But Mr. Wonka meant that I should go, and he was upping the invitation by gently waving his hands at me, insisting I take-off, his hands, fingers pointing down, telling me with their motion to get going and enjoy myself.

"Scoot," he said, and repeated it, but his voice couldn't have been more gentle; I knew he wasn't saying it to get me out of his sight. It wasn't like when the kids at school tell me to scoot, using words not as nice as that one. No, this was more like we were friends, and he knew we'd meet up again, soon, and we'd still be friends, but then I'd have seen the room, like him, and we'd have more in common. That convinced me; more in common would be a good thing. I scooted, and that was when I noticed most of the others already had.

We all went different ways. I was on my way down to the river when I noticed, out of the corner of my eye, that Mr. Salt hadn't gone off, but had gone to stand in front of Mr. Wonka. I stopped. I could see Mr. Wonka's face. He had the look on it that I see on kids' faces in school, when the teacher is about to ask them to explain to the class the project they just got an A-plus-plus on, and they can't wait to do it! But I didn't hear Mr. Salt say anything, and I couldn't see his face, and then he turned away, and then Mr. Wonka made a quarter-turn, and made a face I could see, and he looked surprised, and then disappointed, and then he looked miffed, and then he looked like he wanted to kick something, and then I decided I better make myself scarce. He'd done all that in the space of a second and a half.

I hurried to the edge of the chocolate river. It was so thick and glossy looking. I stared into it, but it told me nothing. I thought about plucking one of the candy-cane reeds that were planted along the shore, and dip that into the river to get some chocolate to taste, but the bank was steep, with a drop-off, and there was something about the chocolate in this unfinished form that made me think twice. It looked as if it shouldn't be touched; as if it were sacred. Mr. Wonka had mentioned it, so I decided to try some of the grass instead. It was minty and sugary, and it melted on your tongue like a mirage. I noticed buttercups a little way up the slope, and tried one of them. It was even better than the grass: soft, and buttery, and salty, and lemony, but without being tart. I could live in this room. You'd never be more than an inch or two from a snack.

My Grandpa Joe was doing his own exploring. He had stayed close to the path on the uphill side. I decided to join him. On my way up, I came across a tree that looked like a willow, but with candied apples on it. An apple would be yummy, and my Mum would approve: an apple is fruit, and fruit is good for you.

I didn't get the apple, though. I reached for it, but when my fingers were about to close around it, Violet Beauregarde showed up and snatched it away. It surprised me, but what surprised me more was that I didn't hear her coming. The smacking of her gum should have been a dead giveaway, but that chocolate fall is pretty loud, and she may have been doing stealth chewing to get the drop on me.

I didn't mind she'd swiped my snack. There were a million more apples on that tree. Well, maybe not a million, but lots.

Having taken the apple I was going for, Violet didn't run off or anything. She wanted me to be sure I knew she'd got the better of me. That was the idea. I think they call it gamesmanship, or psyching out your opponent, or something like that. She stood there, locking eyes with me while she took her time holding the apple, and seeing to her precious gum. She took the grey wad out of her mouth, and was putting it behind her ear, but she had to be careful: there was her hair to think about. Gum and hair don't mix. I decided to make conversation while she was doing this. If she thought petty rudeness was going to psych me out, she was wrong.

"Why hold on to it?" I asked. "Why not start a new piece?"

"Because then I would be a loser. Like you."

Zing! I walked into that one, too, just like with Augustus. Having spat those words at me, she took a big bite out of the apple, crunch, like she was using it to say she'd bite my head off, and chew me up, and after that one bite, having made her point, she ran off.

Yup, I sighed to myself. That was it. Put the fear of losing in me; but I don't fear losing, and snarky apple biting isn't going to change that. I've already won. I'm here, where I want to be, even if it is for only one day. I decided not to have an apple, after all. I'd already had grass and buttercups, and my stomach isn't very big. Eating more might have made me feel sick, and I didn't want that. Violet had probably done me a favor, stopping me the way she did. I'd have to thank her when I got the chance.

Not bothering to spend another moment on Violet's silliness, the next thing I knew, Veruca solved the mystery of the workers.

Are these my characters? They are not. Is this purely for entertainment? It is.
Thanks for reading.
Have my reviewers made my day? Fav and Followers? They have, and I thank them, one and all.
As it ever is in my stories, direct quotes from the 2005 movie are in italics.