Fluency Builder
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The Storm Drain · about 136 words
After three straight days of rain, the street in front of Maya's house had turned into a shallow river. Raindrops tapped on the windows while Maya watched from the porch. Where did all that water go? Her father pointed to the edge of the curb, where a metal grate sat beneath the rushing water. "That's a storm drain," he explained. "It carries the rainwater away through big pipes under the ground." The pipes lead to a nearby creek, which carries the water all the way to the river. Maya had walked past the grate a hundred times and never once wondered about it. Now she saw her whole street differently. The gutter, the grate, the hidden pipes — they were all part of a quiet system, working all night long to keep her street from flooding.