Just a warning: I wrote this story due to a special request from Retro Mania. It didn't seem like a good idea because I'm not British and am not currently living in the year 1945 This story isn't going to be as good as an actual Narnia for that reason. "This is just a tribute."

[0000]

His mom worked the late shift at the hospital, so when Eddie's dad went out to a bar with Frank Escalito, he hired some neighbor kids to babysit. Eddie's father didn't trust Eddie to behave by himself.

Frank lived down the street from Eddie's house. He and Eddie's father were always hanging out. Sometimes they'd take Eddie to truck stops when they went out for coffee or free samples at Dillon's. Generally not when they went to bars, though.

Mrs. Escalito ran her own babysitting service, but Eddie had gotten too old for that. Her method of babysitting had been putting all the kids in one room with a bunch of toys while she watched TV, and now the kids were all younger than Eddie, the toys too stupid to play with. He became an annoyance to Mrs. Escalito.

So Eddie's dad hired Trixie and Michelle from the red house across the street.

Eddie had never met them before. He didn't hang out with black kids very often, especially not ones that had their hair all done up in a bunch of little beads, but they seemed pretty cool.

They hung out in the back yard behind the house, the girls teaching him strange rap songs like `Funky Feet' and `Brass Monkey.' They didn't have too difficult a job. Eddie mostly kept his nose in a book for the first hour, something from The Chronicles on Narnia.

Trixie snatched the book out of his hands. "Whatcha reading?"

When Eddie explained the plot, she rolled her eyes and scoffed. "You a nerd!"

"Well, you asked."

To liven things up a bit, she suggested they play basketball.

"Eddie, can you play any?" she asked as she dribbled back and forth in front of the hoop.

Eddie shook his head.

Trixie chuckled. "That's okay. I'll teach you."

Eddie took off his glasses, and they played back and forth between the goals for awhile. Eddie, being bookish, didn't play so hot, Trixie shooting the most hoops. Michelle backed him up.

When the ball came to him, Eddie fumbled it, and it went flying off into a sandbox at the foot of a tree.

"Ow! Can't you see I'm trying to sleep down here? A good thousand year slumber, ruined again!"

Eddie and Trixie rushed to the sandbox, watching with astonishment as a furry creature came scuffing grumpily out of the sand. Silica grit sprayed into Eddie's brown hair.

"What is that, some kind of alien?" Michelle asked.

Pot bellied, wrinkled, antennas sticking out of its head, it definitely did resemble a Martian from a movie.

However, the creature's wispily mustached turtle mouse only wrinkled like it had just eaten a lemon. "Alien bah! Don't you know what a Psammead is, little girl?"

Trixie furrowed her brow. "A Sammy What?"

"Samoyed," Michelle corrected incorrectly. "It's a type of dog."

"A dog! Why, the nerve of you disrespectful imps!"

Eddie grinned. This had been the best thing to happen to him all week. "Wait! Did you say Psammead? I've read books about you! The Five Children and It!"

The creature seemed to shrivel at the title. "I wouldn't take stock in books of fairy tales written by a disreputable individual."

"Is it true that you grant wishes?"

The Psammead shriveled further. "Who...wants to know?"

Eddie stared at the creature a moment. Trixie opened her mouth to say a wish, but he shushed her. "You gotta be careful! The wishes always backfire, and they end at sundown!"

Trixie glanced at the sky. "It's already dusk."

"The sundown thing is arbitrary," the Psammead muttered. "Considering the time of day you discovered me, and how you didn't call me a dog...I'm willing to give you an even twenty four hours. Hope you have a good hourglass handy..."

Smirking, Trixie showed Eddie her Mickey Mouse watch.

"You should wish for mad basketball skills," Michelle suggested. "Or a million dollars."

The Psammead rolled his eyes.

Eddie frowned, not wanting to waste his wish on anything like that.

"I'm chafing," the Psammead complained. "Could you hurry this up so I can get back to my burrow?"

Eddie knitted his brow in thought.

"Sometime today?"

Eddie opened his mouth.

"Don't you know how wishing works? You don't say it! Have you never had a birthday?"

"Oh right," the boy stammered, closing his eyes.

When he opened his eyes again, the Psammead had his eyebrow raised. "Really? You wished for that? How absurd! I hope you enjoy it there!"

The creature sneezed, spraying sand and sparkles everywhere. It made Michelle's Captain E-O shirt extra sparkly. "Granted!"

The Psammead turned its back to them, burrowing so deep into the sandbox that they could no longer see it anymore. The hole filled in, leaving no sign that it had ever been there.

Trixie put her hands on the hips of her overalls. "Well that was weird!"

Michelle knelt next to the box. "I could have sworn this thing was only a foot deep." She got up, brushing sand off her bluejeans.

The two girls stood over Eddie, looking puzzled and confused. "Okay, kid. Out with it. What did you wish for?"

The boy shrugged. "I just wished that you two would understand why I like Narnia."

The moment he said this, they all heard a curious groaning from the tree behind them.

A door knob had been nailed through the bark a long time ago. Trixie's mom once explained someone had dome that to supplement the tree's iron like a vitamin.

She'd seen the doorknob before, but never a hinge.

Not only that, but the hinge actually worked, a round door on the side of the tree opening on its own accord.

Both girls shrieked, but Eddie only grinned, stepping closer. "Hey! I think this is part of my wish! A magic door, just like in the Narnia books!"

"I...don't know," Trixie stammered. "That looks more like something from Poltergeist."

Eddie crept up to the door, peering inside.

A stone spiral staircase, illuminated here and there by blazing torches in sconces. It seemed to get brighter as it went down.

"Who lives down there?" Trixie asked. "Grandpa Munster?"

Michelle leaned on the bark. "This isn't making any sense at all. If you go down that far, you run into a gas line and sewer pipes."

"That's because it's magic. I wished for this." Eddie clambered through the doorway, descending the first step.

"Whoa, whoa, wait!" Michelle cried, grabbing the back of his gaudy red, blue and black striped shirt. "And just where do you think you're going?"

"Narnia."

She pulled him back. "Your daddy said nothing about no field trips to Narnia, even if I somehow knew what the heck that is."

Eddie struggled in her grip. "Hey, c'mon! Can't I at least go down the stairs and see what's there? I promise to come back once I take a look!"

Michelle sighed and considered it for a moment. "Oh all right. I guess taking one tiny look won't hurt anything...but I'm coming with."

Trixie naturally tagged along behind her sister.

Down the stairs they stalked, the girls jumping at every flickering shadow.

Without warning, the door snapped shut. All three of them rushed to push it back open, but they only found a seamless rock wall where the tree should have been.

Michelle swore softly under her breath. "I knew we shouldn't have come down here!"

Trixie balled her hands into fists. "Nice wishing, Eddie! Now how are we supposed to get out of this mess?"

Eddie shrugged. "By going down, I suppose."

Michelle and Trixie agreed that, considering the circumstances, there didn't seem to be a better idea.

The staircase wound around and around for what seemed like forever.

"You and your stupid books," Trixie grumbled. "You should have wished for a million dollars, or a visit from the Harlem Globetrotters. If this is Narnia, I'm not at all impressed, it's just some boring stair—"

The staircase ended abruptly at an archway. Beyond lay a grassy field, and although it had been dusk when they entered, the sun now shined brilliantly in a bright blue sky.

"Wow," Michelle gasped. "Now that definitely shouldn't be down here!"

Trixie poked her head through the opening. "Is that a unicorn?"

Indeed, unicorns did graze on that particular field, including a small runt-like one.

Eddie eagerly rushed out to get a better look.

Michelle followed him, her expression becoming perplexed when she noticed several grassy islands floating in the air all around them.

She glanced back. They'd emerged from an odd sort of tower, its upper portion hidden within one of those impossibly floating islands.

Grinning, Trixie crept up to the nearest unicorn, petting it on the head. The magical equine endured it well enough until she pulled a brush out of her pocket and tried to beautify its tail. The unicorn huffed in annoyance, galloping away with its foal.

Another pair of unicorns grazed by a wooden booth a few yards off. When the girls noticed the booth, they paused their pursuit of unicorns to stare at it for a moment.

Rich produce covered the roof and sides of the structure, all kinds of fruits and vegetables. Trixie pulled a bumpy yellow fruit off one of its vines, showing it to Eddie. "What the heck is this thing? Is Narnia some kind of science fiction story?"

The boy rolled his eyes. "That's an etrog. It's like a lemon. They have them in the Middle East."

She kept staring at it, turning it over in her hands. "That is so weird."

Noticing the inviting smells of food, Michelle looked into the hut. "Guys!" she waved her companions to the doorway.

All three of them gaped in astonishment. A big buffet spread had been set out on a table inside. The most perfect burgers and lasagna they'd ever seen. Barbecue, taco salad, breads, pizza, several desserts, including cookies and many pies.

The moment they stopped drooling and made a move to grab a plate, something made a deafening roar that shook them all the way to the bone. Each of them turned with horror to face the source of the sound.

A massive, wooly creature, some impossible combination of a great cat and a ram. Huge curling horns, paired with a ferocious lion-like face with a mouthful of razor sharp teeth.

The thing, larger than a semi truck, came charging at them like a buffalo, blasting them with another terrible, earth shattering roar.

Trixie poked Eddie's shoulder, hissing, "Hey, Narnia boy! Throw me a friggin' bone here: What in the world is that thing?"

Eddie shivered. "I think...It's Aslan."