When one sock keeps vanishing from the wash, Anne finds a tiny glowing door inside the washing machine and steps into a strange forest full of sock-shaped wonders.
Anne lived in a small yellow house at the end of Jasmine Street. She loved her striped socks best of all, the ones with red, blue, and yellow bands. But every wash day, one sock always seemed to vanish.
"Not again," her mother would say, lifting out a lonely sock and looking into the washing machine as if it might answer her.
Anne began to wonder where they went.
One morning, before her mother loaded the laundry, Anne tiptoed over to the machine and peered inside the dark round drum. "Hello?" she whispered. "Sock thieves?"
Something soft and tiny gave a little giggle.
Anne blinked. In the back of the drum, where there had only been metal a moment before, a small door was glowing pale gold. It was no bigger than her hand. Tiny silver sparks drifted around it like dust in sunlight.
Anne held her breath. Her mother was humming in the kitchen, buttering toast.
The little door gave a gentle creak.
Anne reached out, touched the warm handle, and stepped through.
The world on the other side was not dark at all. It was a forest, but not like any forest Anne had ever seen. The trees were tall and soft, with leaves shaped like socks fluttering from their branches. Thick, fluffy moss bounced under her feet. Bright cloth flowers nodded beside a path of folded towels. The air smelled clean and sweet, like soap bubbles and warm rain.
Anne turned in a slow circle, wide-eyed.
Then a tiny creature popped out from behind a bush. He wore a hat made from the toe of a grey sock, and his shoes looked like two tiny thimbles. He looked up at Anne and spoke in a very serious whisper.
"At last," he said. "You’ve come. We need help right away. The Sock Forest is in trouble, and the lost left sock with the green peas has disappeared again."
Anne looked down.
On her own foot, one striped sock was missing.
Before she could say a word, the bushes beside the path began to rustle. Something was moving closer, and it was coming straight toward her.