Jack and his sister Jill were orphans who lived together in the countryside on the side of a rough, gravely road. Every day, they went around to neighbors (who lived in actual houses) and begged for food and water from them.
One of them, old Miss Ludbitz, was especially kind and always gave them a whole meal’s worth of food. However, Jack and Jill were humble kids, and only went to Miss Ludbitz around once a month, since she didn’t have much to spare, either. Jack and Jill always slept under the weeping willow tree on the eves of Miss Ludbitz days, one of their many sleeping places that they rotated through.
That was all the life that Jack and Jill had ever known.
Today was a Miss Ludbitz day. Eager for more than some breadcrumbs and a rotten fruit for a meal, they skipped over to her house, singing “Jack and Jill went up a hill to fetch a pail of water. Then Jack fell down and broke his crown and Jill came tumbling after.” When Miss Ludbitz heard their merry song, she smiled, as she had taught them that very song from her very own childhood.
“Welcome, Jack and Jill!” Miss Ludbitz quickly ushered them inside for a customary bath for each of them and fed them a bowl of oatmeal each. She quickly cleaned them while chatting about meaningless things, like the weather and the new recipe of oatmeal she’d recently perfected.
“Say, I don’t have any water left. Could you maybe go fetch a pail of water from Mr. Lewis up the hill? I’m sure he’ll be happy to lend some extra water.”
So Jack and Jill started up the hill, a long journey with a winding path, to fetch a pail of water. After getting one of Mr. Lewis’s spare pails of water, they started down the hill…
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